Champions 2026 Live Hub

The three countdowns

Countdowns run to midnight German time (CEST) of each day – Riot usually announces exact times only shortly in advance.

The full schedule

Update log

All updates from the event land here, newest entries first.

What is Champions – and why is it the biggest event of the year?

Champions is the world championship of the VALORANT Champions Tour: once a year the best 16 teams from all four regions meet – in 2026 in Shanghai. For viewers it is the densest Valorant stretch of the year: Pick’Ems to predict, Twitch drops for watching, the exclusive Champions bundle in the shop and weeks of top-level matches. How the tournament format works is explained in our esports overview; the German streamers covering the event are on our streamer page.

Collectors, take note: the Champions bundle is the only collection of the year that is strictly time-limited and never returns to the shop. What is inside, what it costs and every leak is collected on the Champions 2026 bundle page – and the Valorant-Spind app shows you what your previous Champions skins are worth today with one click.

The 16 teams: who is coming to Shanghai?

The field is complete: all sixteen slots are locked in (as of September 7). The final tickets went to 100 Thieves (3:2 over LOUD in the Americas final) and Global Esports (3:2 over Nongshim RedForce in the Pacific final) on September 6. Teams qualified via two routes: winning or reaching the final of their league's Stage 2 playoff earns a direct trip to Shanghai, while the remaining slots go to the teams with the most Championship Points collected across Kickoff, Stage 1 and the season's Masters events.

One storyline stands above the rest: NRG arrive as the first defending champions in the event's history to enter with a realistic shot at going back-to-back – no team has ever successfully defended a Champions title. And with EDward Gaming, TYLOO, JD Gaming and XLG Esports, the host region China sends four teams into a home-crowd tournament. As soon as the final four teams are confirmed, we will add them right here in the update log.

Format explained: groups, GSL and playoffs

The 16 teams are drawn into four groups of four and play a GSL-style bracket. It sounds complicated but is quickly explained: each group starts with two opening matches, then the two winners meet in the winners match – win that and you are through. The two opening losers play an elimination match where the loser goes home. Finally, the decider match pits the winners-match loser against the elimination-match winner for the group's second playoff ticket. Every team gets at least two chances; a single loss never means instant elimination.

The top two teams from each group reach the playoffs of the final eight, and from there it is knockout matches all the way to the grand final on October 18 – the only best-of-5 of the event. If you want to brush up on the rules beforehand, our esports overview explains the whole VCT system from Kickoff to Championship Points.

Champions history: every winner since 2021

Champions Shanghai is the sixth edition of the tournament. A look at the past world champions shows how close it gets at the top – four of the five finals went the full distance or nearly did:

Two streaks stand out: no region has ever won twice in a row, and no champion has ever defended the title. NRG are playing against a five-year pattern in 2026. The Paris 2025 final is still considered one of the most dramatic in history – NRG led 2–0 before Fnatic tied it at 2–2, and only the fifth map settled the championship.

Shanghai match times for European viewers

Shanghai runs on China Standard Time (UTC+8), six hours ahead of Central European Summer Time for the entire event. For European fans that is an unusual but rather pleasant setup: matches starting in the Shanghai afternoon or evening air in the European late morning to early afternoon. Tune in around 9 or 10 a.m. CEST and you will usually catch the main broadcast window of the day – no all-nighters required, unlike events hosted in the Americas.

These sample times only illustrate the time difference – Riot publishes the official schedule with exact start times shortly before the tournament, and we will add it here.

The tournament airs on the official VALORANT channels on Twitch and YouTube, joined by approved co-streams. The German-speaking streamers covering the event are collected on our streamer page.

Pick’Ems: tips for your predictions

From September 10 you can lock in your Pick’Ems in the client and on the web – predicting how the groups play out and who lifts the trophy. Taking part earns free rewards, so there is nothing to lose. A few lessons from past years help with the predictions:

Do not bet everything on one region. Across five editions of Champions, four different regions have taken the title – EMEA (Acend), Americas (LOUD as a Brazilian roster, Evil Geniuses, NRG) and China (EDward Gaming). Picks that lean entirely on one region rarely pay off.

