The fans win again.
Riot Games confirms that they will introduce a third international League of Legends (LoL) esports event in 2025. Read ahead for all the details on this new, long-awaited change.
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LoL esports gets a third international event
This new addition to the LoL esports structure is something that fans have long waited for. Often, the community clamors for more inter-continental clashes on the Rift. This time, Riot Games finally responded, saying "Players, teams, and fans have been telling us they want more tournaments featuring competition between the best teams in the world, so we’re happy to find time in the calendar to add one."
As of now, the tournament is currently unnamed, but here's what we do know:
- This new event will take place before Mid-Season Invitational (MSI). Currently, it's slated for March 2025.
- There will be five teams involved: one slot per region.
- The five regions are League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK), League of Legends Pro League (LPL), Americas, Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA), and Asia–Pacific (APAC).
- The international round will be a best-of round robin. Riot Games confirms that every region will play against every other region during this round.
- The top four teams from this round-robin advance to the bracket stage.
- The tournament will implement "a version of Fearless Draft." Modifications are unknown as of the time of writing.
- This tournament will be used to seed teams into MSI, but the winning team will not automatically qualify.
Since this will occur before MSI, all regions are expected to move to a three-split year. Currently, only the League of Legends EMEA Championship (LEC) follows this with Winter, Spring, and Summer splits. This new event will also push MSI back a little bit, with MSI 2025 now slated for July 2025.
The structure for MSI and Worlds will also change. MSI will now involve 10 total teams, two teams from each of the five regions. For Worlds, each region will have three slots, and the MSI champion and runner-up will continue to secure additional slots for their respective regions.
Each region will introduce a regional championship to "make the splits more cohesive and interconnected," again following the changes that LEC made to their schedule. In addition, Riot has confirmed that they will reduce the number of teams within their Tier-1 ecosystem.
