Largest eSports Prize Pools

The prestige rate of a gaming tournament is not determined only by the size of its prize pool. What the largest eSports prize pools do is point everybody related in the industry towards a specific event. For the past decade, with the tech evolution, many companies like Twitch helped digital gaming reach a larger audience and increase the number of gamers.

The larger the viewership, the more massive increase in the eSports prize money on offer. You can see the meaning of that with the $13.8 million paid off in 2012 and the over $215 million awarded in 2019. A quarter of the eSports prize pools was given at the Valve's annual Dota 2 event the same year. The first place was for the OG team, with a reward of $15.6 million out of the whopping $34.3 million event prize.

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eSports Prize Pools

The total amount of money (a.k.a. prize pool) distributed among the winners in an eSports event has swept loads of revenue. The world of digital gaming is expanding and increasing in monetary value. Even the remunerative cash paid to the players is colossal. On top of that, the online betting enterprise might be drawing near with some of the best online casino sites for 2024. That can only mean one thing – a sensational jump in the net worth of eSports industry and online gambling.

The main string, pulling eSports higher are the competitions, just like traditional sports. The flow is similar, with all the smaller local tournaments sifting through the player base. Most of them are not even reaching the headlines, but their purpose is different from forming the top eSports prize pools.

Top eSports Prize Money Tournaments

You can get an idea of the bigger picture by checking the value of the top eSports prize pools so far. The niche in the industry is continually shifting, and the events in the table below are up to date with the time this article was written. Each competition tends to grow in both prizes and viewership every year and that makes eSports betting UK all the more relevant. In the table below, you can have a glance at the most massive prizes offered to participants, keen on playing video games and doing it at their best.

eSports Event eSports Prize Pool 1st Place 2nd Place 3rd Place eSports Tournament Insides
The International 2019, Shanghai $34,330,069.00 OG – $15,620,181 Team Liquid -$4,462,909 PSG.LGD – $3,089,706 The 9th annual Dota 2 World Championship hosted by Valve. It was held at Mercedes-Benz Arena. 12 teams were directly invited. The event had over a million viewers.
The International 2018, Vancouver $25,532,177.00 OG – $11,234,158.00 PSG.LGD -$4,085,148.00 Evil Geniuses – $2,680,879.00 The 8th annual eSports event for the Dota Pro Circuit. A new point system determined who was invited. Eighteen teams competed on the 7.19 version of Dota 2.
The International 2017, Seattle $24,687,919.00 Team Liquid – $10,862,683.00 Newbee – $3,950,067.00 LGD.Forever Young – $2,592,231.00 It was held at the KeyArena in Seattle Center with 17,000 seat capacity. Not a big event but with huge eSports prize money on the table. The original prize pool was $1,600,000.
The International 2016, Seattle $20,770,460.00 Wings Gaming – $9,139,002.00 Digital Chaos – $3,427,126.00 Evil Geniuses – $2,180,898.00 A routine event where 16 teams played the 6.88b version of Dota 2. The eSports prize pool was filled by the enormous sales, inflating the prize from the initial $1,600,000 pool to $19,170,460.
The International 2015, Seattle $18,429,613.00 Evil Geniuses – $6,634,660.68 CDEC Gaming -$2,856,590.02 LGD Gaming – $2,211,553.56 The organisers from Valve paid $1,600,000 out-of-pocket to make the event possible and $16,829,613 came from sales and filled the eSports prize pool.
The International 2014, Seattle $10,931,103.00 Newbee – $5,028,308.00 Vici Gaming – $1,475,699.00 Evil Geniuses – $1,038,455.00 Four teams qualified and eleven received a direct invite to compete for the eSports prize money. The tournament featured broadcast talents like TobiWan (Toby Dawson), 2GD (James Harding) and Kpoptosis (Bryan Herren).