Championship Points are a solid compass. Teams that qualified on points were consistent across the whole season – often worth more than a single hot run through the Stage 2 playoffs. At the same time, the GSL format punishes slow starts: lose your opening match and you are straight into elimination games.

Watch the map pools. Patch 13.06 lands a new act right before the tournament – and with it possible changes to the map rotation. Teams that play flexibly across many maps have the edge when surprises hit. All map details are in our map guide.

The complete walkthrough with every reward and deadline is in our Pick’Ems guide.

Drops & rewards for watching

As with every major VCT event, watching with a linked Riot account pays off: drops go out regularly during the live broadcasts – cosmetic rewards such as sprays, buddies or titles that are only available through watching. To be eligible, link your Riot account once with the platform you watch on. Important: the link always runs through the official Riot sign-in – never enter your password on third-party sites. Approved co-streams generally count for drops too, as long as the link is in place.

And if tournament fever makes you want to check your own collection: the free Valorant-Spind app shows you – without any login – what your past Champions skins and the rest of your locker are worth today, and our skin calculator does it right in the browser.

The big storylines heading into the event

Every Champions has its narratives, and Shanghai 2026 brings several at once. The most obvious: can NRG become the first team ever to defend the title? Five editions, five different winners – history says no, but NRG qualified early on Championship Points as the Americas region's constant and carry the experience of the Paris triumph into the race.

Storyline number two is the home game for China: after EDward Gaming's 2024 title in Seoul, the region enters with four teams in front of a home crowd for the first time. TYLOO arrive as freshly crowned Stage 2 champions, and the Shanghai atmosphere should be a tangible factor for every Chinese roster. And third: EMEA is chasing its second star. Since Acend's win at the very first Champions in 2021, Europe has been waiting for a title – with Karmine Corp as Stage 2 winners and three more playoff-tested teams, the setup looks as good as it has in years.

On top of that comes the question that hovers over every edition: how much will patch 13.06 shake up the game right before the tournament? The new act lands on September 22, just two days before the first match – meta shifts around agents or maps could hit some teams much harder than others. Our patch notes overview keeps you up to date.

Viewer checklist: ready in 5 minutes

So you miss nothing on September 24, here is the short preparation list – run through it once and you are set:

Link your Riot account. Connect your Riot account with the platform you plan to watch on – that is the only way to be drop-eligible. The link takes a minute and runs exclusively through the official Riot sign-in.

Lock in your Pick’Ems. From September 10 you can submit your predictions; picks lock before the tournament starts. Come late and you miss the free rewards – all details in the Pick’Ems guide.

Check the schedule. Note the European start times (late morning to early afternoon) and block out the knockout stage from October – the tension climbs match by match there.

Sort your bundle budget. If you want the Champions bundle, set aside the required VP in time – after the final on October 18 it is gone for good. What it should cost is on the bundle page; the cheapest VP pack combination comes from the VP calculator.

Champions terms explained in one minute

Just getting into the esports side of Valorant? These five terms are enough to follow any broadcast: GSL is the group format with winners, elimination and decider matches, where every team gets at least two chances. Bo3 (best of 3) means the first team to win two maps takes the match. The decider is the last group match, deciding the second playoff ticket. Championship Points are the season-long standings through which consistent teams qualify directly. And drops are the cosmetic rewards handed out to watching accounts during the broadcast. More terms are explained in our Valorant glossary – from ace to wallbang.

The road to Shanghai: how the VCT season works

Champions is the finale of a system that spans the entire year. The VCT season opens with the Kickoff of the four international leagues (Americas, EMEA, Pacific, China), followed by Stage 1 and Stage 2 as league phases. Between the stages sit the international Masters events, where the best league teams face off. At each of these stations, teams collect Championship Points – and at season's end those points, alongside the Stage 2 playoffs, decide who makes the trip to the world championship.

The system rewards two qualities: consistency across the season (the points route) and form at the right moment (the playoff route). For viewers that means: tune in for Champions and you are watching the harvest of a whole year – each of the 16 teams earned its place over months. The full structure with all dates and leagues is explained in our esports overview; the tournament patches that shape the meta are tracked in our patch notes.

Frequently asked questions (FAQ)