The band will kick off 'The End concert series in Nebraska in January before wrapping up in Australia and New Zealand in April. No UK dates have been announced yet.
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A video announcement, which you can watch below, stated: ''It's the beginning of the end. It started nearly five decades ago with a crack of thunder, a distant bell ringing and then that monstrous riff that shook the earth. The heaviest rock sound ever heard. In that moment heavy metal was born, created by a young band from Birmingham, England barely out of their teens.

"Now it ends, the final tour by the greatest metal band of all time, Black Sabbath. Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler close the final chapter in the final volume of the incredible Black Sabbath story. Black Sabbath's farewell tour, 'The End,' begins on January 20, 2016 and it promises to surpass all previous tours with their most mesmerizing production ever. When this tour concludes, it will truly be the end, the end of one of the most legendary bands in Rock 'n Roll history... Black Sabbath."

It is not yet clear who will be playing drums. Tommy Clueftos, who plays with Ozzy's solo group, played on the band's reunion album '13' and subsequent tours, after the original drummer Bill Ward fell out with his bandmates ahead of making the record.

At the Ivor Novello Awards in London earlier this year, Butler claimed that he had "absolutely no idea" if the rumoured tour would actually happen. He added: "I'd love to keep going, I'd desperately want to keep going before I kick the bucket". Butler's bandmate, guitarist Tony Iommi also said: "It'd be lovely to do a last tour, it'd be really nice to do that".