EWC VALORANT 2026 details revealed
The 16-team EWC VALORANT tournament will run from July 2-12, with Team Heretics already qualified as the reigning champions from last year.
SAUDI ARABIA – The Esports World Cup Foundation has unveiled the first details for VALORANT at EWC 2026, with the competition set to run from July 2-12 as part of this year’s Esports World Cup in Riyadh.
The tournament will feature a larger US$2,000,000 prize pool and the same 16-team group stage & playoffs format.
Team Heretics are the only team to receive a direct invitation as the defending champions, having won last year’s edition with a reverse sweep over FNATIC in the grand finals.
The four Stage 1 champions from each major region will also qualify for the second edition of EWC VALORANT, while regional qualifiers across the major regions will award three slots each. However, an exception for China which will only have two qualifier spots, with the remaining place effectively reserved for the defending EWC champion.
In terms of format, the tournament will begin with a group stage, where the 16 qualified teams will be divided into four groups of four. Each group will use a double-elimination bracket and all matches will be played as best-of-three series. This is an upgrade from the previous edition, where the group stage followed the same structure but used best-of-one matches, making the opening phase more volatile.
The top two teams from each group will advance to the playoffs, which are expected to take place from July 9-12. From there, the tournament will move into a single-elimination bracket, with teams battling through to a best-of-five grand final to decide the 2026 champion.
Details about the qualification system remain unknown at the time of publishing, including whether non-tier-one teams will be eligible to compete.
With EWC VALORANT 2026 ending on July 12, the tournament is scheduled to conclude only a few days before the start of Stage 2 in several regions. In VCT Pacific, for example, Stage 2 is set to begin on July 16, leaving participating teams with only around three days to recover, prepare, and travel from Riyadh to Seoul if they reach the grand finals.
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