URC 2026/27 season Kit Ranking
United Rugby Championship: New Season, New Kit.
The United Rugby Championship launched last week, kickstarting the 16 Clubs’ Campaigns to be crowned Champions of the 2026/27 season. The new season means an introduction of a lot of new things, one of those new things being new kits.
Let’s take a look at the W’s and L’s of the new season’s attires:
(I must preface this by saying that, while researching every kit for the urc's 2026/27 season kit ranking, looking for official imagery and reading all the clubs’ official articles on their launches, it was a little confusing understanding the terminology and categorisation of each club’s kit. The Home kits were easy enough called “Home”, but the Away Kits were either called “Away” or “Alternate” which made it even more confusing when a club had an “Home”, “Away” and an “Alternate” kit, which was often just the Euro Kit. What a headspinner.)
The Lions:
Let me just state the following: what a mission it is to find anything on the recent Lions 2026/2027 URC Rugby Kits. Apart from a Sponsor Announcement article on their official website that happens to have the new kit’s imagery to accompany it, a YouTube video covering the kit launch event and a URC colab post, there’s absolutely no imagery of the new kit (if you don’t count the player imagery taken of the matches).
At the time of writing this blog I can’t even seem to find it for sale anywhere.
That being said, the new Home and Away jersey is quite straight forward. Nothing flashy, nothing crazy. It’s just a red jersey, a white jersey with a pattern subtly sublimated.
The thing that saves this jersey from being sub par is the Macron Jersey template. Macron’s Jersey Panels have yet to disappoint with their clean collars and colored stitching/trimming in between panels.
Final Verdict: 5.5/10
Cardiff:
The Welsh Rugby club celebrated their 150th anniversary with the 2 heritage-inspired kits.
The Home kit sports a quarter design of blue and black, a nod to the first iteration worn in the 1880’s. The black and blue squares have been previously worn for anniversary seasons, including 1976 and 2001 as per their official website article covering the new season’s kit launch.
The Away kit (or also called the Alternate kit) has a white base and chevrons on the shoulders inspired by the coat of arms (haha, get it? As in, the sleeves "coat" the arms") of the city and the three rivers respectively.
Along with smaller design elements such as special anniversary logos and collar inscriptions, the Cardiff kit is really smart and clean. The Macron effect is also visible, flaunting their feathers as kit manufacturers.
Final Verdict: 7.5/10
Benetton:
Benetton, better known locally as Leoni, has taken a bold step with their interpretation of their traditional green and white stripes.
Erreà Creative Lab, the developers of the jersey and design, have embodied the team's movement and strength, according to the club’s official article. The choice of brush stroke as a defining element of the stripes have been intentionally utilised to connect the club back to its heritage, rooted in Treviso’s culture where the Bailo Museum could be found with its inspirational artworks.
Despite the absence of an away kit to be rated, the creative interpretation of the traditional lines merit a solid rating for this home kit.
Final Verdict: 7/10
Connacht:
With strong ties to their Irish heritage via the color green, Connacht have majority gone a safe route. The base of their Home kit is dark green and has geometric-inspired bright green shapes in both the sleeve ends and the under arm sections.
Albeit the pattern being visually interesting, the simplicity of the rest of the jersey leaves much to be desired. A little green trim around panels or a subtle sublimated pattern would have taken this jersey design from a low range rating to an actual contender with the top kits.
Final Verdict: 6.7/10
The Stormers:
I’ll be honest, my biases have gotten the best of me when it comes to the Stormers’ kit. The simplicity of the kit’s stripes, the curved all-white collar and the red motifs have got me drooling all over my super-objectively written notes. You can see me get worked up by the hype in this article.
Putting that aside, there is something to be said about the Adidas manufactured jerseys.
The Home jersey is a classic. Can’t go wrong with the Blue and White hoops. Couple that with the Adidas Three Stripes on the shoulders and you’ve got a clean jersey. The red Adidas logo and subtle accents on and inside of the collar add a bit of essence borrowed from the old logo.
Then, the Away Kit. Again, super subtle, super clean but packed with nostalgia. The conversion to all-white logos on the all-black kit is a rocking factor and the red collar motif solidifies the history.
All-in-all the Stormers’ Kits don’t break any crazy boundaries or push any major limits, but the execution of the elements are rich and perfected. Topping it for the next season will be a challenge worth keeping an eye out for.
Final Verdict: (A Subtly Biased) 8/10
The Dragons:
The Men of Gwent (The Dragons) went a heritage inspired route with their kit for the 2026/27 season, implementing subtle patterns inspired by the Fleur-de-lis (a stylized symbol shaped like a lily or iris) borrowed from those present in their club logo. They also have a hooped design present, formed by thin black bands running horizontally across the amber/yellow jersey.
The Dragon’s Away Kit seems like it doesn’t have much of a rationale behind its design other than “it’s a cool black pattern”. It’s worth mentioning that they do have sleek gold accents used for the sleeve ends, the collar and their sponsor logos. If only they could’ve applied the same sponsor logos approach as the Stormers’ Away Kit, uniformly colouring the sponsor logos in the same gold. Would’ve been sleek. But alas, it is what it is. And what it is is not a bad looking kit.
