Abstract We consider measurements of exclusive rare semi-tauonic b-hadron decays, mediated by the $$b \rightarrow s \tau ^+ \tau ^-$$ b→sτ+τ- transition, at a future high-energy circular electron–positron collider (FCC-ee). We argue that the high boosts of b-hadrons originating from on-shell Z boson decays allow for a full reconstruction of the decay kinematics in hadronic $$\tau $$ τ decay modes (up to discrete ambiguities). This, together with the potentially large statistics of $$Z\rightarrow b\bar{b}$$ Z→bb¯ , opens the door for the experimental determination of $$\tau $$ τ polarizations in these rare b-hadron decays. In the light of the current experimental situation on lepton flavor universality in rare semileptonic B decays, we discuss the complementary short-distance physics information carried by the $$\tau $$ τ polarizations and suggest suitable theoretically clean observables in the form of single- and double-$$\tau $$ τ polarization asymmetries.