Riot outline LCS 2026 tournaments and formats

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Last Updated: 06/11/2025

The LCS has announced the formats for its LCS 2026 events in a video hosted by the LCS Commissioner. Mark Zimmerman.

2026 sees the North American League of Legends ditch the LTA branding and formats after only one year, reverting to its previous LCS branding.

South America will also return to CBLOL 2026, with the NA and SA circuits no longer intertwined.

LCS 2026 teams

LCS 2026 will feature the following eight teams:

• FlyQuest
• Team Liquid
• Cloud9
• Sentinels
• Shopify Rebellion
• Dignitas
• LYON
• Disguised*

*Disguised occupies the Guest Slot, with all other teams being Partner Teams.

LCS 2026 Lock-In

LCS’s return will start with LCS Lock-In, starting on January 24, with the winner qualifying for First Stand, League of Legends’ first international tournament of 2026.

The tournament will feature a Bo3 Swiss Stage, where the top five will advance automatically to the playoffs.

The sixth and seventh placed teams of Swiss will play a tiebreaker series to determine the last spot in the all Bo5 six-team playoff bracket.

The top four teams will enter the playoffs in the upper-bracket, where the number one seed can choose their first opponents from seeds two-four.

The remaining two teams will join the playoffs in the lower-bracket, meaning the tournament is single-elimination for seeds five and six, but double-elimination for seeds one-four.

“This will make Split One have 50% more games than 2025,” Zimmerman adds.

LCS Spring and Summer 2026 formats

LCS Spring will start with a Bo3 Round Robin group stage, with the top six qualifying for the Playoffs.

LCS Spring Playoffs will follow the same structure as Lock-In, with four teams entering the upper-bracket and two entering the lower-bracket in the Bo5 bracket

The Winner and Runner-up of LCS Spring will qualify for the League of Legends Mid-Season Invitational (MSI) 2026.

LCS Summer also sees six teams qualify for the Bo5 playoffs, but in Summer’s format, the top two teams advance to Round 2 of the Upper-Bracket, with the fourth-sixth seeds starting in Round 1.

The number one seed can then choose which team they play in Round 2.

The format is full double-elimination, with every team getting two lives as the teams fight for LCS’s three Worlds 2026 spots.

Zimmerman clarified that more news was to follow and would be announced at the start of 2026 as the LCS transitions back to its old branding and region.

Certainly, there are some details to iron out, such as the promotion/relegation format for Disguised’s Guest Slot in the league.

However, most NA fans are at least content to have their own League back, with LTA’s English-language viewership collapsing after the transition to LTA’s joined system.

After a tumultuous period of North American League of Legends, whether those fans will come back to LCS remains to be seen.

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.

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