Watch Rugby Online

The easiest way to watch Rugby online in HD in South Africa without DSTV is to sign up for Stan Sports. This is an Australian paid streaming service but they stream South African club rugby, Currie Cup as well as international rugby tests and other international club rugby.

If you just want to watch World Cup Rugby online then you can watch those games for free on ITV 1. It’s only available in the UK so you will need to set Smart DNS up first to get around that. You will need to register a free ITV account with your email address and any UK postal code. You can use E16AN.

Stan will also stream the Rugby World Cup games as well as the Super Rugby and Six Nations matches but not the URC matches unfortunately. It costs around $25 (Aussie) per month which is about R250 per month. They offer a 30 day free trial.

You can share your Stan account with 4 other people so they can also stream the rugby simultaneously. If you share the subscription cost then it works out to around R65 per person per month.

Other options are ITV or ESPN+. ITV is free and they stream some live rugby like the Six nations and a few others.

ESPN+ is also worth checking out as they sometimes stream certain rugby matches. ESPN+ only costs $4.99 a month and all the Super Rugby matches, Guinness PRO14 and rugby tests are available to stream in HD plus a lot more sport.

All these services are blocked if you try to access them from South Africa so we need to get around that first.

Here are the 3 simple steps you’ll need to follow:

Smart DNS Proxy

So because these websites are not available in South Africa we’ll need to make it look like we’re accessing their website from their respective countries.

The setup process is pretty straightforward and we’ve covered it in detail here.

Once you’ve got your Smart DNS working you’ll be able to stream rugby online from international sites.

Watch Rugby Online – Including World Cup Rugby

Head over to Stan and sign up. You need to sign up for their regular streaming service first ($14 for the HD option) and then add the Sport add-on which is around $10 per month. Paying with an SA credit card or Paypal works fine.

Once you’ve got your Smart DNS service working go to the “Regions” link you’ll see in you SmartDNS My Account page. Scroll down to the different Channel Groups.

Make sure that Channel Group A and D are both set to “Australia”.

Now you’re good to go. Go to the Stan website and go to Sports – Rugby. Enjoy.

You can watch on 4 different screens so you could share the cost of the account with up to 4 different people which works out around R65 each per month to stream rugby in HD. Bargain.

Stream Rugby Online Free – ITV

To watch rugby online for free we’ll need to sign up on the ITV website. The site streams sport and other content in the UK for free.

You just need to enter a name, date of birth, postcode, email and choose a password. The only tricky part is the postcode. Just enter any UK postcode and you’ll be fine. As an example, you could use the postcode of Manchester which is M24WU.

Once you’ve signed up you can log in and then go to the ITV streaming page which will then default to ITV Channel 1. Most of the Rugby games are streamed on this channel are on ITV Channel 4.

If you want to stream Rugby in South Africa for free then these free HD streams are the easiest way to do it. Just bear in mind that the times they show in their guide are UK times and are currently an hour behind SA time.

If you don’t mind having rugby commentary in Welsh then check out the SC4 channel on BBC iPlayer. They often stream rugby free on that channel.

Another site that allows you to stream rugby free online is the Irish channel TG4. The commentary is in Gaelic but it’s free rugby.

Watch Rugby On ESPN+

ESPN+ streams loads of different rugby competitions including the Guinness Pro14 and plenty more. Unlike ITV it’s a paid service but at $4.99 a month it’s not likely to break the bank.

We’ve put together a guide on how to sign up to ESPN+ with some more details if you need a little more help.

During commercial breaks you won’t see the ads but rather just get a “Commercial Break In Progress” message.

Rugby Tournaments Streamed On Stan

Here’s a list of some of the rugby tournaments you can stream live in South Africa if you sign up for Stan:

  • Rugby World Cup
  • Six Nations Rugby
  • Super Rugby
  • Currie Cup
  • Guiness PRO14
  • Rugby Challenge Cup
  • Rugby Champions Cup
  • The Rugby Championship

The really cool thing about using Stan is that all the rugby matches stream in HD if your internet connection is up to the task.

ESPN+ doesn’t stream as much rugby as Stan but there’s loads of other sport you can stream on ESPN+ besides rugby.

At $4.99 a month it’s about 10 times cheaper than DSTV too. The setup with Smart DNS is pretty simple and only needs to be done once. This is easily the best way to stream HD rugby online in South Africa without DSTV.