MSI - the main tournament of the spring season in LoL

The Mid-Season Invitational is the second most important League of Legends tournament after Worlds, where the best teams from each region clash. The first MSI took place back in 2015 in Florida, and back then it was a modest test of the cross-regional format. Since then, the event has grown into a crucial proving ground before the main championship of the year. Riot Games hosts it at the end of the spring stretch of the season, and for many rosters, it is the first opportunity to measure their level against the Asian top tier. For other regions - it is a chance to prove that local victories carry real weight.

The tournament's prize pool has steadily grown since its initial launch. Riot Games significantly increased the base prize money compared to the starting seasons. Constant financial backing from the developers has firmly cemented the event's status - clubs come here to take the international cup, not just to test patches. The popularity of the broadcasts confirms this trend, recording peak numbers of over 2.8 million viewers during the grand finals of recent years.

The tournament offers something a regular seasonal split cannot: the winning team earns an automatic ticket to Worlds, and the second-best region receives an extra slot. Teams fight not just for themselves, but for quotas for their entire league, whether it is the European LEC or the Korean LCK, where internal competition is always at its limit. Consistent failures at the spring tournament mean a loss of representation at the main championship of the year, knocking the region out of the race for global leadership.

The history of MSI winners directly reflects the shift of dominant regions in the League of Legends pro scene. Over the past seasons, the tournament has seen three trophies from Royal Never Give Up, the historic breakthrough of the European G2 Esports roster in 2019, and the successes of T1. In the spring of 2025 in Vancouver, the cup was taken by Gen.G, who snatched a 3-2 victory from T1 in the grand final. Defending the title and securing a second consecutive championship solidified the Korean club's status as one of the strongest spring rosters in the international arena. At the same time, past statistics show that such results do not always guarantee a team automatic dominance in the summer split or a triumph at Worlds. Nevertheless, it is exactly this tournament that sets the balance of power for the next six months, and the participants' results serve as the main indicator of their form before the autumn World Championship.

MSI Format, Tournament Qualifications, and How the Rules Have Changed

The tournament format has undergone many changes over the years. For a long time, MSI ran on a classic system with a round-robin group stage and a simple four-team Single Elimination playoff bracket. However, over time, the gap between major and minor regions demanded a serious overhaul. Starting in 2023, Riot Games completely abandoned the old structure, introducing the Play-In stage and transitioning the main stage to a Double Elimination system.

Qualification for the tournament is based purely on the results of the spring splits in local leagues. The strongest regions - the Korean LCK, Chinese LPL, and European LEC - send their champions and runners-up to the tournament. There are no direct invites for past achievements here: tickets are distributed solely based on the outcomes of the current regional finals. A poor start to the season within a local league directly strips an organization of its chances for an international trophy.

The tournament itself is divided into two key stages. It all starts with the Play-In stage, where lower-seeded teams fight for survival in the bracket. The winners advance to the Bracket Stage, where the champions of the main regions are already waiting for them. The remaining eight play Best-of-5 matches (up to three wins) all the way to the grand final, where participants are finally eliminated from the tournament only after a second loss thanks to the lower bracket format.

The main structural change in 2025 was the introduction of the Fearless Draft system. This rule fundamentally changed preparation for the tournament: champions picked within a single Best-of-5 series are banned for subsequent maps in that match. Coaching staffs had to forget about the possibility of playing a single practiced composition for all five maps. The implementation of Fearless Draft shattered the predictability of the meta and started heavily punishing teams whose players rely on two or three signature heroes.

Mid-Season Invitational 2026

The Mid-Season Invitational 2026 will take place from June 28 to July 12 in Daejeon, South Korea, at the Daejeon Convention Center. In this iteration, Riot Games have gathered the 11 best teams from around the world to share a solid prize pool of $2,000,000. The tournament features representatives from six competitive leagues, including the top seeds from the LCK, LPL, and LEC. The main motivation for the clubs remains unchanged - alongside the $500,000 check for first place, the tournament champion secures a direct spot at the autumn Worlds 2026.

Predicting the winner this year is incredibly difficult, primarily because the reigning two-time champions, Gen.G, failed to even qualify for the tournament. And although the Korean rosters of Hanwha Life Esports and T1 are traditionally in peak form in front of their home crowd, their status as undisputed favorites has been severely shaken. The Chinese LPL and European LEC have firmly cemented their positions on the international stage over the past year - teams like Bilibili Gaming or G2 Esports are coming to Daejeon with genuine claims to the cup. The absence of a clear regional hegemon at the start makes the upcoming event one of the most unpredictable MSI iterations in the history of the discipline.

