The Paris Olympics are, by far, the biggest and most-watched competition in competitive table tennis. In fact, it’s probably the only time you can watch table tennis on live television in most countries.
Watching table tennis on live TV just feels different. Once every four years, the main sports channels of every country show our beloved sport for everyone to see.
This does wonders for the table tennis community, with table tennis’ popularity as a sport reaching highs that couldn’t be achieved in any other circumstance.
Depending on where you live, you’ll need to tune in to different channels to watch matches live or on demand. We’ve tried to cover as many locations as possible in this guide.
Where to watch for:
North America
United States
NBC and Telemundo will broadcast the Olympics from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET daily.
In addition, NBC Sports Digital will stream the Olympics on its TV Everywhere platforms. You can watch them on NBCOlympics.com, NBC.com, the NBC Sports App, the NBC App, and all of the other NBC apps.
You can watch the Olympics on mobile devices, tablets, and connected TVs.
Canada
CBC holds the rights to broadcast the Olympics in Canada.
Viewers from Canada will be able to watch the Olympics on the CBC channel and partner networks TSN and Sportsnet.
In addition, you will be able to watch live events on the free CBC Gem streaming service, CBC’s Paris 2024 website, and the CBC Paris 2024 app.
South America
Argentina
TyC Sports holds the rights to broadcast the Olympics on TV in Argentina.
You’ll be able to watch the event live on the TyC Sports channel and its streaming platform, TyC Sports Play.
In addition, you’ll be able to follow the Olympics through the Claro Sports Olympics channel on YouTube.
Brazil
TV Globo and SporTV will be the channels to broadcast the Paris 2024 Olympics in Brazil. They’ll provide comprehensive coverage every day of the competition.
Europe
France
You’ll be able to watch the Olympics on France 2, France 3, France 4, and France 5 and France Télévisions app.
UK
The BBC holds the rights to broadcast the Olympics in the UK.
There will be live TV coverage across BBC One, BBC Two, and BBC iPlayer, providing access to all 32 events at Paris 2024.
In addition, a nightly highlights programme will recap all the best bits.
Spain
You will be able to follow the Olympics via the RTVE channel and its affiliates. In addition, you’ll also be able to watch the Olympics live on the RTVE Play app.
RTVE will broadcast 400 hours of every sport on La 1, Teledeporte, and La 2.4.
Sweden
Warner Bros. Discovery has the exclusive rights to the live broadcasts from Paris in 2024.
In addition, Sweden’s national public TV broadcaster Sverige Television will feature a programme every evening including the best of the action from the Paris 2024 Olympics.
Denmark
You will be able to watch the Olympics on TV 2’s channels. They may be followed on TV 2’s channels and TV 2 PLAY.
Asia
China
CMG, the state-owned China Media Group, will broadcast the Olympics. This means you’ll be able to follow them on the CCTV channel.
In addition, other rights owners are Migu, Douyin, Kuaishou, and Tencent, so you can expect additional Olympics coverage on their channels and platforms.
Japan
The Japan Consortium owns the rights to the Olympics, so you can expect Olympics coverage on all of their channels, including NHK General TV, Fuji TV, Nippon TV, TBS, TV Asahi, and TV Tokyo.
South Korea
You’ll be able to watch the Olympics on either channel 6, 9, or 11.
Oceania
Australia
The 2024 Olympic Games will be broadcast in Australia on more than 40 free-to-air channels under the Nine Network.
Nine will be providing 24/7 coverage across its main TV channel, 9Gem and 9Now.
Streaming platform 9Now will have more than 40 channels, allowing viewers to watch whatever event they want throughout the games.
Africa
Nigeria
Nigeria, and most African countries, will be able to follow the Olympics through Supersport.
Are WTT Showing Any Matches Live / Playback?
No. WTT is the circuit created by the ITTF for table tennis athletes to compete in.
The Olympics are outside of the scope of the WTT circuit, so we can’t expect any Olympics matches on the WTT channel as they are two completely different things.
YouTube Channels Showing Highlights / Live Matches?
There is the official Olympics channel, which will show highlights and stories from the Olympics, but probably not live matches.
For context, Ma Long beat Fan Zhendong on July 30th at the Tokyo Olympics, and that match was uploaded to the Olympics channel on August 13th.
I believe something like this will happen for these Olympics as well, so we can expect high-quality replays sometime after the matches are played.
In addition, some countries will have live coverage on YouTube, but this content will have restrictions.
Some parts of the world will have exclusive YouTube channels covering Olympics matches and highlights, while others will not.
It goes without saying that table tennis matches from the Olympics uploaded by unaccredited sources will be taken down as fast as possible due to copyright reasons.
Alvaro’s been playing Table Tennis since he was 15 and is now ranked within the top 100 in his native Argentina. He loves to compete in provincial tournaments and is always looking for ways to improve. Alvaro made his favourite memories with a racket in hand, and he joined the RacketInsight team to share his passion with other players!
Blade: Butterfly Fan Zhendong ALC | Forehand: Butterfly Dignics 09c | Backhand: Butterfly Tenergy 19
Playstyle: The Controller
