Riot Games announced on August 1 that the biggest tournament of Valorant – Valorant Champions 2026 will be hosted in Shanghai, China. This is the second time, Shanghai hosted an international Valorant tournament, after the success of the VCT Masters Shanghai in 2024. Especially, Riot Games determined that Champions 2026 was the next step in Riot Games's world journey with Champions events.
In 2024, the journey began in Korea – the Pacific area. By 2025, the Champions tournament will be held in Paris, France, which is also the first time the country has hosted a Valorant Champions event. In 2026, the event held in Shanghai, China and in 2027 will be a country in the Americas. It is predicted that the tournament can be hosted in Brazil when the US has held the Champions 2023, while Canada has just hosted Masters Toronto recently.
At the end of 2027, the loop will return to the Pacific area and continue in the following years. It can be seen that Riot Games is very prioritizing in China, from creating a separate area or continuously hosting professional tournaments of professional Valorant.
In recent years, Chinese Valorant has achieved many remarkable achievements. Emerging from the middle of 2023 with the success of the Edward Gaming team, China officially became a private area of Valorant with the name VCT CN since the beginning of 2024. Right in August 2024, Edward Gaming has become the world champion, bringing the first international title for this area.
By 2025, Chinese teams are still impressive. Although Edward Gaming was in a formal form after the world championship, Wolves Esports showed extremely impressive at Masters Toronto 2025 recently to win the position in the top 3.
The Valorant Champions 2026 in Shanghai, the teams in the Chinese region will receive more opportunities to develop regional strength, follow Asia's dominance with the world Valorant from between 2024 to the present time.
