Did Hannah Waddingham Just Leak the ‘Ted Lasso’ Season 4 Premiere Date?

While we already know that Apple’s hit comedy series Ted Lasso will be returning for a three-season sequel that’s set to kick off this year, one of the stars has just let a more precise release date slip out of the bag.

While attending the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs), Hannah Waddingham, who portrays team owner Rebecca Welton on the show, told Deadline’s Baz Bamigboye that the season premiere would be coming this August.

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While Waddingham walked that back a bit by admitting that she may be wrong, the timing does fit. She also added that she wasn’t quite certain about a season 5, but emphasized that she loves the role of Rebecca, and will be happy to continue in it for as long as the series runs.

Thankfully, there’s every reason to believe we’ll see a season five, and a six after that. Last summer Deadline reported that the stars have all been locked in for three-year pacts, and while that doesn’t guarantee the show will continue, it says a lot about what Apple, Warner Bros, and Sudeikis and his team of producers have in mind for the next arc.

This setup will also likely make the return of Ted Lasso feel more like a sequel than a continuation. The original three seasons were intended to be a single, self-contained narrative arc that wrapped up nicely in 2023 with a finale that Sudeikis called “the end of the story we wanted to tell.” However, nobody ever ruled out the possibility that Ted would someday return, and it seemed likely that door would be wide open for a show that brought record viewers to Apple TV and received a record-breaking 20 Emmy nominations and a rare first-year Comedy Series win.

So, it seems the team of writers didn’t take long to find a new story to tell, and it expands on the hook they left in place at the end of season 3. From what we’ve heard and seen so far, Season 4 will kick off with Rebecca travelling to Kansas with Leslie Higgins (Jeremy Swift) and Keeley Jones (Juno Temple) in tow, as seen in a promotional photo shared by Apple CEO Tim Cook last summer.

It’s likely they’re making the trip to convince Ted (Sudeikis) to return to England to coach the second division women’s football team that’s set to become the core of the new seasons — undoubtedly the same team that Keeley pitched to Rebecca in the season 3 finale, which Waddingham referred to as the “Lady Greyhounds” in this week’s comments.

Those four will naturally be joined by Brett Goldstein and Brendan Hunt, who will return to reprise their roles as Roy Kent and Coach Beard. Others like Phil Dunster (Jamie Tart) have moved on to other projects, but we can still hope for the occasional guest appearance. Another mystery is Nick Mohammed, who’s dropped a lot of hints about his involvement, but has played coy about how much of a role he’ll have on screen.

With the focus shifting to the “Lady Greyhounds,” most of early-season regulars will likely face into the background to make way for new faces, including Tanya Reynolds (Sex Education), Jude Mack (Back In Action), Faye Marsay (Adolescence), Rex Hayes, Aisling Sharkey (Jurassic World: Dominion) and Abbie Hern (My Lady Jane).

Perhaps most significantly, Ted’s son Henry is expected to show up a lot more, with the role being recast from Gus Turner who showed up in the first three seasons to be replaced by Grant Feely, best known for his portrayal of the young Luke Skywalker in Obi-Wan Kenobi, who will have a “heavily recurring” role in season 4, and possibly become a regular in the fifth season.

An August release not only fits Apple’s “summer 2026” timeline, but would also be an ideal time for the series to kick off, as it lands shortly after the conclusion of the 2026 World Cup, which will take place in North America this year.