With fixtures played across the northern and southern hemisphere with the finals taking place at the Allianz Stadium, Twickenham from 27 to 29 November.<\/p>\n
Co-Chair of the Nations Championship, Ronan Dunne, said: \u201cThe Nations Championship, and its introduction into the international rugby calendar, is a transformational moment for the entire sport, and demonstrates the power of collaboration.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe tournament will bring together the very best from across the game, elevating rugby on a global scale, but its power to alter the sport\u2019s trajectory and usher in a new era of sustained growth stands to be a hallmark of the Nations Championship.\u201d<\/p>\n
Japan and Fiji are included despite not being a part of the Six Nations or Rugby Championship.<\/p>\n
Brendan Morris, CEO of SANZAAR, said: \u201cWe warmly welcome our Pacific neighbours Japan and Fiji into the tournament, as part of our \u2018team\u2019. The participating teams are excited, the broadcasters are excited, and the fans are excited, and we very much look forward to July 2026 when it all kicks-off.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Six Nations CEO Tom Harrison added: \u201cRugby\u2019s strongest nations have collaborated with a clear vision to grow the game, by challenging traditional ways of operating to create a tournament structure with genuine global relevance, which will unlock the true value of the sport.\u201d<\/p>\n
Below is everything you need to know about the competition.<\/p>\n
Related: Nations Championship confirmed<\/a><\/p>\n Nations Championship 2026: Overview<\/p>\n \u2013 Dates:\u00a0Saturday 4 July \u2013 Sunday 29 November, 2026<\/p>\n \u2013 Participating teams:\u00a0Argentina, Australia, England, Fiji, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Scotland, South Africa, Wales<\/p>\n Siya Kolisi of South Africa celebrates after winning The Rugby Championship match between New Zealand All Blacks and South Africa (Getty Images)<\/p>\n Nations Championship 2026: Format<\/p>\n The competition will happen once every two years and involve 12 teams. Six are northern hemisphere teams and six are southern hemisphere. There will be three rounds of fixtures played in the southern hemisphere in the summer and three played in the northern hemisphere in the autumn.<\/p>\n The games will then culminate in a finals weekend, reportedly all taking place at Twickenham in November.<\/p>\n The Nations Championship will not affect the Six Nations or the Rugby Championship. The new competition has been launched as a joint venture by the organisers of both of the other tournaments.<\/p>\n Nations Championship 2026: Fixtures<\/p>\n The venues and kick-off times are TBC<\/p>\n Round 1: Saturday 4 July 2026<\/p>\n New Zealand vs France Round 2: Saturday 11 July 2026<\/p>\n New Zealand vs Italy Read more: Rugby Championship fixtures<\/a><\/p>\n Round 3: Saturday 18 July 2026<\/p>\n Japan vs France Round 4: 6-8 November 2026<\/p>\n Ireland vs Argentina Round 5: 13-15 November 2026<\/p>\n France vs South Africa Round 6: Saturday 21 November 2026<\/p>\n England vs New Zealand Finals weekend: 27-29 November 2026<\/p>\n Fixtures TBC \u2013 to be played at the Allianz Stadium, Twickenham<\/p>\n Nations Championship 2026: Squads<\/p>\n The squads for all 12 teams will be updated when they are announced in 2026.<\/p>\n Download the digital edition<\/a>\u00a0of Rugby World straight to your tablet or\u00a0subscribe to the print edition<\/a>\u00a0to get\u00a0the magazine delivered to your door.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Everything you need to know about the new Nations Championships including fixtures, format and more The Nations Championship…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294666,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-294665","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294665\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Nations](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-2235170303-630x420.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\nAustralia vs Ireland
\nJapan vs Italy
\nFiji vs Wales
\nSouth Africa vs England
\nArgentina vs Scotland<\/p>\n
\nAustralia vs France
\nJapan vs Ireland
\nFiji vs England
\nSouth Africa vs Scotland
\nArgentina vs Wales<\/p>\n
\nNew Zealand vs Ireland
\nAustralia vs Italy
\nFiji vs Scotland
\nSouth Africa vs Wales
\nArgentina vs England<\/p>\n
\nItaly vs South Africa
\nScotland vs New Zealand
\nWales vs Japan
\nFrance vs Fiji
\nEngland vs Australia<\/p>\n
\nItaly vs Argentina
\nWales vs New Zealand
\nEngland vs Japan
\nIreland vs Fiji
\nScotland vs Australia<\/p>\n
\nScotland vs Japan
\nIreland vs South Africa
\nItaly vs Fiji
\nFrance vs Argentina
\nWales vs Australia<\/p>\n