Apeks have been officially relegated from the Valorant Champions Tour (VCT) EMEA league after a difficult season.
After losing 2-1 to KOI, they have failed to qualify for the Playoffs and have not met Riot Games’ performance requirements to maintain their place.
They won’t have a chance to defend their VCT spot at Ascension 2025 and will not compete in Valorant’s top tier in 2026.
Apeks has failed to win a single series across the Kickoff event, Stage 1, and Stage 2, picking up a 0-11 record.
They are one of the only VCT teams in the world, FURIA being the other, that have failed to win a single series since the Kickoff events.
Apeks have one match left this year to end their streak of losses, but it comes against reigning EMEA champions Fnatic.
After reaching the Valorant Masters Toronto final, Fnatic are one of Valorant betting sites’ favourites to win Stage 2.
The match against Fnatic will sting even more for Apeks too, considering they are the ones who took their brightest talent.
After earning promotion through the Ascension tournament, Apeks lost Kajetan ‘kaajak’ Haremski to Fnatic and have struggled to recover since.
That’s not to say they don’t have a talented roster. Apeks signing Penny for VCT EMEA Stage 2 was a solid attempt to change their fortunes.
The Canadian led the way in yesterday’s series as Apeks took the lead against KOI by winning 13-9 on Lotus.
However, KOI completely outclassed them on the next two maps, winning 13-4 on Ascent and 13-8 on Haven.
Having failed to qualify for the Playoffs, Apeks consequently can’t compete at this year’s Ascension promotion tournament either.
And Gentle Mates, who are also a promoted team, could potentially be in danger of facing the exact same fate.
Riot’s rules are that if a team is promoted from Ascension, they need to qualify for Champions, the biggest event of the year, to automatically hold onto their VCT spot.
Otherwise, they need to qualify for Stage 2 Playoffs or finish in the top eight for Championship points to earn a spot at Ascension.
Otherwise, they are automatically relegated and will have to compete in Challengers, the second tier, in 2026.
Currently, Gentle Mates are bottom of their group and look likely to miss out on an Ascension slot too.
This would mean that Ascension EMEA would be made up entirely of Challenger teams, and two new teams will be promoted to VCT EMEA for next year.
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