England Tour of Australia 2026: ODI Schedule & UK Times

The england tour of australia 2026 odi schedule is three fifty-over matches in six days — Perth on Friday 13 November, Adelaide on Sunday 15 November and Hobart on Wednesday 18 November. Every one of them begins at 03:30 GMT in the United Kingdom. That is the single most important number on this page, and it shapes everything about how a British supporter experiences this series.

Cricket Australia published the fixtures alongside the rest of its 2026-27 international summer, and the England and Wales Cricket Board confirmed them the same day. What follows is the schedule first, then the practical business of watching cricket that starts while most of Britain is asleep, then the venues, the context and the questions people actually type into a search box.

England tour of Australia 2026 ODI schedule in full

Match	Date (Australia)	Ground	City	Local start	UK start (GMT)
1st ODI	Friday 13 November 2026	Optus Stadium	Perth, Western Australia	11:30 AWST	03:30 Friday
2nd ODI	Sunday 15 November 2026	Adelaide Oval	Adelaide, South Australia	14:00 ACDT	03:30 Sunday
3rd ODI	Wednesday 18 November 2026	Ninja Stadium (Bellerive Oval)	Hobart, Tasmania	14:30 AEDT	03:30 Wednesday

Three grounds, three states, three different local kick-off times — and yet an identical UK start. That is not a coincidence. Perth sits on Australian Western Standard Time, eight hours ahead of GMT and with no daylight saving. Adelaide runs on Central Daylight Time, ten and a half hours ahead in November. Hobart is on Eastern Daylight Time, eleven hours ahead. The staggered local starts of 11:30, 14:00 and 14:30 are the arithmetic that lands all three matches on the same British clock slot.

The one-day leg is the opening act. Five Twenty20 internationals follow between 21 November and 2 December, and those are covered separately in our T20 leg fixtures rundown. In total it is eight white-ball internationals in twenty days, an unusually compressed block by modern standards.

Why every match starts at 03:30 GMT — and what to do about it

Half past three in the morning is a brutal hour. Britain will be on Greenwich Mean Time throughout — the clocks go back on Sunday 25 October 2026, well before the tour begins, so there is no mid-series shift to catch anyone out. A fifty-over match runs roughly eight hours with the innings break, meaning a 03:30 start finishes somewhere around 11:30 GMT.

That has an odd consequence that works in the British viewer's favour. Unlike the Ashes Tests in Australia, where play stops at breakfast time and the day's cricket is over before most people have opened a laptop, these ODIs are still going deep into the British morning. The second innings of each match falls between roughly 07:30 and 11:30 GMT. If you cannot face the alarm, you can wake at seven, know the first-innings total and watch a run chase in full over breakfast and into the mid-morning.

Three sensible approaches, depending on how committed you are:

• The full sitting. Alarm at 03:15, coffee, both innings, done by lunch. Realistic for the Sunday Adelaide match and very hard for the Wednesday in Hobart.
• The chase only. Sleep normally, join at around 07:30 for the second innings. You get the half of the game that usually decides it.
• The Friday special. The Perth opener is a Friday. Anyone able to work from home, take a half-day or simply function on five hours' sleep gets the whole of the tour's first match.

Two of the three fall on weekdays, which will decide it for most people. Sunday 15 November in Adelaide is the one to circle if you only intend to do this properly once.

Where to watch and listen in the UK

Television rights for the 2026-27 Australian summer had not been announced at the time of writing, and it is worth being blunt about that rather than guessing. What can be said is the recent pattern. TNT Sports held exclusive United Kingdom rights to every international fixture staged in Australia between August 2025 and March 2026, which covered the last Ashes tour, and those matches streamed on discovery+ alongside the linear channels. Whether that arrangement extends into the 2026-27 summer should be confirmed with Cricket Australia or the broadcaster nearer the time.

Radio is on firmer ground. The BBC renewed its audio agreement with Cricket Australia to carry Test Match Special commentary on England's away tours through to the 2026-27 season. On past form that means ball-by-ball coverage on BBC Radio 5 Sports Extra and BBC Sounds, free at the point of use, which for an overnight fixture is arguably the better companion anyway — a radio does not demand that you look at it.

The BBC Sport website and app have historically carried live text commentary and in-play clips of England's overseas matches, and the ECB's own channels post highlights after the event. If you want the fuller picture of how the British broadcasting landscape divides up, our UK cricket viewing guide explains which rights sit where and why so little cricket is on free-to-air television.

One practical warning about spoilers. With a UK finish around 11:30 GMT, a result lands in the middle of the British working day. Push notifications, social feeds and news apps will all know before you do. Mute them the night before if you intend to watch a recording.

Optus Stadium, Perth — the tour opener

Perth is where England's cricketers keep beginning things. Optus Stadium, in the Burswood peninsula bend of the Swan River, opened in 2018 and holds a little over 60,000, making it comfortably the largest stadium in Western Australia. It replaced the WACA as the city's international venue, and with it went a good deal of the WACA's fearsome reputation — the drop-in pitches at Optus have generally been quicker and truer than the old ground's cracked terror, but far more even-handed.

An 11:30 local start is early for Perth and is clearly designed for the eastern-seaboard television audience rather than the local crowd. It also means the entire match is played in daylight and heat; mid-November in Perth regularly reaches the low thirties. The venue is reached on the Armadale and Thornlie lines to Perth Stadium station, or across the Matagarup Bridge on foot from East Perth.

