Pink it, Shrink it, Shut it : The Short Life Of Sky Sports Halo

Pink it, shrink it, shut it: the short life of Sky Sports Halo

Sky Sports launched Halo as a TikTok channel for female sports fans. Three days later it shut the whole thing down. For a project that was meant to empower women in sport, its short life span tells you everything you need to know.

Halo arrived as the “lil sis” of Sky Sports. The pitch was simple. A TikTok space that would celebrate all sports, champion female athletes and create a safe community for young women who love the game. On paper that sounds overdue. Women’s sport is finally getting bigger crowds and better coverage so a major broadcaster putting money behind a female focused channel should have been a win.

Instead Halo became a case study in how not to talk to women who already live and breathe sport.

Sky Sports Halo has got to be one of the worst concepts I’ve ever seen. So condescending. Creating a dumbed down sports channel for women is unbelievably sexist. Incredible that it was approved and that it’s still live.

— James (@jamesdsmitth) November 14, 2025

While the channel was still live, I put a poll in the Women’s Sport Collective WhatsApp group, which is full of women who work across the industry. Out of 35 people who voted, 28 said Halo was not a positive move for women’s sport, zero said yes, seven were not sure. That alone was a red flag.

So I widened it out. I set up a Google Form and shared it with women in my wider network. Out of 143 women who responded, only one said she liked Sky Sports Halo. One single vote in favour. One hundred and forty two against.

If you only read the launch copy, Halo sounded promising. Sky said it would be a place for female fans to enjoy content from all sports with behind the scenes clips, fashion, lifestyle and the occasional live fixture. The language around community and culture made it seem like a modern social first way to bring more women into the conversation.

Then people started scrolling the actual feed.

I’ve noticed there is a misconception about Sky Sports Halo

It is not about giving women’s sports more coverage. It’s about having a separate channel for female spectators and separating us from the main channel which is why it’s even worse pic.twitter.com/4DSZ9wcTc9

— Frey :) (@FreyaQuinton) November 14, 2025

Early breakdowns of the account found that almost half of the first posts were about men’s sport even though Halo was supposed to champion women. Instead of leading with WSL, netball or women’s cricket, the channel pushed male storylines, bromances and gossip. One video focused on a Formula 1 driver’s relationship. Another explained a motorsport scandal “in girl terms”. There were pink hearts, cutesy captions and endless references to matcha and hot girl walks.

Women looked at that and saw a familiar pattern. When in doubt, pink it and shrink it.

The content did not say “we see you as serious fans”. It said “we think you need sport watered down with pastel graphics”.

The backlash was instant and loud. Creators, journalists and fans called the tone patronising and unbelievably sexist. It was not just anonymous accounts either. Well known voices in sport were saying the same thing.

Cricket writer Elizabeth Ammon summed it up in one tweet:

This is really bad. Patronising, sexist and a bit weird. Women don’t need things dumbed down and pink and fluffy. We’re fine. https://t.co/cO0YTIH4CU

— Elizabeth Ammon (@legsidelizzy) November 15, 2025

Across social media people described Halo as one of the worst concepts they had seen, a dumbed down sports channel for women that nobody had asked for. The overall message was clear. Women do not need a fluffy version of Sky Sports. They are already here watching the real thing.

Very quickly the story moved from launch to damage control. After days of criticism Sky posted a statement admitting “we did not get it right” and confirmed that all activity on the account would stop. Halo was gone almost as quickly as it arrived, something the Guardian captured in detail.

More On The Shutdown

The shutdown matters because it proves the problem was never women being hard to please. The problem was that Halo did not respect who female fans actually are. These are women who already analyse tactics, shout at officials, track stats and travel for away days. Plenty of them work inside clubs, agencies and media outlets. They do not need sport translated into soft girl language to understand it.

Put that next to the numbers from my polls. Thirty five women in a specialist WhatsApp group and not one yes. One hundred and forty three women in a wider survey and only one yes. Halo did not fail in silence. Women told Sky exactly how it felt. The company listened in the end, but only after walking straight into the wall.

as of 5 minutes ago, “sky sports halo” is officially gone 🎉 pic.twitter.com/uQWIlhVlKx

— alex (@oscgoat) November 15, 2025

If you strip away the pink graphics, none of the criticism is complicated.

Women want sport first. If you say a channel is about championing female athletes, they expect to see female athletes front and centre. WSL highlights, netball internationals, women’s cricket, tennis, athletics and behind the scenes with players. Not F1 relationship rumours and random girl dinner energy.

They want to be spoken to like adults. Women know the rules, the rivalries and the context. Many have been building women’s sport when mainstream broadcasters ignored it. A TikTok channel that leans on stereotypes about what girls like feels lazy.

They also want integration not segregation. If broadcasters truly believe in women’s sport, the answer is not to push it into a separate soft focus channel. It is to make sure women’s games, stories and voices sit confidently on the main platforms with the same energy and investment.

The frustrating thing is that Halo did have glimpses of what could have worked. Streaming live netball, highlighting key moments in women’s sport and giving players another route to reach younger fans are all good ideas. The problem was that those bits were buried under aesthetic fluff that made women feel talked down to.

Shutting Halo down was the right call. Leaving it up would only have deepened the disconnect. But a quiet deletion is not enough on its own.

If Sky is serious about learning from this, the next step has to be listening to the women who called it out. That means speaking to fans, players, journalists and creators who already know how to reach female audiences because they are the audience. It means moving away from pink it and shrink it content and towards coverage that treats women’s sport as part of the main event.

sky sports halo company car pic.twitter.com/U1jROU0FZv

— Charlotte Dunne (@CharlotteDunne) November 16, 2025

Women’s sport does not need a consolation prize. It does not need a little sister brand. It needs visibility, respect and proper coverage on the biggest stages. Halo tried to give women a corner of the room and wrapped it in pastel branding. The reaction, the polls and the shutdown made the point very clearly.

Women are not asking for less sport with more glitter. They are asking for the same sport with the same respect.