Top Earners by eSports Event and Player

The global eSports industry according to public gaming resources, is now dominated by the battle strategy titles like Dota 2 and League of Legends. Riot Games and Valve present the largest eSports prize pools at the moment. Competitive gaming compared by eSports earnings looks like this:

  • Dota 2 – that game had handed out more than $219 million in eSports tournament prizes
  • Fortnite – a royal battle with $100 million prize pool
  • Counter Strike: Global Offensive – with $87.1 million
  • League of Legends – with $73 million
  • Starcraft II – a strategy game by Blizzard with $32.1 million eSports prize pool

We can say that these are the leading representatives of the professional gaming industry. The most popular eSports games form some of the of the top eSports prize pools tournaments offering gamers millions of reasons to keep on participating. Such a competitive environment had raised and paid over $700 million in eSports prize pool money. A professional gamer can earn up to $15,000 per hour only from broadcasting games on live-streaming platforms. One of them is ‘Bugha’ or Kyle Giersdorf, age 16, a Fortnite streamer. His age only helped him pop up as the 12th highest ranked winner with over $3 million in total winnings. See who are the biggest individual earners at the moment in the world of eSports:

  • Johan Sundstein – a 26-year-old Danish player a.k.a. ‘N0tail’ masters Dota 2 and runs the OG team as its captain. In 2019 he earned more than $3 million in winnings, while the amount his whole team made was $6.8 million
  • Jesse Vainikka – another OG team Dota 2 player from Finland also known as ‘JerAx’. His overall earnings throughout his career are over $6.4 million in total
  • Anathan Pham – a 20-year-old Australian member of the OG team seen in the industry as ‘ana’, had managed to earn about $6 million from Dota 2
  • Sebastien Debs – a.k.a. ‘Ceb’ is a French gamer and the fourth-highest earner again with Dota 2 speciality from the OG team
  • Topias Taavitsainen – or ‘Topson’ from the OG team playing Dota 2 comes as the fifth earner for the team

The Largest eSports Prize Pools Earnings by Game

We would like to present an overall perspective of the top eSports prize pools at the moment, which will help you visualise the immense scope of the business. Digital gaming is on a rapid growth among competitive players, which brings loads of attention. That leads to major streaming companies, gaming hardware and software providers investing and getting involved in eSports tournaments even more within every year. Take a look at some of the constantly growing eSports prize pools with a whiff of the past:

eSports Event Pool Prize Now Pools Before
The International 9 $34.3 million $1.6 million for about 3 years from 2011 to 2013. Then the curve went straight up making the event the largest eSports prize pool
The 2019 Fortnite World Cup Finals $30.4 million Epic battles leaving Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf with a solo win of $3 million and another $3 million split in a duo final pushed the event to its largest eSports pool in 2019
The 2018 League of Legends World Championship $6.4 million For the first time in 2017 Riot Games allowed the overall eSports prize pool to be increased to its 2018 amount by in-game items purchases.

FAQ on eSports Prize Pools

Let’s wrap it up in several Q&A, marking the largest eSports prize pools. We add some details to reveal the tremendous scale of the business. Competitive digital gaming started small, but have evolved and reached millions of players. The industry is now related to live-streaming companies, investors and many more. Every purchase and involvement create each eSports prize pool, which will benefit players and companies.

🔝 What is the largest prize pool in eSports?

eSports prize pools have been evolving and becoming bigger and bigger with time. When the money at stake is a tasty bite, more players sign up, and even more investors participate. The largest eSports prize pool at the moment is the 2019 Dota 2 tournament offering $34.3 million for the winner.

💰 Which eSports game is with the highest prize pool?

The leader in that category has been shifting in time. The major representatives throughout the years with the heaviest impact on the eSports prize pools are mainly strategic and shooting related. The leader in prize pool size is Dota 2 with its millions collected and rewarded over the years.

🙎 Who is the winner with the top eSports earnings?

We can say that the leading teams in digital gaming combine some of the best players in the industry. In that line of thoughts, the richest tournament brings the best teams and players. That is why, the captain of the winning team at Dota 2 has earned the most from practising his hobby for money.

🥇 Who won The International 2018 eSports competition?

It was held in Vancouver and it was a change of the scenery for a bit. Loads of events were held in the largest gaming arena in Seattle. The winners back then were the OG team, with a win of a bit over $11 million out of that eSports prize pool.

🏆 Who is the youngest winner of an eSports prize pool?

eSports prize pools combine various gameplays, which attract diverse players. Gamers with longer experience qualify higher and rank for the highly rewarded events based mainly on Dota 2 and CS: GO. That have cleared the way for the 16 years old Fortnite streamer going home as No.12 from the highest winners in eSports.

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