The 2025 Grand Finals for KPL, the Chinese Honor of Kings league, now holds the Guinness World Record for biggest live audience at an esports event.
The grand final of the Kings Pro League 2025 was held in Beijing, China, last November 8. Beijing's National Stadium, also known as the Bird's Nest, became the site of the spectacle that made Honor of Kings and KPL 2025 the newest holders of the most-attended esports event in the Guinness Book of World Records.
During the same weekend, other major esports events were held in China, namely the League of Legends 2025 World Championship and the Counter-Strike 2 IEM Chengdu 2025.
HoK and KPL break the Guinness World Record for live attendance at an esports event
KPL is the Chinese regional league for Honor of Kings esports. Meanwhile, Honor of Kings is the dominant title in China when it comes to mobile games. Thus, the vast number of live attendees to witness the grand final between Chengdu AG Super Play and Chongqing Wolves was not a surprise.
Still, the tickets for the event sold out in just 12 seconds. The final count of the live audience reached 62,196, which set the record for the largest live attendance for an esports tournament.
The previous record-holder was the PES 2016 UEFA EURO 2016 in Chap de Mars, France. Their total number was 45,000.
AG Super Play was successful in defending their title against the Wolves, continuing their dominance in the title as they claim their sixth straight championship.
KPL 2025 prize pool
This tournament had an insane CN¥70 million prize pool. This equates to around US$9.8 million. With this much money on the line, KPL 2025 is now the event with the highest prize pool this year. It overtook Worlds 2025, which had US$5 million, and the PUBG Mobile World Cup 2025, which had US$3.05 million.
Of course, as the champions, AG Super Play claimed the lion's share of CN¥20 million (~US$2.8 million). Xu "YiNuo" Bicheng received the Finals MVP award and will be celebrated with an in-game skin.
Honor of Kings esports in 2025
The year is not yet over for Honor of Kings esports. The Honor of Kings International Championship 2025, or KIC2025, is set to begin on November 14 in Manila, Philippines. This will see the best teams from all around the world, except China, clash for glory and a ticket to the Challenger Cup 2025.
The Challenger Cup will involve 32 teams from different leagues, including several top teams from the Chinese KPL league, the top three teams from KIC, and teams from the Women Open and Campus leagues.
