Stormers most-watched as over 34 million rugby fans tune in for debut URC season

Over 34 million fans watched the inaugural United Rugby Championship season, with the league setting a number of major broadcast records in its first campaign. 

Organisers announced on Wednesday that records were set for the season-long audience, playoff viewers and the URC grand final itself. 

The Stormers, who beat the Bulls 19-13 in the final in Cape Town, were the most-viewed team in the league with their total audience coming in at over 7.2 million. They are followed by the Bulls, Munster, Sharks and Leinster for audiences across the entire season.

In its first season, the 16-team event was supported by free-to-air (FTA) broadcasters in the UK, Ireland and Italy - BBC Wales, BBC Northern Ireland, Mediaset, RTÉ, S4C and TG4 - and by leading Pay TV companies SuperSport (South Africa) and Premier Sports (UK and Ireland).

URC CEO Martin Anayi said they were "blown away" by the broadcast audience in the debut season.

"It is a tremendous credit to the standard of rugby displayed by our teams and players and the superb work done by our broadcasters to showcase that talent.

"The URC offers a diversity in playing styles and cultures across two hemispheres that is unique in club rugby and we can see that fans in the north and south have been attracted to that. With a mix of Free to Air and Pay TV coverage allied to our increased presence in South Africa and record figures in Italy we have found a very effective formula to grow interest in our league and the sport of rugby union."

Regular Season

According to Nielsen Sports, the URC audience for the entire 2021/22 season reached a high mark of 34.6 million across 7 000-plus hours of coverage.

That figure of 34.6m was an increase of 169% compared to the 2020/21 PRO14 and Rainbow Cup