Valorant eSports Tournaments: Format, Major Championships and Prize Funds

Valorant entered professional eSports in 2020 and became a sensation right away. The first Valorant tournament broadcasted on Twitch gathered more than one million viewers, becoming an absolute blast. With the development of professional championships in the discipline, the popularity of the events continued to grow. Currently, Valorant tournaments are ranked 8^th most viewed in eSports.

If you are interested in Valorant events and want to get all the details about the teams’ performance firsthand, our website features all the upcoming Valorant tournaments in a convenient format. Also, our online service offers information about the tournaments’ results, prize pools, and other details you may be interested in.

Types of Valorant Tournaments

Despite the young age of this eSports discipline, the number of events taking place in Valorant eSports exceeds those of disciplines that have been on the professional scene for years. Like in other eSports, the type of championship is predetermined by its size, prize pool, and prestige. Championships offering more prize money gather top-tier teams ready to fight for the win. The lower the prize poll gets, the fewer famous participants it can attract.

Overall, Valorant tournaments can be of several types:

• S-tier events, like Valorant World Championship, LCT Regional Leagues or VCT Game Changers Championship, refer to the most prestigious tournaments with prize pools exceeding half a million dollar mark. To participate in such competitions, teams should go through numerous qualifiers to determine who deserves a place among the world’s most elite Valorant teams. S-tier events are huge and spectacular LAN tournaments with millions of spectators watching the teams playing offline and online.
• A-tier tournaments are places where the most competitive teams meet to find out who is the best. To qualify for an A-tier event, a team should win in several competitions, including open qualifiers, so they are much easier to get to compared to S-tier tournaments. This type of event is usually of high regional importance. For instance, Valorant Challengers, Red Bull Home Ground, and others.
• B-tier competitions typically have top teams among the competitors and boast rather high prize pools, which may range from $5,000 to $50,000. To be scaled B-tier, the event should have some regional impact. The championships with low prize pools can still be classified as B-tier if there are many famous names on their contestant list. South-East Asian Games and Astral Clash are the tournaments fitting into this category.
• C-tier events, like Valorant East and Valorant College tournaments, concentrate on the local level teams. The prize pools of such competitions are insignificant, but they allow beginner teams to start. Such events are typically held online as their budgets cannot handle the organization of LAN events.

VALORANT Champions Tour

The first official circuit of the VALORANT Champions tour was held in 2021. Since that year, the championship has been held annually. The organizer of the tournament is Riot Games — the game-owning company.

Being the largest and most prestigious LAN event of the year, this championship has a complicated qualification system so that only the most outstanding teams and players can make it to the final. The competition format comprises three systems:

1. Pro system;
2. Semi-pro system;
3. Women’s pro system.

Each of these comprises a range of stages and competitions the teams should pass. Let’s take an in-depth look at each of them.

The Pro system format of the 2023 championship is a bit different from what we saw in the previous year. This time it includes five qualification championships:

• Lock In involves 30 teams from International Leagues playing for the extra spot for their League in Masters.
• International Leagues competition includes three LAN events for 10 teams selected by Riot Games for each of the three leagues (Americas League, EMEA League, and Pacific League). The best representatives of each league qualify for Masters.
• Masters is a championship held between the top teams of the International Leagues. The best ones make it right to Champions.
• Last Chance Qualifiers are the rivalry between the teams left behind by the leaders of the Masters. Those winning the competition enter the Champions event.
• Champions is the main event of the year where participants get the chance to fight for the World Champion title and the mind-blowing prize pool.

Semi-pro system allows beginner teams to enter the high league and guarantee their place in the International League of the following year. At this point, there are two major events aimed to define the best ones. These are the Challengers League and Ascension. The Challengers League includes competitions in 23 minor regional leagues divided into three territories: Americas, EMEA, and Pacific. The top teams from each region qualify for the Ascension.

The latter includes three tournaments, one for each region. The winners of each competition get their tickets to the International League.

Women’s pro system refers to Game Changers. The circuit takes place throughout the year in different parts of the world. The best competitors from each region get the chance to play for the main prize of the year and the champion’s title.

The format of the final event includes two stages: Group Stage, where four groups, each containing four teams, compete in the double-elimination bracket. The top 2 from each group enter the Playoff stage, which has the format of double-elimination bracket Bo3. The final game determines the champion among the Bo5.

How Are the Professional Valorant Tournaments Held?

Valorant tournaments can be held online or offline, though some regional leagues also practice mixed-type events. Nevertheless, the biggest and most important championships are mainly LAN events. For instance, competitions held within Valorant Champions Tour are all offline events. But the lower we get with the tournament grading, the more online events we will see there.

Speaking about the locations of the top-tier tournaments, the venue depends on the regional league that hosts the event. This year’s local VCT Leagues events will be held in Berlin, Seoul, and Los Angeles.

The Size of the Valorant Prize Pools Bodes Well for the Future of the Game!

Provided that Valorant is a very young eSports discipline and its history of large championships started in 2021 only, the prize pools for the top-tier events are huge. Some disciplines, like CS: GO, which has been in the pro tournaments arena for years still cannot afford to pay such prize money to their player as Valorant event organizers do.

The professional Valorant tournament winners can share a $1,000,000 prize pool for the victory in Valorant Champions. Tournaments leading to this event don’t have such prize money, but they still offer a significant financial reward, ranging from half a million dollars to $700,000. Such an outstanding prize does a great job in terms of enhancing the popularity of this eSports and bringing it to the world top.

If this is what the organizers can offer now, we can only assume figures that will appear in the tournament’s prize pools in the future.

Can a Young Team Break into the Valorant eSports Scene?

The ultimate goal of any beginner gamers team is to enter top leagues and compete for multimillion-dollar prize pools. But is it real? Can a young team break into the Valorant pro tournament and reach the top? Absolutely! The structure of the Valorant professional tournaments allows beginner teams to get into the top leagues.

The semi-pro system described earlier can be used as a trampoline from the minor regional championships to the top-tier competitions and the world championship.

Actual Valorant Tournaments Schedule at Pro Gaming Online

To keep your hand on the pulse of this eSports discipline and know everything about the upcoming Valorant events, you should have a reliable source of information. Pro Gaming Online can become your reliable partner and informatory. We provide up-to-date upcoming Valorant tournament schedule and display the results of past events for you to keep track of your favorite teams and players.

With us, you can also find Valorant tournament rules, extensive information about the prize pools of the championships, the best gamers, and any other details that may be important to you. Check out our website and see it for yourself. Pro Gaming Online is your best eSports informational partner at all times.