2025–26 Premiership Rugby
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The 2025–26 Premiership Rugby is scheduled to be the 39th season of the top flight of English domestic
rugby union Rugby union football, commonly known simply as rugby union in English-speaking countries and rugby 15/XV in non-English-speaking world, Anglophone Europe, or often just rugby, is a Contact sport#Terminology, close-contact team sport that orig ...
competition. The competition is being broadcast by
TNT Sports TNT Sports is the brand name for sports television channels, broadcast divisions, programming, and other media around the world that are owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). The name originates from the American cable television ...
for the thirteenth consecutive year and the second year of their current broadcast deal. The reigning champions entering the season are
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, who claimed their seventh league title after winning the 2025 final. No team was promoted from the
2024–25 RFU Championship The 2024–25 RFU Championship was the sixteenth season of the RFU Championship, the professional second tier of rugby union in England. It featured twelve English teams. Ealing Trailfinders were the reigning champions, having been refused promo ...
, as the champions,
Ealing Trailfinders Ealing Trailfinders Rugby Club is an English professional rugby union club based in West London. The club's first team are the reigning RFU Championship champions of 2024–25 but were considered ineligible for promotion to Premiership Rugby a ...
, were not able to satisfy the eligibility criteria required to enter the league.


Teams

The competition will feature the same 10 teams from the 2024–25 season as for the fourth consecutive season, the top team in the
Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this sys ...
was ineligible for
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to the Premiership, after 2024–25 Championship winners
Ealing Trailfinders Ealing Trailfinders Rugby Club is an English professional rugby union club based in West London. The club's first team are the reigning RFU Championship champions of 2024–25 but were considered ineligible for promotion to Premiership Rugby a ...
failed to meet the minimum standards criteria to join the competition.


Stadiums and locations

Notes * –
Bristol Bears Bristol Bears (officially Bristol Rugby Club or Bristol Rugby) are a professional rugby union club based in Bristol, England. They play in Premiership Rugby, England's top division of rugby. The club was founded as Bristol Football Club in 18 ...
will also play one home game at
Principality Stadium The Millennium Stadium (), known since 2016 as the Principality Stadium () for sponsorship reasons, is the national stadium of Wales. Located in Cardiff, it has a retractable roof and is the home of the Wales national rugby union team; it has ...
,
Cardiff Cardiff (; ) is the capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of Wales. Cardiff had a population of in and forms a Principal areas of Wales, principal area officially known as the City and County of Ca ...
. * – Harlequins will also play two home games at Allianz Stadium,
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
. * –
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will also play one home game at
Tottenham Hotspur Stadium Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is the home of Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur F.C., Tottenham Hotspur in North London, replacing the club's previous ground, White Hart Lane. With a seating capacity of 62,850, it is the List of football stadium ...
,
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.


Player movements


Table


Round-by-round progression

The grid below shows each team's progression throughout the season, indicating their points total (and league table position) at the end of every round:


Regular season

The regular season fixtures are not yet announced. Notes * All fixtures are subject to change. * Referees appointed to officiate Premiership matches are employed by the
RFU The Rugby Football Union (RFU) is the national governing body for rugby union in England. It was founded in 1871, and was the sport's international governing body prior to the formation of what is now known as World Rugby (WR) in 1886. It prom ...
, unless indicated otherwise.


Results


Promotion/relegation play-off

Subject to meeting the eligibility criteria for
promotion Promotion may refer to: Marketing * Promotion (marketing), one of the four marketing mix elements, comprising any type of marketing communication used to inform or persuade target audiences of the relative merits of a product, service, brand or i ...
, the champions of the 2025–26 Champ Rugby season will play in a two-legged
play-off The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eith ...
against the team which finishes 10th in the Premiership table at the end of the regular season. The winner, based on
aggregate score There are a number of formats used in various levels of competition in sports and games to determine an overall champion. Some of the most common are the ''single elimination'', the ''best-of-'' series, the ''total points series'' more commonly kn ...
, will play in the Premiership for the following season.


Broadcast coverage

The competition is being broadcast by
TNT Sports TNT Sports is the brand name for sports television channels, broadcast divisions, programming, and other media around the world that are owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). The name originates from the American cable television ...
for the thirteenth consecutive year. The 2025–26 season is the second of the new broadcast deal with
Premiership Rugby Premiership Rugby, officially known as Gallagher Premiership Rugby, or the Gallagher Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is an English professional rugby union competition, consisting of 10 clubs, and is the top division of the English rugby ...
, under which all 93 matches will be shown live on
TNT Troponin T (shortened TnT or TropT) is a part of the troponin complex, which are proteins integral to the contraction of skeletal and heart muscles. They are expressed in skeletal and cardiac myocytes. Troponin T binds to tropomyosin and helps ...
and
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. In addition, seven select matches, including the Premiership Final, will be broadcast free-to-air on ITV over the course of the season. This season will be the second to have the one-hour highlights programme, titled ''Gallagher Premiership Unleashed'', which is aired on
ITV4 ITV4 is a British free-to-air television channel which first aired on 1 November 2005. It is owned by ITV plc. The channel focuses primarily on general entertainment programming targeting a male audience, including action series and films, ...
each Wednesday at 7pm, recapping all of the fixtures held over the previous weekend. An abridged, half-hour version of the show is also shown on
ITV1 ITV1 (formerly known as ITV) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the British media company ITV plc. It provides the ITV (TV network), Channel 3 ...
every Wednesday at 11.45pm, while both programmes will remain available to view on demand via
ITVX ITVX is a British Over-the-top media services, over-the-top and ad-supported Streaming television, streaming service operated by ITV plc. The service offers original content from the broadcaster, livestreams of the ITV television channels, Free ...
.


See also

* 2025–26 European Rugby Champions Cup * 2025–26 EPCR Challenge Cup * 2025–26 Premiership Rugby Cup * 2025–26 Champ Rugby * 2025–26 United Rugby Championship * 2025–26 Top 14 season * 2025–26 Rugby Pro D2 season * 2026 Super Rugby Pacific season


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:2025-26 Premiership Rugby Premiership Rugby seasons 2025–26 in European rugby union leagues 2025–26 in English rugby union leagues