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The Springboks will represent South Africa at the 2023 Rugby World Cup in France, starting on 8 September. Photo: SA Rugby website.

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Springboks ranked among the most popular RWC teams

The Springboks are ranked among the most popular international rugby union sides according to a new study.

06-10-23 10:15
Springboks records
The Springboks will represent South Africa at the 2023 Rugby World Cup in France, starting on 8 September. Photo: SA Rugby website.

When it comes to raw social media numbers the Springboks are among the most popular teams at the Rugby World Cup.

A new study, conducted by New Zealand Online Casino Experts NZCasinoClub, combined social media followings from Instagram, X, Facebook and YouTube to reveal which team is the most popular at this year’s Rugby World Cup. 

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New Zealand’s All Blacks are the most popular team at this year’s Rugby World Cup according to the data.

With more than 8.4 million (8,482,000) followers across all platforms, the All Blacks have nearly double the online following of the second most popular side, England. 

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More than half of their followers also come from Facebook with their official page boasting 4,700,000 followers.

With a combined social media following of more than 4.3million (4,301,000), England are the second most popular team at this year’s Rugby World Cup. 

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The Steve Borthwick coached side are also the most popular team on X (formerly known as Twitter), with 1,100,000 of their followers coming from the platform.  

WHERE DO THE SPRINGBOKS RANK AMONG RUGBY WORLD CUP TEAMS

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The Springboks ranked in third with a combined social media following of 3,336,000. 1.5million of those followers are from Facebook. 

Meanwhile, 2023 host nation, France, ranked fourth with a social media following of 2,852,000. 

Les Bleus also have the third highest number of subscribers to their YouTube channel (135,000), behind only New Zealand and England.  

Six Nations champions Ireland are the fifth most popular team at this year’s Rugby World Cup with a follower total of 2,326,200. More than 850,000 (851,900) of their followers are on X.  

With more than 1.5 million (1,575,800) followers and subscribers across all platforms, Wales ranked sixth. The Red Dragons have 588,000 followers on Facebook making that their strongest support base across social media.  

The wobbly old Wallabies are the seventh most popular team out in France. However, the Aussie Rugby do have the fourth-highest number of subscribers on YouTube (104,000).  

Scotland are the eighth most popular team at this year’s Rugby World Cup (1,208,600). They are the final nation with over 1 million followers and subscribers across all platforms.  

Fiji (899,900) and Argentina (849,600) ranked in ninth and tenth.  

On the other side of the scale, Italy (723,400), Japan (478,100), Georgia (428,520), Samoa (289,700), Uruguay (119,060), Portugal (114,353), Chile (113,431), Romania (110,360), Tonga (101,653) and Namibia (36,097) made up the ten least followed sides at the tournament.  

Nation Instagram followers X followers Facebook followers YouTube subscribers Total 
New Zealand 2,200,000 1,000,000 4,700,000 582,000 8,482,000 
England 1,200,000 1,100,000 1,800,000 201,000 4,301,000 
South Africa 933,000 859,700 1,500,000 43,900 3,336,000 
France 1,000,000 833,200 884,000 135,000 2,852,200 
Ireland 756,000 851,900 656,000 62,300 2,326,200 
Wales 422,000 534,200 588,000 31,600 1,575,800 
Australia 453,000 258,800 743,000 104,000 1,558,800 
Scotland  362,000 430,400 362,000 54,200 1,208,600 
Fiji 272,000 136,900 491,000 899,900 
Argentina 283,000 330,300 215,000 21,300 849,600 
Italy 231,000 166,900 300,000 25,500 723,400 
Japan 132,000 66,900 195,000 84,200 478,100 
Georgia 67,300 39,500 313,000 8,720 428,520 
Samoa 82,100 31,100 175,000 1,500 289,700 
Uruguay 40,000 52,800 22,000 4,260 119,060 
Portugal 60,200 8,153 46,000 114,353 
Chile 50,600 22,200 40,000 631 113,431 
Romania 21,100 13,400 70,000 5,860 110,360 
Tonga 34,800 2,853 64,000 101,653 
Namibia 9,968 2,129 24,000 36,097