Final Verdict: 7/10
*Added thought: I’ve come to start enjoying the Kit Style and Jersey panel designs of VX3!
Edinburgh:
The Scottish-based club Edinburgh had used the terms “Away” and “Alternate” interchangeably across their platforms, causing some confusion while researching. On their Club’s Home Website they labeled their Second Kit as “Alternate Kit”, but on manufacturers Macron’s Website it's called the “New Away Kit”.
(Writing this I realised that the confusion was caused by me not knowing which teams are both playing in the URC and European Championships)
Anyways, Edinburgh Home Kit’s design is based on their city’s crest (Edinburgh's Coat of Arms). They have a tone-on-tone pattern inspired by the rope wound around the anchor at the center of the crest. This runs horizontally all over the jersey and is present in an orange around the sleeve ends and the collar. It’s also polished on the back with an embroidered “1872” below the neck and an anchor from the Coat of Arms is embossed in navy.
The Edinburgh Away (or Alternate) Kit is a wild one. The diagonal, orange-and-blue-toned pattern is inspired by both one of their landmarks, Victoria Street, as well as the Edinburgh International Festival. It’s something new, something fresh, something different. Have to give some points for boldness.
Final Verdict: 7.5/10
Glasgow Warriors:
The Warriors easily beat the competition when it comes to confusion.
It seems like they have 2 Home Jerseys; one which sports a black base, overlaid with a tartan pattern, accompanied by white stitching and blue tartan-patterned cuffs and side panels. The other is an all black jersey with “electric” blue stitching and patterns on the sleeves inspired by those found on Celtic warriors. This pattern is also on the black base of the jersey.
(Yes, they also have a Euro Kit.)
Their Away Kit is a teal blue in colour with a “Teardrop Rose”- pattern of globally recognised Glasgow designer, painter and architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh present. This is accompanied by white cuffs and a white collar.
Final Verdict: 6.7/10 (minus points for confusion)
Final Verdict: 6.7/10
Hollywoodbets Sharks:
Oh boy, where to start.
It’s difficult to give these jerseys a pass on their questionable designs when it’s preceded by a rebrand that still elicits negativity and rejection by the club’s own fanbase and supporters.
As stated by the club’s own article covering their new jerseys, the looks are “bringing the Club’s unmistakable identity into a new era”. The definition of the “unmistakable identity” is debatable. The article itself is lackluster, but we’re not here to rate articles, we’re here to rate kits, damnit!
The Home Kit is nothing but sub par. A black jersey that fades downward to gray with a color that resembles something of an old TV’s noise and static patterns when there’s “no signal” received”. A little on the nose given the circumstances. A seemingly conventional and fashionable take on a Rugby Jersey that falls excruciatingly flat.
(The more I read the article the more I think it’s written by Ai)
The Away Kit is much more interesting and visually appealing than the Home Kit, with a cream base and horizontal red lines covering the base of the jersey. It also has red panel-like shapes stretching from the collar, over the top of the chest towards the under arms.
The only thing that is bothering is the fact that this does not resemble the Sharks at all. The Away Jersey would be much more suited for an Alternate Kit. A cool looking jersey if you look at it from a lens where the sharks hadn’t committed club sewerslide.
Final Verdict: 6/10 (Away Jersey Saving Grace)
Leinster:
For the next 2 seasons Leinster are flexing a retro inspired Home jersey, celebrating the year 2001, when they lifted their first trophy as a professionally competing rugby club.
The jersey is majority blue, which is the club’s primary identity colour and has white lines in diminishing widths, originating from the thickest line where the main sponsor logo resides. These white lines are followed by and capped off by a golden line which is the same colour as the ending edges of the collar. It’s giving the same energy as the Stormers’ vintage approach.
The Away kit doesn’t have a lot of information covering the design style. It has a gray-blue-ish wavy pattern with somewhat of a grungy texture over it. One can only assume it resembles that of the River Liffey waters, the same river that the Samuel Beckett Bridge spans over, the same bridge found in the Leinster Rugby Logo.
The cuffs and collar are colored in a lime green which feels a bit removed from the Leinster Identity colour palette and is an odd choice of colour to be paired with the gray-blue-ish colour of the waves.
Final Verdict: 7/10
Munster:
Munster have nothing new to offer in the Home Kit department as their jerseys to be worn for the 2026 Season falls within the 2025 to 2027 period allocated for the jersey.
The Away (or “Alternate”, if you will) has a new design. According to the club’s official article, the new away jersey “takes inspiration from flowers found across the province of Munster, brought together in an abstract floral print on a sandy pink base with a henley collar. Each county is represented by a specific flower, with Fuchsia (Cork), Hawthorn (Clare), Bluebells (Kerry), Rhododendron (Tipperary), Meadow Buttercup (Waterford) & Rose (Limerick) all incorporated into the graphic.”
