Newbie Quickstart Guide

If you're totally new to sumo and want to know where to start, here are the basics to get you up and running. There many other options than the ones I listed below, but these are the most convenient, best quality and newbie friendly options to easily get you going.
Updated 22nd Jan 2026

OK, so how can I watch sumo?

To watch live:
Less-Than Legit:
There's a lot of options to watch live now; most people watch a re-streamer on Twitch/Kick/Youtube because it's low effort and free. An incomplete list is:
- https://www.twitch.tv/midnightsumo - The biggest Sumo streamer. Chat is a little "lively" and he adds his own commentary to be "transformative". Abema Footage.
-  https://kick.com/s0desune  -  Formerly Mbovo.  The only guy still using NHK footage for streaming, and the English commentary too.
- https://www.twitch.tv/leodickinsonsumo - Leo adds commentary and an overlay to his streams like Midnight. Abema.
- https://kick.com/avoidingthehenka - Originally on Twitch but has moved to Kick; no overlays or added commentary for a more pure experience. Abema.
- https://kick.com/karla-japan - Karla has been restreaming sumo for years, she ended up moving to Kick due to copyright issues also. No overlays or commentary but the stream often has issues. Abema
- https://www.twitch.tv/sanyaku_brothers/ - Another stream with no overlay. Abema.

Legit:
- https://abema.tv -You can of course just watch Abema live yourself on their website. Sumo however requires a Japanese VPN to watch outside of Japan, so if you have one and it works you can watch it direct from the source yourself.
- The "official" method for watching live is via NHK World Premium (note this different to the normal "NHK World Japan" which is a free channel, premium obviously means paid);
In North America this is done via https://www.jme.tv
Pretty much everywhere else this is via https://www.toober.com
As mentioned these cost money but you will get live sumo every day.

To watch highlights:
Less-Than Legit:
NHK's insane rampage has made uploading highlights very difficult. Some say Natto still exists, somewhere... but I'm afraid I can't help here.
- https://www.youtube.com/@knitamaya - Who could this be? The videos don't stay up for long to avoid copyright issues.

Legit:
- https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/sumo/ - At this specific link, the NHK Grand Sumo Preview in English is uploaded 8 hours after the final match, which is the same day for most people in the west. This is honestly the best and easiest way now to watch highlights with no hassle. Please note this link is NOT the typical NHK Grand Sumo site link, which is still delayed by a day.
- https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/tv/sumo/ - This is the old link; same video as above but the site is a day behind in updates. Use the above link.
- https://www.youtube.com/@NHKWORLDJAPAN/ - Same again, NHK highlights (amongst other things on the NHK World channel) but delayed by a day.
- https://www.nhk.jp/p/ts/Z8WRRJ9K96/blog/bl/p781bLebx4/ - This NHK.jp link has all matches for both makuuchi and juryo (they're divided into two halves), it's in Japanese but it's simple enough to navigate, or just have the page translated.
- https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/live/ - The NHK World TV channel shows the highlights at various times each day, check for your timezone.
- https://www.youtube.com/@sumo-video - The Kyokai's official Youtube channel uploads highlights, but not every match unfortunately. Still, it's convenient.
- https://sumo.dwango.jp/en/ - The Grand Sumo mobile app has videos of all matches, but the app itself is not available in all regions. Search your relevant app store or here:

• I don't understand anything! How can I learn more about sumo? 

NHK World's Grand Sumo Highlights website (https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/tv/sumo/) has a lot of great resources for beginners. The links at the top have a lot of info: the "Sumopedia" series of videos is great at explaining some of the concepts, rules and history of sumo. The "Techniques" page has videos on every single winning technique, or "kimarite" in sumo; you don't have to watch them all but it's great at breaking down the many ways to win. There's also the "Basics" and "Q&A" pages to fill in any gaps in your knowledge. It even has an official highlights show of all the top division matches, but the link here is delayed; use the first link in the "Legit" highlights section above.

• OK, I understand the basics now, where can I get more involved?

This very website has a ton of different sumo resources to learn more and get your sumo fix. I recommend joining some Discord servers for chatting; Grand Sumo Discord (https://discord.gg/Wg4DsMt) is the biggest sumo Discord server and a jumping off point for others.
If you like forums, Sumo Forum (http://www.sumoforum.net/forums) has been running for decades and is full of extremely knowledgeable people.
I would also highly recommend Sumo Reference, commonly known as SumoDB (http://sumodb.sumogames.de/), a statistics website with results going back 300 years! It's a little unreliable and old-looking, but if you like your stats there's literally nowhere better; it's even better than the official website!
If you want to take things further, there are plenty of sumo podcasts to listen to, Youtube channels to watch, news sites to read... you can find all of these on the relevant pages of this very website, navigation at the top!