Our fuller Perth ODI match guide goes into the ground, the likely conditions and the travel detail for anyone actually flying out.

Adelaide Oval and Hobart — the middle and the finish

Adelaide Oval is the prettiest ground on this leg and one of the few in world cricket that has modernised without vandalising itself. The heritage-listed scoreboard and the Moreton Bay fig trees on the eastern hill survived a redevelopment that lifted capacity above 50,000. St Peter's Cathedral sits behind the northern end. A 14:00 local start makes this a day-nighter under the lights, with the second innings played in the cool of an Adelaide evening — historically a slightly easier proposition for batting than the afternoon glare.

The ground is a ten-minute walk from Adelaide's city centre across the River Torrens footbridge, which makes it the most straightforward of the three to attend without a car.

Ninja Stadium at Bellerive, across the Derwent from central Hobart, is the smallest venue England will visit on the whole tour at around 20,000 capacity, and the coolest. Tasmania in November is not the Australia of the postcards — a windy fifteen degrees is entirely plausible, and the ground has produced some genuinely seam-friendly one-day cricket as a result. A 14:30 start pushes the finish well into the evening, and Hobart evenings get cold. Bellerive is reached by ferry across the river from Brooke Street Pier or by bus over the Tasman Bridge.

For readers used to English grounds, the scale comparison is stark: Optus Stadium alone holds roughly twice what Lord's does. Our English grounds guide sets out the home equivalents.

What this series is actually for

Bilateral one-day cricket needs a reason, and this one has a clear enough one. The next fifty-over World Cup is scheduled for 2027, hosted in southern Africa, and November 2026 puts England roughly a year out. Series like this are where a squad is assembled rather than where trophies are won.

England's recent one-day history has been turbulent. The 2019 triumph on home soil — the subject of our 2019 World Cup page — was followed by a dismal title defence in 2023 and a period of rebuilding under new leadership. Harry Brook has taken on the white-ball captaincy and this tour is a substantial chunk of his preparation runway. Expect selection to be exploratory rather than settled: a look at players who have had strong domestic fifty-over summers, and at least one name that surprises.

The One-Day Cup is the domestic feeder competition that tends to supply those names, and its August scheduling means recent form will be fresh in selectors' minds when the squad is confirmed. The ECB usually names touring squads several weeks out; anything circulating before then is speculation and should be treated as such.

Australia, meanwhile, arrive at this series off the back of a 4-1 Ashes win in the 2025-26 summer and will be building towards the same World Cup cycle. The two sides have been trading one-day series for half a century, and the rivalry's Test-match dimension is covered on our Ashes hub.

Tickets and travelling out

Tickets for Australian internationals are sold through Cricket Australia's official channels and the individual venue operators, with members of the state associations getting first access before a general public sale. Prices had not been published when this page was written and should be checked directly with Cricket Australia rather than taken from any secondary source.

The realistic advice for a British supporter is that a dedicated trip for three ODIs is a big ask — Perth to Adelaide to Hobart is a lot of flying for six days of cricket. The more common pattern is to combine the one-day leg with the Twenty20 matches that follow, which keeps you on the eastern seaboard for the second half. If you are only going for one game, the Adelaide Sunday is the easiest to build a weekend around.

FAQ

What time do the England v Australia ODIs start in the UK?

All three one-day internationals start at 03:30 GMT. The Perth match begins at 11:30 local time, Adelaide at 14:00 and Hobart at 14:30, but the differing Australian time zones mean they converge on the same British start. Each should finish around 11:30 GMT.

How many ODIs are England playing in Australia in 2026?

Three, on 13, 15 and 18 November 2026. They are followed by five Twenty20 internationals running to 2 December, making eight white-ball matches on the tour in total.

Which channel is showing England's tour of Australia in the UK?

The broadcaster for the 2026-27 Australian summer had not been confirmed at the time of writing. TNT Sports held the equivalent rights for the 2025-26 season, and BBC Test Match Special has an audio agreement with Cricket Australia covering England away tours through 2026-27. Confirm the television arrangements with Cricket Australia or the ECB closer to the tour.

Are England playing any Tests in Australia in 2026?

No. This is a white-ball tour only — three ODIs and five T20 internationals. The most recent Ashes series in Australia concluded in January 2026, and the next one is not due in this window. England's red-ball calendar is covered on our England cricket hub.

Do the clocks change during the tour?

Not in Britain. The United Kingdom moves to GMT on Sunday 25 October 2026, three weeks before the first ODI, and stays there for the duration. Australia's eastern and southern states are already on daylight saving by November, which is why the time gap is as wide as it is.

Where can I follow the scores if I'm asleep?

Live text commentary on the BBC Sport app, radio coverage via BBC Sounds, and the ECB's own social channels all update through the British night. Because the matches run until late morning UK time, you can pick the game up mid-chase without having missed the whole thing.

The england tour of australia 2026 odi schedule is, on balance, one of the friendlier overseas assignments a British follower gets — the cricket is inconvenient at the start and perfectly watchable by the end. For the second half of the trip, see our Melbourne T20 guide, and for the domestic summer that precedes it, our England home fixtures page.