Months after announcing Shanghai, China, as the host city for The International 2026, Valve has revealed the tournament’s venue, format, and schedule.
The 15th edition of Dota 2’s crowning event will take place at the Oriental Sports Center, featuring 16 of the best teams from across the globe competing for the Aegis of Champions.
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While The International headed to Shanghai back in 2019, the event was held at the Mercedes-Benz Arena. That said, the Oriental Sports Center is known for hosting the 2017 League of Legends Worlds Semi-finals, the Counter-Strike 2 Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024, and other sporting events.
Dota 2 The International 2026 Format and Schedule
The International 2026 will feature 16 teams. The line-up will consist of organisations invited directly to the event, along with those qualifying through Open and Regional Qualifiers. The Open Qualifiers will run from June 9th to 12th, while the Regional Qualifiers will be organised from June 15th to 28th.
All 16 squads will begin the campaign in a Swiss-style Group Stage scheduled from August 13th to 16th. From there, the top eight teams will advance to the Main Event to battle in a double-elimination bracket to crown the champion.
Valve will reveal ticketing information for The International 2026 in the near future.
The International Viewership
Although The International 2025 became the third most popular Dota 2 event in terms of peak viewership, it couldn’t break into the list of the top 10 most-watched esports events of the year.
With the tournament returning to Asia for the first time since 2022, it will be interesting to see whether it will be able to set new viewership records. For comparison, TI 2025 peaked at 1.78m viewers, while the 2022 edition that took place in Singapore achieved a similar peak viewership of 1.75m.
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