In my humble opinion, I don’t think the execution of the pattern or overlay design is amazing. It looks a smidge low effort and stock image/vector-esque.
It’s a bit of an underwhelming combo for Munster. Hopefully the 2028 season brings some fresher smelling flowers.
Final Verdict: 6/10
the Ospreys:
The Ospreys from Wales have quite the Kit Duo going for them this season. One of the favorites to be quite honest. Their Home Kit’s design features a black base with castle remnants and ruins, building on their foundational heritage such as the Oystermouth Castle and various other stone built historical buildings.
These structures have been captured on the jersey in a gold vectored line drawing. The drawings are present on both the base of the jersey as well as the sleeves. It also has a gold finishing on the collar. The only bleak thing about this design is the step-and-repeat nature of it. It creates an odd negative space in between the structures, and, because it’s the same layout of 2 lines repeating, the negative space becomes obvious. A simple solve would’ve been just to apply a brick-styled offset to each line.
The Away jersey is visually intriguing. The colors are a subtle combination of white and a mint-ish green, giving life to the urban street map design of the Swansea area where the club is based. The rationale behind the mint-ish green (teal, as stated on the official article) is inspired by the oxidised copper of Swansea's industrial heritage and historic copperworks.
This away kit would’ve gone so hard about 2-3 years ago, but unfortunately it’s an old design style that has been done before. The most recent to also do it is the Bulls, but we’ll get to them in a second.
Final Verdict: 7/10
the Scarlets:
The Welsh Rugby Union created team has paid respects to the club’s long and rich history of 150+ years by designing a Home Kit inspired by their 2006 special edition jersey based on the red and chocolate quarters jersey.
The 2026/27 jersey has a subtle two tone aesthetic and is divided into quarters, 2 darker and 2 lighter with a more conventional geometric pattern overlaid onto them. It’s capped off by white and blue cuffs and an all-white collar.
The Away jersey is also a nod to one of the jerseys of the past. The 2001-2003 jerseys to be exact. This design has navy on the shoulders, a thick red line across the abdomen and a white torso. The cuffs also sport this sequence of colours.
It’s simple, it’s clean and it’s nothing flashy. But with this color combo and proportions it doesn’t have to be.
Final Verdict: 7/10
Ulster:
Ulster have gone with a simple jersey and rationale for the home and away kits. When you read their official launch articles on the Home and Away Kits you realise that simplicity was the aim.
The Home Kit has a white base with a suuuuper subtle map design of the nine counties that make up the province. A cool addition is the graticule (graphical depiction of a coordinate system) elements on the map section. This white body is paired with a red collar, apparently because of popular demand from the supporters and fans.
The Away Kit is straight forward. A navy shirt with a red collar and a red rectangle on the front accompanied by a thin red line above and below it. It’s retro, but it falls short of the jersey of the kind such as the Scarlets.
I think the main reason for this would be the kit manufacturer. Castore just hasn't quite nailed it with this kit like VX3 have. It’s almost as if the colors are a bit desaturated and don’t work together on the away kit because of that.
Final Verdict: 6.5/10
the bulls:
The Vodacom Bulls have gone wild with their 2026/2027 Season’s Home and Away Kits. For better and for worse.
"Better" would definitely be the Home Kit. Yes, I know, I didn’t have the best to say about the Ospreys that had the same style and aesthetic of map execution, but the factors that make the Bulls’ hit the mark are 1) the colors that work in their favor being their primary colors and 2) the strategic placement of the map on the jersey and the Bull’s logo position located at their home grounds, Loftus Versfeld. There’s just a smidge more of intention behind the design and layout which elevates it.
Now for the "worse". The Bulls miss the mark is the Away Jersey. “Retro-futuristic” and “flowing organic patterns that express a fluidity of movement” feel like a word-salad to express that they wanted to try something new, which ofcourse I am a fan of, but there’s no actual substance behind the design. Compared to the “All Roads Lead to Loftus” concept, this jersey falls miles short.
The other element that counts against the jersey’s design is the color being in the same range as the home jersey. Both being blue, it kind of defeats the purpose of an away jersey being the opposite of their home jersey so as to not clash when playing against an opponent on their home ground. This was evident in the most recent match when the Bulls face Zebre away.
The meme is stating facts:
The home jersey is a proper representation of intentional design, but the away jersey’s design choice infringes on what could’ve been an epic Home and Away kit combo.
Final Verdict: 7/10
Zebre parma:
The team from Italy launched their new home and away jerseys on September the 17th, showing off their stripes - zebra stripes that is.
Zebre, named after a group of zebras in Italian, showcased a kit pairing inspired by that of a zebra’s stripes, executed via a ton-on-tone design. This is applied to both the home jersey in blue tones and the away jersey in yellow tones.
What is enjoyable about the pairing is the inverse nature of the colours for home and away. The home jersey is majority blue with yellow accents whereas the away jersey is majority yellow with blue accents.
There’s nothing wrong with the jersey’s. They’re safe executions tied to the team’s identity. Does it have room for exploration? I do think so.
Final Verdict: 6.5/10
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