Riot has announced the Valorant Champions Tour, a year-long tournament circuit for 2021 that will feature regional events and culminate in a global LAN finals.

Overview of the Valorant Champions Tour (full resolution)

The circuit will feature three tiers of competition: Challengers, Masters, and Champions. Three sets of Challengers-Masters competition will be played before the final Champions event in December.

Challengers

Challengers will be regional and run similarly to First Strike and Ignition Series events, where competitions are hosted by third-party tournament organizers.

Each challenger stage spans six weeks and is comprised of three separate tournaments culminating in a final. The individual tournaments will feature eight teams who earned their spot through an open qualifier. The eight best teams from the three tournaments will advance to the Challenger finals, which will award qualification slots for the next Masters event.

The first set of Challenger events is set to start in late January.

Masters

Masters events will take place immediately following the corresponding Challenger event. These tournaments will remain regional until the global COVID-19 situation improves and be limited to the 8-team format of the Challenger finals.

International Masters events will feature 16 teams and award circuit points for the final Champions event in December. The team who wins the last Masters event of the year will also automatically qualify for the Champions and grant an additional team slot for their region.

Four last-chance qualifiers will be held following the third Masters event through which four additional teams—one per continent—will qualify for Champions.

Champions

Champions is the final event of the year slated for December 2021 where a global champion will be determined on LAN.

The event will span two weeks and feature 16 teams qualified through either circuit points, the last Masters event, or last-chance qualifiers.

OCE, CIS, TURKEY, MENA

The footer of a Challengers infographic contains the following notes:

  • OCE teams will have qualification paths through NA events
  • CIS, Turkey, and MENA teams will have qualification paths through EMEA events

Notably, the ping disadvantage presents an effectively insurmountable obstacle for teams within the OCE region if the qualification path includes online play.