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Major fighting games event series, the Evolution Championship Series (aka Evo), has revealed today additional details for its inaugural Evo Awards powered by Qiddiya.
The 2025 Evo event calendar kicks off on February 15th in Los Angeles with the inaugural Evo Awards, ‘to celebrate the icons of the fighting game community and the future trailblazers.’
Voting is now open across 21 categories at evo.gg for fans to celebrate their favourite moments and players. Hosted by international talent Majin Obama with featured special guests including Maximilian Dood, the invite-only event will be streamed live on Evo’s Twitch Channel, along with never-before-seen announcements from some of Evo’s publishing partners.
As part of the pre-show, FGC legends Justin Wong, Michael ‘IFC Yipes’ Mendoza, Sanford Kelly and Duc Do will take centre stage for a Marvel vs Capcom 2 ‘Tournament of Champions’.
Evo Awards 2025 categories
- Best Pop Off
- FGC Content of the Year
- FGC Meme of the Year
- Comeback of the Year
- Match of the Year Award
- Best Commentator Duo
- Best Commentator Call
- Best Custom Hardware
- Best FGC Cosplay
- Best Dressed
- Best Button of the Year
- Tech of the Year
- Marketing Campaign of the Year
- Fighting Game Release of the Year
- They’ve Got Next
- Best FGC Local
- Invitational of the Year
- Content Creator of the Year
- Commentator of the Year
- Player of the Year
- Moment of the Year
Evo 2025 in Las Vegas gets expanded game tournament line-up, brings back Top 8
Organisers have announced plans for their flagship Evo event in Las Vegas, which is seeking to become the largest tournament in esports history once again.
The Las Vegas Convention Center will host Evo’s biggest event of the year from August 1st to 3rd and welcomes back Chipotle as presenting partner for the third year in a row.
Evo is also launching an extended tournament line-up featuring Aether Studios’ Rivals of Aether II, SNK’s The King of Fighters XV, Arc System Works’ Blazblue Centralfiction and Guilty Gear Xrd REV 2, and more. Evo will share more details during the Evo Awards.
Registration to compete is now open at evo.gg in the featured Arena tournaments, including:
- SNK’s Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves – 1st appearance at Evo
- Cygames’ Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising – 2nd appearance at Evo
- Arc System Works’ Guilty Gear -Strive- – 4th appearance at Evo
- Capcom’s Marvel vs Capcom 2 – throwback tournament
- Warner Bros. Games’ Mortal Kombat 1 – 2nd appearance at Evo
- Capcom’s Street Fighter 6 – 3rd appearance at Evo
- Bandai Namco Entertainment’s Tekken 8 – 2nd appearance at Evo
- Arc System Works’ Under Night In-Birth II Sys:Celes – 2nd appearance at Evo
Spectator tickets for the three-day fighting game tournament and culture festival are also on sale February 15th on the Evo website, including a ‘refreshed ticketing experience for fans to purchase designated tickets for the Arena tournaments in the largest capacity for an Evo Arena to date’.
Organisers are promising more seats and bigger screens in the arena, and a return to a Top 8 format there, from a Top 6.
Fans can also explore more than 600,000 sq ft on the show floor, connecting them as a community and culture. Evo promises an even larger arcade with massive dedicated freeplay console areas.
The Evo Art Museum will also return and will host featured guest artist JB Style and more to be announced. Classic FGC art will also be available in the museum gift shop, along with meet and greet opportunities during the event. VampyBitMe will host the Cosplay Contest as part of the Evo Art Museum programming.
Rick Thiher, General Manager of Evo, said:
“Evo continues to iterate and expand on what it means to be the world’s largest fighting game festival. This year we’re excited to be seeing new games on-site and are thrilled by the extended tournament lineup, expanded arcade, new featured artists, and community programming that is bringing fighting game culture to every corner of the show.”
Rick Thiher, Evo
The Evo Showcase will also return with special events, industry panels, reveals and more, along with publisher booths, game-inspired photo opps, the Artist Alley showcasing fighting game focused artists, and the Qiddiya Legends Lounge.
In 2024, the Las Vegas event featured 10,244 competitors becoming the largest tournament in esports history.
More Evo events in 2025 including Japan and France
Evo also returns to Japan on May 9th to 11th at Tokyo Big Sight and will also feature two five-on-five tournaments with Street Fighter III 3rd Strike-Fight for the Future- and Virtua Fighter 5 R.E.V.O.
Evo will make its European debut at the Palais des Expos in Nice, France, on October 10th to 12th and also announced it will expand to Singapore in 2026.
Evo was established in 2002 after a series of local arcade tournaments run by Tom and Tony Cannon were first held in 1996.
Evo is owned and operated by RTS and Sony Interactive Entertainment.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
