Johannes Prandl

Luminosity playoffs qualification was sealed by a win over NIP, sending the Canadian organisation through after a decisive 3-2 group-stage run. The post Rainwaker-led Luminosity Survive Three-Way Playoff Race appeared first on Esports Insider.

Asian Games esports will feature 25 Japanese players across nine titles in 2026, amid questions over the discipline's place in multisport competition. The post Japan’s 25 Esports Players Head to 2026 Asian Games appeared first on Esports Insider.

StarSeries Fall 2026 sees NRG beat world No. 2 MOUZ 2-1, earning an upper-bracket semi-final and a major VRS ranking boost for the North Americans. The post NRG climb 18 VRS places after MOUZ upset appeared first on Esports Insider.

Team Yandex signs ATF as its new offlaner after Team Falcons' exit, adding a second The International champion ahead of PGL Wallachia Season 9. The post Team Yandex adds TI champion ATF to 2026-2027 roster appeared first on Esports Insider.

StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2026 brings eight teams to Barcelona from Sep. 17–20, with $500,000 on the line and a compact double-elimination bracket that leaves little room for a slow start. With both Team Spirit and Team Falcons absent, the field is missing the two teams ranked above the leading StarSeries contenders. That leaves MOUZ, Vitality, … Continued The post StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2026 predictions: Which teams can win in Barcelona? appeared first on Esports Insider.

The world of esports business never slows down. Whether it’s tournament organizers expanding their presence into new markets or organizations inking deals with new sponsors to support their ambitions, partnerships are happening all over the world.  Compared to high-profile tournaments and blockbuster roster moves, business deals often fly under the radar, even though some can … Continued The post ESI business roundup: BLAST’s Mongolian expansion, Riot Games considers prediction market dea

Women’s esports has two clear centers of gravity. VALORANT has spent five years building Game Changers into a global circuit with regional competitions, open qualifiers, and an annual world championship. Meanwhile, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (MLBB) has taken a different route, leveraging its massive Southeast Asian audience to host some of women’s esports’ biggest events. … Continued The post VALORANT vs. MLBB: Which game dominates women’s esports? appeared first on Esports Insider.

iTero, the AI-powered coaching app from GIANTX (formerly XL Esports) recently hit the 1,000,000 download milestone. The milestone comes after an impressive period of growth following the 2024 acquisition by the LEC organization. The story of the company starts a little less glamorously, with Jack Williams, a former Deloitte employee finding himself banned from every … Continued The post Jack Williams on iTero, GIANTX, and the future of AI coaching in esports appeared first on Esports Insider.

Sportsbook supplier Data.Bet is now offering clients short-term crypto and commodity prediction markets to supplement its esports betting product. The markets will allow users to wager on whether the prices of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum will rise or fall in short time spans. Additionally, users can wager on the price changes of commodities … Continued The post Data.Bet joins surge into short-term crypto markets to supplement esports betting appeared first on Esports Insider.

From age 12, Seth Young got into competitive gaming. He said it became serious between the ages of 17 and 22 when he rose through the ranks in CS2 and got paid to play. While he still has a soft spot for esports, it has taken a back seat as he focuses on what he … Continued The post “It pains me to say, I don’t think the esports market is there yet”: ROLR CEO on esports betting in the U.S. and standing out in the betting market appeared first on Esports Insider.

Last weekend’s VCT Americas matches sparked heated discussions within the global VALORANT esports community. With LOUD’s successful dark horse run in the Stage 2 Lower Playoffs Bracket all the way to a second-place finish, Masters London winner Leviatán was pushed out of VALORANT Champions qualification. The Argentinian esports organization has now become the first team … Continued The post Should VCT change its qualification rules after Masters London champion Leviatán missed out on Cha

For many years, Fnatic was considered the strongest team in the VCT EMEA circuit. With two international trophies under its belt and countless global VCT appearances, Fnatic’s consistency and regional dominance stood out amid EMEA’s glaring struggles compared to other VCT regions. Heading into the 2026 season off the back of two top-2 international finishes … Continued The post “I wish I was better”: The downfall of Fnatic’s VALORANT team appeared first on Esports Insider.

Every year, the Mid-Season Invitational (MSI) gives us what should be our first proper answer to one of League of Legends’ biggest questions: who is actually the best team in the world? The strongest teams from across the world meet, and eventually the best of them are thrown into best-of-five series against each other. By … Continued The post Can MSI performance predict Worlds success? appeared first on Esports Insider.

