Rugby Scoring: What Each Score Is Worth in Union and League

What every rugby score is worth, under World Rugby’s Laws for rugby union and the International Rugby League’s for rugby league — because the two codes separated in 1895 and have priced a try, a penalty goal and a drop goal differently ever since. Every answer names the clause it was read from.

Every score, in both codes, with the clause it was read from

One identical set of scoring events, scored under each

Whose law, from which year, and in whose competition

Rugby is two sports, and this page will not answer for both at once. Rugby union is governed by World Rugby and played fifteen a side under its Laws of the Game; rugby league by the International Rugby League, thirteen a side under its own International Laws. The two separated in 1895 and have published different numbers ever since — a try is five points in union and four in league, a penalty goal three and two, a drop goal three and one. So the code is an input here, and the other code’s figure is printed beside the answer. A number here belongs to a period as well as to a body: union’s try has been worth one point, two, three, four and five at different dates, and league’s long-range drop goal is one point under the international laws and two under the National Rugby League’s own competition rules. Every figure is printed with the body that publishes it and the clause it was read from.

“Conversion” and “penalty” each name several things on this site, and only one of each is rugby’s. A rugby conversion is the kick a team earns by scoring a try, taken under World Rugby Law 8.8(a) “on a line through the place where the try was awarded, parallel to the touchlines”, and worth two points in both codes. It is not association football’s shot conversion, goals over shots; not field hockey’s penalty-corner conversion, goals over corners; and neither of American football’s two, the two-point conversion and the third-down conversion, which is not a score at all. A rugby penalty goal is a kick at goal from a penalty, three points in union and two in league — not football’s penalty kick and not field hockey’s penalty corner or stroke.

There is no conversion factor between the two scoreboards, and the arithmetic says why. Subtract league’s values from union’s score by score and the remainder is one point for every try, one for every penalty goal and two for every drop goal. The gap grows with the KIND of scoring rather than with the size of the score, and because a conversion cannot be attempted without a try it is strictly positive for any match in which anything was scored. Two matches both ending 28-21 in union could be 21-18 and 24-16 in league.

The values have each moved, and the dates matter. In rugby union a try was worth one point in 1889-90 — when Scotland alone scored it at two, before the International Board’s system was adopted across the four countries for 1890-91 — then two from 1891-92, three from 1893-94, four from 1971 and five from 1992. The penalty goal rose from two to three in 1891-92. The drop goal fell from four to three in 1948. There was once a goal from a mark, worth four and then three, abolished in 1977-78 with the free-kick clause. The penalty try became a flat seven points with no kick in 2017. In rugby league the drop goal was reduced from two points to one in 1971. A points total spanning any of those dates is not on one scale.

The sharpest thing here is not a difference between the codes but one inside a code. The International Rugby League prices a drop goal at one point “from any position in the field of play”. The Australian Rugby League Commission decided on 11 December 2020 that in the 2021 Telstra Premiership “a two-point field goal will be awarded for teams who kick a field goal from outside the 40-metre line”. The Rugby Football League’s Laws Committee considered importing the same rule, rejected it, and had the rejection ratified by its Board on 3 February 2021, its Chief On-Field Officer saying “we remain unconvinced by the arguments for introducing a two-point drop goal”. One kick, one code, three published answers depending on whose competition you are watching.

Where the conversion is taken from, which is why a kicking percentage is hard to read. Law 8.8(a) requires it “in the field of play on a line through the place where the try was awarded, parallel to the touchlines”. A try under the posts yields a kick from under the posts; a try a metre in from the corner flag yields a kick from a metre in from the corner flag, at an angle from which professionals miss regularly. Same name, same value, different task — which is why the goal kicking success calculator takes conversions and penalties as separate fields and bands neither by distance.

On sourcing, since this page is almost entirely other people’s rules. Union’s five values are quoted from World Rugby’s own Law 8, clause by clause; that portal prints no edition year, so this site cites the clause and the date read rather than an edition it cannot see. Rugby league’s come from Section 6 of the International Rugby League’s 2024 International Laws, whose cover carries that year — and whose extracted text stops partway through Section 17. The one place this page needed something beyond Section 16, the penalty try, is the one place it declines to answer. The historical values come from the World Rugby Museum’s account, which lists four published histories as its sources, corroborated independently for 1971, 1992 and the 2017 penalty try.