All Mid-Season Invitational

All Mid-Season Invitational MVP

Status and Features of the MSI Tournament

The Mid-Season Invitational is considered the second most prestigious tournament for professional teams in League of Legends after the autumn Worlds. This championship is known for its strict qualification system through the spring regional splits. The world's best rosters compete at MSI, but the total number of participants regularly changes depending on slot distribution. In the 2026 season, 11 teams from key regions arrived at the tournament, including the Korean LCK and Chinese LPL. For comparison, 13 rosters fought for the cup in 2023, and next year the list of participants will decrease to 10 teams. Regardless of the number of competing clubs, they receive the opportunity to earn a direct ticket to the main championship of the year for their league.

The defining feature of MSI is its unique place in the calendar - Riot Games host this tournament just once a year, dividing the competitive season into two halves. Although the event was completely cancelled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the system of international spring encounters otherwise remains stable and serves as the primary indicator of the teams' form ahead of the autumn start.

How the Mid-Season Invitational Structure Changed Over the Years

The first tournament of the series took place in May 2015 in Tallahassee, Florida. Riot Games gathered the winners of the spring splits from five major regions and added one Wildcard qualifier winner. The trophy was then taken by EDward Gaming, who defeated the SK Telecom T1 roster with a score of 3-2 in the grand final. This match officially laid the foundation for the main spring international event.

Starting with the 2017 tournament in Brazil, the developers radically changed the qualification system. Riot Games abolished the separate International Wildcard Invitational (IWCI) tournament and expanded the list of MSI participants to 13 teams. It was then that the Play-In stage appeared, where representatives of developing leagues fought for the right to play against seeded champions from top divisions.

This structure, with a strict division into major and minor leagues, worked until 2020, when the spring event had to be completely cancelled due to the pandemic. In 2021, the tournament returned in Reykjavik, Iceland. Due to logistical difficulties and a reduction in the number of participants to 11 teams, the organizers temporarily reworked the format, placing all rosters into a single group stage and abandoning the classic preliminary bracket.

The global restructuring of the competitive ecosystem began at the London tournament in 2023. Riot Games finally abandoned the "one region - one team" rule and for the first time allocated two slots for the strongest leagues of that time: the Chinese LPL, Korean LCK, European LEC, and North American LCS. The familiar round-robin Rumble stage was replaced by a full Double Elimination bracket for the eight best rosters.

The next massive stage of reforms occurred in 2025. Riot Games conducted a historic merger of the North American LCS, Brazilian CBLOL, and Latin American LLA, forming a single pan-American league, LTA (League of Legends Championship of The Americas). In parallel, the unified LCP league appeared in the Asia-Pacific region. This radically redrew the slot distribution map for the spring tournament, reducing the number of independent leagues but exponentially increasing the competition for quotas within the new macro-regions.

Together with the implementation of the Fearless Draft system at the Vancouver tournament and the introduction of a direct ticket to the autumn World Championship for the winner, these structural changes permanently cemented the modern, extremely fierce MSI format, where there are no walkover matches or weak regions.

The Evolution of the Mid-Season Invitational Prize Pool

Initially, the MSI prize pool consisted of a modest $200,000, which was contested at the very first tournament in Florida in 2015. By 2017, largely due to crowdfunding and the sale of in-game skins, Riot Games significantly raised the bar, increasing the amount to $1,690,000.

In 2025, the organizers set a record prize pool of $2,000,000 at the tournament in Vancouver. Riot Games maintained this same benchmark for the 2026 season in Daejeon, fixing the two million dollar sum as the new standard for the spring international start. Such financial growth permanently cemented the tournament's status as a crucial event where teams fight not just for regional prestige, but for massive checks.

Where to Follow the MSI Schedule and Matches

An up-to-date schedule for the Mid-Season Invitational is available on EGW, where you can find both past match results and the bracket for upcoming matchups. The platform allows you to follow the games in real time, provides access to multilingual broadcasts, and gathers detailed statistics on each roster.

Beyond bare numbers, we publish detailed analytical predictions for matches featuring top teams from around the world. Follow the latest news from MSI and other major League of Legends events so you don't miss key moments of the competitive season.