VALORANT Champions Shanghai arrives at the end of a 2026 season that has refused to settle on a single dominant team, region, or even a definitive player. That unpredictability has been reflected at almost every major event. Nongshim RedForce clinched the Masters Santiago title; LEVIATÁN took the Masters London title but failed to qualify; 100 … Continued The post Eight players to watch at VALORANT Champions Shanghai appeared first on Esports Insider.

Sportsbook supplier BETBY has launched SlotBets, a new interface that could turn esports betting into a casino style slot game experience. “SlotBets transforms live sports and esports into a simple, fast, and familiar slot experience,” the company said. It promises its partners to bridge the gap between sports betting and casino gaming. “Watching sports becomes … Continued The post BETBY bringing slots betting to esports for continuous gameplay appeared first on Esports Insider.

Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (MLBB) launched globally in 2016 and found extraordinary success in Southeast Asia (SEA), becoming one of the region’s biggest mobile esports titles. Even as Free Fire led installs and Honor of Kings emerged as a major challenger, MLBB has remained SEA’s leader in engagement and revenue. It took a traditionally PC-heavy … Continued The post How MLBB built an esports empire across Southeast Asia appeared first on Esports Insider.

The International has always sold Dota 2 as a global competition, yet the teams carrying each region’s banner have rarely been national squads. Instead, rosters have usually comprised a mix of players from different countries, making team-level labels a poor guide to where TI’s strength actually comes from. To look beyond the organizations, I analyzed … Continued The post Who really owns The International? A regional analysis of TI history appeared first on Esports Insider.

There’s a Nintendo Direct tomorrow (September 9th) and there’s a rumor that we will get the first confirmation that Super Smash Bros. 6 is on the way. This isn’t really a big surprise or secret: Kirby’s father, Masahiro Sakurai, has been saying he wants to work on another Smash for years now. He just needed … Continued The post Here’s what Super Smash Bros. 6 needs for the esports scene to grow appeared first on Esports Insider.

As the dust settles on the 2026 VALORANT Champions Tour (VCT) Stage 2 events, we turn our attention to the crowning event of the year: Champions Shanghai. At the heart of the discussions is one simple question: which teams are the strongest in each region? Building on an earlier analysis of the strongest VCT regions … Continued The post VALORANT’s strongest teams in each region before Champions Shanghai appeared first on Esports Insider.

On August 28th, VCT China organization FunPlus Phoenix issued a statement announcing that it had “terminated all cooperation” with its IGL and controller, Blendi “kovaQ” Kovaci. According to FPX, the player made “inappropriate remarks while communicating with teammates during a game.” As a result, the organization launched an internal investigation in cooperation with Riot Games … Continued The post Esports players know how to compete, but esports orgs need to teach them how to beh

The changes to League of Legends’ Tier 2 system have long been whispered about, but the lack of commitment has created a regional imbalance among teams. Riot has now made its first step in making Tier 2 a healthier ecosystem. The company announced a collaboration with TJ Sports to host the 2026 World Star Challengers Invitational, … Continued The post “I have always worried about the livelihood of Tier 2″: 2026 World Star Challengers Invitational gives hope and opportunity to struggling

Last week, a video of North American Counter-Strike trash-talk went viral, as SportsBetExpert’s Shane “shane” Dressler was recorded yelling at Without a Roof’s Jake “Stewie2K” Yip after winning a series 2-0 at FRAG Midwest St. Louis 2026.  In this (primarily) one-sided altercation, shane got right in Stewie’s face and started calling him out, telling him … Continued The post Stewie2K gets called out for old skin stealing scandal, but public shaming is the only solution in CS2 ri

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate hasn’t had an update since June 2025, but Nintendo just had to barge into the competitive space when it saw players attempting to thrive. Developers woke from their slumber like Godzilla sensing another kaiju landing in Tokyo and decided it was necessary to drop Patch 13.0.5, which only came with one … Continued The post Latest patch has FGC saying Nintendo can’t leave competitive Super Smash Bros. Ultimate players alone, bruh appeared first on Esports Insider.

The International brought together the top 16 Dota 2 teams in the world, with Team Vision lifting the Aegis of Champions. The total prize pool was $3.32 million, but the top 10 traders at Polymarket earned over $5.3 million between them. Team Vision took home $1.46 million as it joined the list of winners to … Continued The post Dota 2’s biggest winners don’t play Dota 2 anymore, they trade it appeared first on Esports Insider.

The 2026 VALORANT Champions Tour (VCT) season has already produced two very different international results. The earlier Masters Santiago saw two Pacific teams meet in the grand final, while Masters London saw an unlikely Americas team win from the lower bracket. Ahead of VALORANT Champions 2026, we crunched the numbers from two major events this … Continued The post Pacific vs. Americas: Which VALORANT region is truly the strongest in VCT 2026? appeared first on Esports Insider.