What a result is worth in a table is a different question with a different answer in each competition, on the bonus points and table points calculator; the margin that settles a tie is on the points difference and standings calculator; and the two codes’ grounds are on the pitch dimensions interpreter.

Every number on this page is arithmetic on a count, a law or a regulation that a governing body or a competition publishes, and each one names where it was read. Nothing here is a commercial prediction, and no page in this section is.

Frequently asked questions

Related calculators

References

1. World Rugby. Laws of the Game — Law 8, Scoring, served clause by clause at passport.world.rugby (read 15 Oct 2026). Clause 8.1: a try 8.1(a) “Five points”; a conversion 8.1(b) “Two points”; a penalty try 8.1(c) “Seven points”; a penalty goal 8.1(d) “Three points”; a dropped goal 8.1(e) “Three points”. 8.3, on a penalty try: “No conversion is attempted”. 8.7: a try “gives that team the right to attempt a conversion, which may be a place-kick or drop-kick”. 8.8(a): the kick is taken “in the field of play on a line through the place where the try was awarded, parallel to the touchlines”; 8.8(b) allows a placer; 8.8(c) requires the kick “within 60 seconds (playing time) from the time the try was awarded”. 8.18: “A penalty goal can be scored only from a penalty”; 8.20 binds a declared intention to kick; 8.21 gives the same 60 seconds. 8.28 scores a dropped goal from a drop kick in open play and 8.29 bars one from a free kick. About 18,000 characters including navigation. The page prints no edition year — its image filenames contain “2501”, which is an inference and not a stated fact — so this site cites the clause and the date read.
2. International Rugby League. International Laws of the Game, 2024 edition (cover: “2024 International Laws of the Game”, © 2024 International Rugby League), PDF at rugby-league.com (read 15 Oct 2026). Quoted only where the TEXT says it; the extraction runs to roughly 50,000 characters and is truncated partway through Section 17, and Section 1’s ground plan is an IMAGE, so no field dimension is quoted from this document anywhere on this site. Section 6, Law 1: “A try shall count four points” and “A conversion goal or penalty goal shall count two points.” Section 6, Law 7: “A drop goal is scored by a drop kick during play from any position in the field of play and counts one point.” No penalty-try provision appeared in the text returned, which is recorded as not established rather than as absent.
3. International Rugby League. International Laws of the Game, 2024 edition (cover: “2024 International Laws of the Game”, © 2024 International Rugby League), PDF at rugby-league.com (read 15 Oct 2026). Quoted only where the TEXT says it; the extraction runs to roughly 50,000 characters and is truncated partway through Section 17, and Section 1’s ground plan is an IMAGE, so no field dimension is quoted from this document anywhere on this site. Section 4, Law 1: “The game shall be played by two teams each consisting of not more than thirteen players on the field at any one time.” Section 4, Law 2(a): four nominated replacements and “A maximum of 8 interchanges … from the 17 named players.” Section 7, Law 1: “The game shall normally be of eighty minutes duration.” Section 11, Law 7(a): “A team in possession of the ball shall be allowed five successive play-the-balls”, with a handover when “The team is tackled a sixth time”. Section 11, Law 10(g): defenders other than the marker and acting half “are out of play if they fail to retire ten (10) metres from the point at which the ball is played.” Section 12, Law 3: “No more than six players on each team shall assist in the formation of a scrum.” Section 16, Law 6: the referee may “caution, temporarily suspend for ten minutes, or dismiss the offender.” Section 1, Note 3: “The goal posts are considered to extend indefinitely upwards”; Section 2’s glossary: a corner post “not less than 1.25m. high”.
4. World Rugby. Laws of the Game — Law 3 (Team) and Law 5 (Time) (passport.world.rugby, read 15 Oct 2026). 3.1: “Each team has no more than 15 players in the playing area during play.” 3.4 allows a union up to eight replacements for an international, 3.5 leaves the number to the match organiser up to the same eight, and 3.8 sets minimum front-row cover by squad size. 5.1: “A match lasts no longer than 80 minutes”, in halves “each of not more than 40 minutes plus time lost”, with extra time only where “the match organiser has authorised the playing of extra-time in a drawn match within a knock-out competition”. 5.2: half-time is “an interval not exceeding 15 minutes as decided by the match organiser”.
