League of Legends Worlds Returns to the US: Four LPL Teams In, Play-Ins Open Oct. 15 in Los Angeles
The biggest event of the esports year is about to start. The 2026 League of Legends World Championship (Worlds 2026) opens Oct. 15 at the Riot Games Arena in Los Angeles and stays in the United States throughout, ending with the final on Nov. 14 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn — the first Worlds final ever held on the US East Coast. Nineteen teams are in: the play-in stage comes first, with Karmine Corp (EMEA), Cloud9 (North America), MVK (Asia-Pacific) and Brazil's No. 2 seed fighting through a best-of-five double-elimination bracket for a single spot in the 16-team Swiss stage.
China's LPL earned four berths this year, all straight into the Swiss stage (from Oct. 23 in Allen, Texas): Anyone's Legend (AL), Bilibili Gaming (BLG), Top Esports (TES) and Invictus Gaming (IG). IG took the hardest road, beating JD Gaming 3–1 on Sept. 19 in the regional qualifier to claim China's last ticket; veterans TheShy and Rookie, who won the title with IG back in 2018, are back on the roster. The headline storyline, though, is Korea's T1: winners in 2023, 2024 and 2025, with mid laner Faker chasing an unprecedented fourth straight crown — yet T1 arrives only as Korea's third seed, behind Gen.G and Hanwha Life Esports, with a tougher draw.
For US viewers the best news is the clock: play-ins start at 11 a.m. Pacific in Los Angeles and most Swiss-stage days begin around noon Central, all streamed free on lolesports.com, Twitch and YouTube. Thinking of going in person? The Los Angeles play-in studio seats only about 300, so the realistic ticket is the Swiss stage and knockouts in Allen, Texas. One bonus for this weekend: fighting-game fans get EVO France 2026 in Nice from Oct. 9–11, headlined by Street Fighter 6 and Tekken 8, with official streams on YouTube and Twitch. (Sources: Riot Games' announced schedule, lolesports.com, the tournament's Wikipedia entry)
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图片来源：Openverse · Flickr 用户（CC0）
