Evaluating the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program: What is right and wrong heading into the third year of EWC?
Applications for the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program are open, and esports organisations are being encouraged to apply.
What will be different about the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program compared to 2025? Which teams have been re-invited? Most importantly, which aspects of the program are working, and what areas are still facing scrutiny?
How will the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program work?
The Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program, like its previous iterations, provides funding and marketing support to selected teams. In total, 40 teams will receive “six-figure funding” to support their operations overall.
Operated by the Esports World Cup Foundation (EWCF), $20million USD (~£15.2m GBP) has been committed to overall support for this Partner Program.
Club Partner Program teams participate in several Esports World Cup initiatives, including actively promoting the competition on social media.
However, Partner Program teams must qualify for the Esports World Cup 2026 through traditional methods, whether through esports title performance or Last Chance Qualifiers. Competitive participation is not guaranteed.
The Esports World Cup 2026 initiative will also re-include the Super Fan Program.
In 2025, the Super Fan Program saw esports organisations collectively bring nearly 2,000 of their fans to Riyadh to support their teams in person.
However, after the 2025 program, some EWC-attending “Super Fans” alleged censorship and unequal treatment while in Riyadh. This censorship allegedly included confiscating a fan’s sign for using the word “king” in reference to an esports player.
Meanwhile, others noted preferential treatment given to Team Falcons fans, a Saudi Arabian organisation with suspected ties to the Public Investment Fund.
Regardless, the Super Fan program is expected to grow in 2026.
Director of Club and Player Relations at the EWCF, Hans Jagnow, explained that in 2026 the program aims to “deepen [The EWCF’s] global reach, supporting Clubs as they grow their communities.”
While marketing and promotion are crucial parts of the Club Partner Program, so is the raw monetary value for esports organisations.
Teams receive significant funding to purchase and maintain teams capable of qualifying for the Esports World Cup tournament. This funding links to the “six-figure funding” promised for overall operations support.
Which teams are re-invited, and how are the remaining teams selected?
The EWC directly invited eight organisations to the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program. These directly invited teams (automatically assumed to be a part of the program) are as follows:
- Team Falcons
- Team Vitality
- Team Liquid
- Twisted Minds
- Virtus.pro
- AnyonesLegend
- Gen.G
- WeiboGaming
They have earned automatic re-qualification through their placement in the Esports World Cup 2025 Club Championship.
All other 2025 Club Partnered teams must reapply for 2026.
The Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program application form heavily emphasises social media engagement.
There is also a hefty emphasis on how esports organisations have promoted and engaged with the Esports World Cup in the past. Previous Club Partnered teams likely have an advantage, with their required promotion in 2025 counting toward their 2026 applications.
In fact, disregarding the form sections dedicated to organisation contact details and region, approximately 85% of the application questions are specifically for collecting social media engagement data.
Alongside this, approximately 23% of non-organisation contact/region questions are explicitly requesting data on engagement for EWC 2025 social media posts.
However, the EWCF maintains complete secrecy in how it determines which teams are accepted.
In the application’s Terms and Conditions (which are the same as those used for the 2025 Program), it states:
“The Club acknowledges and agrees that participation in the Program is subject to the Club satisfying the applicable qualification requirements for the Program, as determined in the Foundation’s sole and absolute discretion.”
Therefore, although we know that the EWCF heavily weighs applications on engagement metrics, there is no further transparency in the application and selection process.
Why are organisations so eager to apply to the Club Partnership Program?
Instability has become a cornerstone of the esports industry. For example, in November 2025, TSM left Valorant and Sentinels exited Marvel Rivals on the same day. Teams constantly juggle esports title participation based on revenue and investment.
This balancing act has led to high-profile team exits, abandoned legacies, and widespread concern about the industry’s future.
However, the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partnership Program offers teams the opportunity to secure financial support in exchange for their marketing prowess.
By agreeing to actively promote the Esports World Cup and participate in its tournaments, accepted clubs receive active promotion on EWC media channels, coupled with a financial injection from the EWCF.
Alongside this, the weight given to previous EWC promotion in the Esports World Cup 2026 Club Partner Program application suggests that it is easier to gain repeat EWCF funding if you have already been a part of the program.
Therefore, the Club Partner Program also functions as a gateway to more stable funding in the future.
It can be reasonably assumed that successfully fulfilling the EWCF’s engagement requirements from the previous year forms a core part of the following year’s application. Through this, year-on-year engagement with the EWC becomes a crucial practice for future financial gain.
Why is it vital to continue applying critique to the EWCF model heading toward the Esports World Cup 2026?
While the Esports World Cup 2025 Club Partnership Program will most likely continue providing esports organisations with monetary and promotional benefits, it is vital to recognise that the model still has flaws.
The Club Partnership Program is part of a system that aggressively reinforces loyalty to the wider Esports World Cup system and its goals.
For example, the Esports World Cup’s Club Championship (open to all competitors, including non-Club-Partnered teams) heavily favours teams with higher budgets. Club Partnered organisations have an advantage in this area thanks to their Saudi-funded cash injection.
Many attribute Team Falcons’ repeated wins in the Club Championship to this budget-weighted model, given that the esports organisation is also backed by Saudi Arabian funding.
The overall Esports World Cup Foundation and Tournament is also a cornerstone for Saudi Arabia’s sportswashing campaign.
“Sportswashing” is the utilisation of sport-related event hosting, sponsorships, and team ownership to improve a country’s reputation. It is usually associated with countries with particularly incriminating human rights records.
Saudi Arabia is widely recognised as a country that is heavily investing in sportswashing campaigns.
The Esports World Cup 2026 will continue to play a part in these campaigns.
As the EWCF’s influence continues to expand, so will the financial and promotional incentives to join the Club Partnership Program.
In turn, esports’ participation in sportswashing will also prevail.
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