5. National Rugby League. NRL announces rule changes to make game more entertaining, nrl.com, Friday 11 December 2020 (read 15 Oct 2026). The Australian Rugby League Commission, on its innovation committee’s recommendations, confirmed for the 2021 Telstra Premiership that “a two-point field goal will be awarded for teams who kick a field goal from outside the 40-metre line”, field goals from inside the 40 remaining worth one point. The same item records that field goals “were reduced from two points to one in 1971”; that six-again replaces the penalty for 10-metre infringements while referees keep the power to penalise and sin bin; that a ball or carrier into touch restarts with a play-the-ball rather than a scrum; and that “A conversion attempt will not be permitted until the Bunker is satisfied a try has been scored”.
6. Yorkshire Evening Post. No scrums in 2021 and ‘two point’ drop goal idea thrown out (read 15 Oct 2026). The RFL Laws Committee “considered, but rejected, two further law changes” taken from the NRL, one of them “awarding two points for drop goals kicked from outside the 40 metre line”; the RFL Board ratified the rejection on 3 February 2021. RFL Chief On-Field Officer Dave Rotheram: “we remain unconvinced by the arguments for introducing a two-point drop goal.” The same item records “no scrums again in rugby league this season”, on medical and scientific advice about Covid-19 risk, with scrums possibly returning “certainly at Betfred Super League level”, and that the committee was “not persuaded of the merits of extending Six Again to cover 10 metre offside infringements”, Six Again having been introduced for the 2020 restart. A press source, and the only account read that records the rejection with its body and date; the RFL’s own operational rules were not reached.
7. World Rugby Museum. Points scoring through the ages, From The Vaults, by Richard Steele, which lists as its sources John Griffiths’ The Book of English International Rugby 1871-1982 (Willow Books, 1982), Percy Royds’ The History of the Laws of Rugby Football (Walker, 1949), Sandy Thorburn’s The History of Scottish Rugby (Johnston & Bacon, 1980) and OL Owen’s The History of the Rugby Football Union (Playfair, 1955); read 15 Oct 2026. The values by date: in 1889-90 England, Ireland and Wales scored a try at 1 point, a conversion at 2 and a drop goal or goal from a mark at 3, while Scotland scored a try at 2; the International Board system was adopted across all four countries for 1890-91; a try rose to 2 in 1891-92, in the passage that also has the penalty goal “now raised from two to three points”; a try rose to 3 in 1893-94 as the conversion fell from 3 to 2; a goal from a mark fell from 4 to 3 at the end of 1904-05; a drop goal fell from 4 to 3 in 1948; a try rose from 3 to 4 in 1971 and from 4 to 5 in 1992; and the goal from a mark ceased to exist in 1977-78 with the free-kick clause.
8. Wikipedia. Laws of rugby union (read 15 Oct 2026). Read to corroborate the museum’s dates independently: a try at one point until 1891, two for the next two years, “three points were awarded for a try and two for a kick” in 1893, “increased to four in 1971” and “five in 1992”; a drop goal of four points “reduced to three points in 1948”; “In 1891 penalties were increased from two to three points”. And for one thing the museum does not cover: “Beginning in 2017, penalty tries are automatically worth seven points, negating the need to attempt a conversion.” The article says nothing about the 1895 split or about rugby league’s scoring.
9. National Rugby League. NRL Stats Glossary — official stats definitions, nrl.com/operations/the-game/official-stats-definitions (read 15 Oct 2026), in sections headed Points Scoring (Try Scoring, Conversion, Penalty Goal, Field Goal), Ball Runs, Attack, Passing, Defence, Kicking and Negative Play. Quoted: “Tackles made — Defensive player successfully completes tackle”; “Missed tackles — Defensive player does not bring player to ground or complete tackle”; “Ineffective tackles — Defensive player does not stop attacking player from offloading in tackle”; “Conversion — An attempt at goal after a try has been scored”, resolving to “Points- Conversion is successful” or “Missed – Conversion is unsuccessful”; “An error is when the ball is lost by the attacking team or when defensive players have reset tackle count to zero.” It defines no tackle efficiency, no tackle break, no completion rate and no percentage of any kind. About 6,500 characters including navigation.