Rugby League Pacific Championship

The Rugby League Pacific Championship is a rugby league tournament for national teams in Oceania. Its inaugural tournament was in 2019. Of the seven Oceanian teams, six compete across two divisions of three teams, while a rotating seventh goes on tour.

History
The tournament was created in 2019 as the Oceania Cup with a two tiered format. The top tier (cup) consisted of Australia, New Zealand and Tonga and the second tier (shield) consisted of Fiji, Samoa and Papua New Guinea.

Australia won the Cup in the inaugural season while Fiji won the shield and got promoted for the 2020 competition.

For the 2020 edition, Cook Islands were scheduled to take Fiji's place in the shield. No team was relegated from the cup as Australia were going to go on a tour of England that year. The competition was scheduled to begin in June and conclude in November, but was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2023, International Rugby League announced the return of the tournament under the name Pacific Championships as part of a new seven years international calendar.

Format
The Pacific Rugby League Championship is a competition for the seven full member of International Rugby League located in Oceania:



The tournament currently is divided into two divisions of three teams based on IRL rankings, while the seventh team tours a European Rugby League nation.

Each team plays three matches in a single round robin with the top two advancing to the division final.