The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping in Australia: release date and where to watch every Hunger Games movie

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The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping opens in Australian cinemas on Thursday 19 November 2026, a day before the US. It is a cinema release only for now: no streaming or digital date has been announced. You can stream all five earlier Hunger Games films on Stan, the four Katniss films are also free with ads on SBS On Demand, and The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is on Netflix and Stan.

When is Sunrise on the Reaping released in Australia?

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping is in Australian cinemas from Thursday 19 November 2026, through Roadshow Films. The US release is Friday 20 November, so Australia gets it first. Lionsgate filmed parts of it for IMAX, and IMAX sessions run in Australia from opening day.

• Director: Francis Lawrence, who directed every Hunger Games film since Catching Fire.
• Screenplay: Billy Ray, from Suzanne Collins' novel Sunrise on the Reaping (published March 2025).
• Running time: 158 minutes, per Wikipedia's listing. Check your session times at the cinema, since ads and trailers add to that.
• Rating: at the time of writing no Australian classification had been published. The five earlier films were all rated M.

What is Sunrise on the Reaping about?

It is set 24 years before Katniss volunteers, at the 50th Hunger Games. For that Quarter Quell, every district must send twice as many tributes, so 48 children go into the arena. One of them is 16-year-old Haymitch Abernathy from District 12, the hard-drinking mentor Woody Harrelson played in the original films.

Cast

Actor	Character
Joseph Zada	Haymitch Abernathy
Whitney Peak	Lenore Dove Baird
Mckenna Grace	Maysilee Donner
Jesse Plemons	Plutarch Heavensbee
Ralph Fiennes	President Coriolanus Snow
Elle Fanning	Effie Trinket
Kieran Culkin	Caesar Flickerman
Maya Hawke	Wiress
Kelvin Harrison Jr.	Beetee Latier
Lili Taylor	Mags Flanagan
Ben Wang	Wyatt Callow
Glenn Close	Drusilla Sickle
Billy Porter	Magno Stift

Joseph Zada, who plays Haymitch, is Australian.

When will Sunrise on the Reaping be on streaming?

Not announced. Neither Lionsgate nor Roadshow has given a digital (rent or buy) or a streaming date for Australia, and nobody has said which subscription service will get it first. Big films usually come to rent or buy on Apple TV, Prime Video and Fetch some weeks after cinemas, and to a subscription service months later, but no date is confirmed. The film's page on CompareTV has a Tell me when it streams button: we email you once, the day it lands on a service in Australia.

Where to watch every Hunger Games movie in Australia

Availability from our daily JustWatch feed for Australia, checked on 15 November 2026. Rental prices are for standard definition where both are offered.

Film	Year	Streaming (included in the subscription)	Free	Rent or buy
The Hunger Games	2012	Stan, Disney+, Paramount+, Prime Video	SBS On Demand (with ads)	Rent $4.99, buy $9.99 (Apple TV)
Catching Fire	2013	Stan, Disney+, Paramount+, Prime Video	SBS On Demand	Rent $3.99 (Fetch), buy $9.99
Mockingjay - Part 1	2014	Stan, Disney+, Paramount+, Prime Video	SBS On Demand	Rent $3.99 (Fetch), buy $9.99
Mockingjay - Part 2	2015	Stan, Disney+, Paramount+, Prime Video	SBS On Demand	Rent $3.99 (Fetch), buy $9.99
The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes	2023	Netflix, Stan	No	Rent $4.99, buy $14.99 (Apple TV)
Sunrise on the Reaping	2026	Not yet	No	In cinemas from 19 November

Stan is the only service with all five. SBS On Demand is free (you sign in with a free SBS account) but has only the four Katniss films, and free services licence films for a set time, so watch them there while they last.

The cheapest way to catch up before the new film

• Free: the four Katniss films on SBS On Demand, with ads. Add The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes with a rental ($4.99) and you have seen all five for under $5.
• Stan Basic with ads, $9.99 a month: all five films, no lock-in. Standard is $17.99 and Premium $23.99.
• Paramount+ Basic with ads, $7.99 a month: the cheapest plan here, but it has only the four Katniss films.
• Netflix Standard with ads, $9.99 a month: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes only.

Prices are monthly, in Australian dollars, with no lock-in contract, as checked by CompareTV.

The Hunger Games movies in order

There are two orders. If you are new to Panem, watch in release order: the prequels assume you know the original story. If you have seen them all and want the timeline, this is the order of events:

1. The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes (2023): the 10th Hunger Games, 64 years before Katniss. A young Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth) mentors District 12 tribute Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler).
2. Sunrise on the Reaping (2026): the 50th Games, the second Quarter Quell, won by Haymitch Abernathy.
3. The Hunger Games (2012): the 74th Games. Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) volunteers for her sister.
4. Catching Fire (2013): the 75th Games, the third Quarter Quell, with past victors back in the arena.
5. Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014): District 13 and the start of the rebellion.
6. Mockingjay - Part 2 (2015): the war reaches the Capitol.

Sunrise on the Reaping fills in characters you meet later: Haymitch, Effie, Plutarch, Beetee, Wiress and Mags all turn up again in Catching Fire, so a rewatch of Catching Fire after the new film pays off.

If you like the Hunger Games

Title	Why	Where to watch in Australia
Divergent	Another young adult dystopia split into factions	Stan, Paramount+
The Maze Runner	Teenagers trapped in a deadly test	Disney+

See everything coming soon to streaming and cinemas in Australia, week by week.