Sports are beautiful and we have truly relished some memorable moments over the course of the last three decades.
While traditional sports have a worldwide fan following for a range of sports including rugby, cricket, football, and more, esports has emerged as one of the most exciting and enthralling genres of competition in recent years.
Just like how teams and players compete against each other in conventional sports, there are teams and individuals who play against each other in the gaming world for a prize and of course, pride and bragging rights.
Esports has grown from strength to strength in terms of popularity over the last decade. The growing popularity can be attributed to a host of factors including talented and charismatic esports athletes, legacy teams, and some nerve-biting matches between esports teams.
Although the pandemic put the brakes on offline competitive gaming events, normalcy seems to have been restored.
While there were only a handful of esports events in the past couple of years due to travel restrictions in many countries, 2022 has a lot to offer.
There are some amazing esports events lined up in 2022, and we are pretty sure you would not like to miss them.
So mark your calendars and let’s explore the top esports events in 2022.
SEE ALSO: Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) in Gaming: Present and the Future
Esports events in 2022
1. 2022 FIFAe World Cup
- Location: Online
- Dates: To be confirmed
We are all looking forward to the FIFA World Cup in Qatar at the end of this year. Having said that, a new FIFA competition with a different flavor will grace us in 2022 in the form of the 2022 FIFAe World Cup.
It is an online tournament that will be hosted in different parts of the world. The event is organized by Electronic Arts (EA) and FIFA.
We will see representatives from different clubs compete against each other. In addition, the regions have been divided into ten different regions.
The first stage of the event is the league model online qualification, after which the best organizations and clubs will fight for the FIFAe World Cup title.
2. 2022 VCT Masters 1 Stage 1
Location: Online
Dates: April 2022
The 2022 Valorant Championship Tour (VCT) will feature three competition levels including Challengers, Masters, and Championship.
The VCT will take place throughout the year between February to December. The top teams from different regions of the world will participate in the event after facing off with regional teams in their respective regions.
- Stage 1: Challengers
The Challengers phase kicked off in February 2022 and ended on 1st March 2022.
- Stage 2: Challengers
Stage 2 of VCT will take place in May and June 2022.
- Stage 3: Masters and Last Chance Qualifier
This will be the last stage of this competition which will decide who will compete in the main event of the Valorant World Championship.
3. 2022 ESL Pro League Season 15
- Location: Online
- Dates: November 2021 to Apr 10, 2022
This is a seasonal Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament that is organized by ESL. The competition ended with a grand final in April 2022 which saw the FaZe Clan triumph over ENCE.
The tournament was held only in the European region.
4. The International 11 & Dota 2 Pro Circuit 2022
As we all know that things have changed in the Dota world over the past three to four years. The introduction of the Dota 2 Pro Circuit in 2017 has received mixed reactions from the Dota community.
It is primarily a point-based qualifying format in which teams compete against their regional competitors to earn a spot in Dota’s biggest tournament The International.
Although Valve has not revealed the location of the event yet, we are all looking forward to one of the most prestigious esports events of the year.
5. Free Fire World Series 2022
- Location: Online
- Dates: 21st May 2022
The top Free Fire teams from around the world will feature in the 2022 Free Fire World Series. The third edition of the event was initially scheduled around late 2021. However, due to the complications put forward by the pandemic, the event was canceled altogether.
The qualifications for the event have already started and the finals will be held on May 21, 2022.
6. Dreamhack Summer 2022
- Location: Elmia, Jönköping, Sweden
- Dates: 18th to 21st June 2022
The pandemic put a dent in Dreamhack’s ambitions of hosting this event in 2021. However, Dreamhack is back with another exciting event, the Dreamhack Summer 2022 which will take place in Sweden.
Dreamhack events are best known for their different esports tournaments. The Dreamhack summer tournament will also host the ESL Pro League Conference along with a host of other esportS events.
7. 2022 Asia Pacific Predator League
- Location: Japan
- Dates: To be announced
We will see the fourth iteration of the Asia Pacific Predator League this year. The event takes us to the beautiful nation of Japan where eleven teams from ten countries from the Asia Pacific region will compete against each other.
Before the main event, there will be qualifiers to find the best of the best from each country.
8. 2022 Asian Games
- Location: Hangzhou, China
- Dates: 10th to 25th September 2022
Yes, you have read this right. The 2022 Asian Games is a unique esports event as competitive gaming makes its debut here.
We will see players fighting for the medals across eight games. These games include Dota 2, FIFA, Asian Games version of PUBG Mobile, League of Legends, Arena of Valor, Street Fighter V, Hearthstone, and the Dream Three Kingdom 2.
Every game has a gold, silver, and bronze medal up for grabs.
Some more esports events in 2022
Apart from these 8 esports events, we will see many more competitive gaming tournaments in 2022.
The list is never-ending.
Some of the other notable events in the gaming circuit include IEM China 2022, APEX 2022, 2022 Pokemon World Championships, IEM Cologne 2022, and more.
SEE ALSO: Recap of the 8 Biggest Gaming Events in 2021
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Feature Image Source: Castiblanco2000 used under the license Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International
