Sky Sports is closing in on a deal to broadcast the first-ever women's British & Irish Lions tour of New Zealand, a move that would hand the women's game a significant commercial and visibility boost. The broadcaster, which has held live rights to men's Lions fixtures since the 1997 tour of South Africa, is understood to be in advanced discussions about adding the women's series to its portfolio.
The inaugural women's Lions will play five fixtures in New Zealand next September: three Tests against the Black Ferns and two tour matches. Sky is expected to broadcast all five. The agreement would represent one of the most prominent broadcast commitments yet made to the women's rugby union code, placing the tour alongside established men's international fixtures in the same subscription package.
For the Lions organisation, the deal would extend a relationship with Sky that stretches back nearly three decades. The broadcaster's long association with the men's team has made it the de facto home of Lions rugby in the UK and Ireland, and adding the women's tour would allow it to present the two programmes as a single, continuous property. That continuity matters commercially: it gives sponsors and advertisers a familiar environment in which to invest, and it gives viewers a clear destination for the fixtures.
The women's Lions tour has been positioned as a landmark moment for the sport since its announcement. A five-match schedule in New Zealand, including three Tests against the world champion Black Ferns, offers the touring side a demanding and high-profile introduction to international competition. New Zealand is also a market where women's rugby already commands significant public attention, which strengthens the case for live coverage rather than highlights or delayed rights.
Broadcast exposure of this kind is widely regarded as one of the main levers for growing women's team sports. Free-to-air coverage can reach the largest audiences, but pay-TV deals of the scale associated with the Lions bring production budgets, promotional weight and scheduling consistency that smaller packages often lack. Sky's existing infrastructure around Lions tours — studio coverage, commentary teams and cross-promotion across its sports channels — would be available to the women's series from the outset.
The timing of the talks is notable. The tour is scheduled for September 2027, giving the broadcaster and the Lions roughly a year to finalise terms and begin marketing the fixtures. An early agreement would allow ticket sales, sponsorship activations and editorial coverage to be built around a confirmed television destination, rather than leaving the tour's reach dependent on a late deal.
Women's rugby union has been attracting rising attendances and viewing figures in several markets, and the Lions brand carries unusual weight because of its rarity. Tours take place only every four years, which concentrates interest and makes each series a standalone event. Extending that scarcity to a women's team for the first time creates a new property with no direct historical comparison, and one that Sky would hold exclusively if the discussions conclude as expected.
Neither Sky nor the Lions have confirmed the terms of any agreement, and the discussions are described as advanced rather than complete. If concluded, the deal would mean that all five fixtures — the three Tests against the Black Ferns and the two warm-up tour matches — are shown live on Sky Sports. For the players, that would mean performing in front of a UK and Irish television audience from the first match of the tour, rather than building recognition match by match.
The commercial logic runs in both directions. For Sky, the women's Lions add a distinctive, quadrennial event to a rugby portfolio that already includes the men's tours, helping to retain subscribers during a period of the sporting calendar with fewer marquee fixtures. For the Lions, a pay-TV partner with a long track record in the men's game offers continuity of production standards and a ready-made audience of rugby supporters who already associate the brand with the broadcaster.
The first women's British & Irish Lions tour is therefore set to arrive with a television platform already in place, rather than having to build one. If the deal is completed, the 2027 series in New Zealand will be judged not only on results against the Black Ferns but on whether the broadcast reach converts into lasting growth for the women's game.