 | |
| Game | Overwatch |
|---|---|
| First season | 2016 |
| Continent | International |
| Most recent champion |  Saudi Arabia |
| Most titles |  South Korea (3 titles) |
| Broadcasters | |
TheOverwatch World Cup (OWWC) is an annual internationalOverwatchesports tournament organized byBlizzard Entertainment, the game's developer, with the first edition taking place in 2016. The tournament ran every year until 2019; after a three-year hiatus, the OWWC returned in 2023, and it will return in 2026 after another two-year hiatus.
The tournament format has varied in each year, with the most recent one involving a preliminary stage in which national teams competed against others in a single-elimination tournament system to claim the five qualification spots in the group stages, which also included five national teams who prequalified via ranking. Top-ranked teams from the group stage advanced to a single-elimination playoff bracket at Blizzard'sBlizzCon event every November. The first three World Cups were won bySouth Korea, while the most recent one was won bySaudi Arabia.
According to former lead game directorJeff Kaplan,Overwatch was not developed with any dedication towardsesports. Dan Szymborski ofESPN stated thatOverwatch was poised as the next big esport for having a sufficiently different look and playstyle from established esports games likeCounter-Strike: Global Offensive andCall of Duty, enough variety in maps and characters, and strong support from Blizzard to maintain the game for a long time.[2] Bryant Francis writing forGamasutra noted the speed and short match times ofOverwatch make the game highly favorable for viewership, further supporting the title as an esports.[3]Overwatch's progression into esports was described byRolling Stone as a "strategy [that] involved carefully rolling out the game in steps – first a closed beta, then open beta, then full release, then a competitive mode and finallya league."[4]
In June 2016, the esports organizerESL announced that they would host the first internationalOverwatch competition in August 2016, calledOverwatch Atlantic Showdown.[5] The competition used four open qualifiers beginning in June, followed by regional qualifiers and then a final online qualifier. Eight teams then competed for a six-figure prize in the finals to be held atGamescom 2016 from August 20–21.[6]Turner Broadcasting'sELeague announced the firstOverwatch Open tournament, starting in July 2016, with a total prize pool of $300,000, with plans to broadcast the finals on Turner's cable channelTBS in September 2016.[7]In August 2016, Blizzard announced their ownOverwatch international tournament, allowing users to vote for teams to represent their nation or region.[8][9] Over 3 million votes to decide national teams were cast.[10] TheinauguralOverwatch World Cup was watched by 100,000 people atBlizzCon 2016.[11] The South Korean team won the tournament, defeating the Russian team4–0 in the final round.[12]
In March 2017, Blizzard announcedOverwatch World Cup 2017.[10] The selection of national teams for the 2017 World Cup was different from 2016 in that participating nations were required to vote for anOverwatch World Cup National Committee.[10] The National Committees were based upon nominations chosen by Blizzard; according to Blizzard, "analysts, coaches, statisticians, and other authorities" recommended rosters for all stages of the competition.[10][13] Blizzard announced the 2017 World Cup participants in April.[14] The 2017 World Cup experienced an issue with several players on the Chinese team being denied visas to enter the United States for the final round, causing four players on the team to be replaced by substitutes.[15][16]
The 2016 format had four qualifying tournaments to thin the field for the final tournament,[17] while the 2017 and 2018 formats used an average skill rating of each country's top players to determine which countries qualified for the tournament.[13][18] Qualified teams were divided intoround-robin style groups – 4 groups in 2016, 8 in 2017, and 4 in 2018.[19][20] In every year, teams that made it past the group stages moved on a single-elimination playoff bracket.
The 2019 World Cup took place across three stages: preliminary rounds, group stages, and playoffs. A country's national ranking was determined by a point-ranking system based on final placements in the previous World Cups. Any country wishing to participate was eligible to play in the preliminary rounds, asingle-elimination, seeded bracket. The top five countries based on their national ranking were not required to play in the preliminary rounds and received abye to the group stages. The seeding was based on the national rankings, and the top five countries from the preliminary rounds advanced to the group stages.[21] The Group Stages took place on November 1, 2019. The ten countries competing in the group stages were split evenly into tworound-robin style groups. The top three countries from each group advanced to theknockout stage on November 2, with the top-ranked country from each group receiving a bye to the semifinals. The four other countries that advanced from the group stage would play in the quarterfinals.[21] The winners of the finals would be awarded a gold medal, while the losers would be awarded silver. The two teams that lost in their respective semifinals match would play each other for the bronze medal.[21]
The World Cup was broadcast throughlive stream channels via theTwitch platform.[22] Official live stream broadcast channels were provided inEnglish,Chinese,Korean,French,Russian,German,Japanese, andThai.[22] Other languages were broadcast through community–run channels on the official Overwatch World Cup team page.[22] Prior to the third edition of the event,Disney andBlizzard Entertainment announced a multi-year deal for coverage ofOverwatch esports.[1]
| Team | Champions | Runners-up | Third place | Fourth place | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| South Korea | 3 (2016,2017,2018) | – | 1 (2019) | 1 (2023) | 5 |
 United States | 1 (2019) | – | – | – | 1 |
| Saudi Arabia | 1 (2023) | – | – | – | 1 |
 China | – | 3 (2018,2019,2023) | – | – | 3 |
 Canada | – | 1 (2017) | 1 (2018) | – | 2 |
 Russia | – | 1 (2016) | – | – | 1 |
 Sweden | – | – | 2 (2016,2017) | – | 2 |
 Finland | – | – | 1 (2023) | 1 (2016) | 2 |
 France | – | – | – | 2 (2017,2019) | 2 |
 United Kingdom | – | – | – | 1 (2018) | 1 |
Source:OWWC
An MVP award for the Final Round of the OWWC had been awarded since theinaugural tournament in 2016.
| Overwatch World Cup MVPs | ||
|---|---|---|
| World Cup | Country | Ref. |
| 2016 | Gong "Miro" Jin-hyuk | [23] |
| 2017 | Félix "xQc" Lengyel | [24] |
| 2018 | Bang "JJoNak" Sung-hyeon | [25] |
| 2019 | Jay "sinatraa" Won | [26] |
| Media |
|  | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Characters |
| ||||||
| Esports | |||||||
| People | |||||||
| Related | |||||||
