Mid-Season Invitational

Mid-Season Invitational is an annual League of Legends tournament, happening between the Spring and Summer splits of all regions. The Spring Split champions of each LoL Region compete for the MSI trophy and an extra team slot for their region at LoL Worlds.

The first Mid-Season Invitational was held in 2015 in Tallahassee, Florida. The event featured the champions of the five main LoL regions and one extra team from the International Wildcard event. Edward Gaming were crowned the first ever Mid-Season Invitational Champions. Since then, four different teams earned the MSI trophy, with SKT T1 and Royal Never Give up the two teams that have won the title more than once.

In 2022, the Mid-Season Invitational will feature 11 teams, and the winners of every region in the LoL Esports ecosystem.

When is MSI LoL 2022?

Mid-Season Invitational 2022 starts on the 10th of May 2022 and ends on the 29th of May 2021. Busan, South Korea was chosen as the LoL MSI 2022 location, with three weeks of competition all taking there.

Contrary to last year, MSI 2022 tickets will be available this year. With that being said, going to Korea might be a problem due to the Covid-19 situation and the travel restrictions in the country. For most people, the best way to enjoy MSI is watching it on online through live streams that can earn you MSI drops and in-game rewards.

Watch MSI LoL Live:

MSI 2022 TEAMS

All the MSI 2022 teams are champions in their own home regions. The eleven champions and their region in LoL Spring Split 2022 are:

G2 Esports, LEC
TBD, LCS
T1, LCK
TBD, LPL
TBD, CBLOL
PSG Talon, PCS
ORDER, LCO
DetonatioN FocusMe, LJL
Unicorns of Love, LCL
Team Aze, LLA
Istanbul Wildcats, TCL
Saigon Buffalo, VCS

Due to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the LCL will not send a representative to MSI.

Read our MSI Power Rankings to find which MSI 2022 teams are the favorites in this years’ competition.

MSI 2022 Format

The Mid-Season Invitational currently consists of three stages of competition: Group Stage, Rumble and Knockout.

All 11 teams participate in the first Group Stage, divided into three groups based on seeding. All groups are set to play a double round robin format with the top two teams advancing to the Rumble Stage, while the rest of the teams are eliminated.

*Due to Russian representative not participating, we will likely see a quadruple round robin format instead in one of the groups.

Rumble Stage also features a double round robin group between the best six teams from the Group Stage. The top four teams will advance to the Knockout stage while the bottom two teams are eliminated. Finally, the Knockout Stage is a single elimination best-of-five bracket between the four remaining teams.

MSI 2022 RUMBLE STAGE

The rumble stage is the 2nd portion of the event, featuring the best two teams (six in total) from each group. The teams are set to battle in a double-round robin format with the top four advancing to the final Knockout Stage of the event. You can read our Overview and Expectations MSI Rumble Stage Games here.

MSI Schedule

The schedule at Mid-Season Invitational has already been set and all the matches are set to be played between 10-29th of May. All matches begin at 15:00 CET (13:00 UTC, 06:00 PT, 21:00 BJT). MSI LoL odds are already widely available for the opening matches.

MSI 2022 is finished, check back in a few months for updates and dates in MSI 2023.

Mid-Season Invitational Winners

The five MSI winners thus far were:

2015 – Edward Gaming
2016 – SK Telecom T1
2017 – SK Telecom T1
2018 – Royal Never Give Up
2019 – G2 Esports
2020 – ~~Cancelled~~
2021 – Royal Never Give Up
2022 – Royal Never Give Up

Mid-Season Invitational History

The MSI History started in 2015, with the tournament evolving with each consecutive iteration. The prize money, host destinations, competing teams and ruleset are constantly adapted and tweaked as the tournament grew in size and scope. Initially the LoL esports system consisted of major and minor regions with the main regions automatically participating in the MSI Group Stage, while the minor regions had to play through a Play-Ins event. Starting in 2021, all regions are on equal grounds and they are seeded based on their regions past performance in international League of Legends events.

2015 Mid-Season Invitational

MSI 2015 was the first event of its type organized by Riot Games. It was hosted in Florida, USA between 7–10 May 2015. The event featured 12 participating regions, with LPL, LCK, EULCS, NALCS and LMS automatically seeded into the main event. The remaining 7 teams played a separate International Wildcard Invitational event in Turkey to determine the final 6th participant at MSI 2015. The winner of the Wildcard event was the TCL champion Beşiktaş Esports.

EDward Gaming defeated SKT T1 3:2 in the final to claim the first ever MSI trophy.

2016 Mid-Season Invitational

MSI 2016 was hosted in China, between 4-16 May 2016. The event featured 13 participating regions, with LPL, LCK, EULCS, NALCS and LMS automatically seeded into the main event. The remaining 8 teams played a separate 2016 International Wildcard Invitational event in Mexico to determine the final 6th participant at MSI 2016. The winner of the Wildcard event was the TCL champion SuperMassive eSports.

SKT T1 defeated Counter Logic Gaming 3:0 to claim the trophy and $1,000,000 in prize money. This event was the first one to feature MSI betting at a large scale, with the final being one of the most “bet on” matches to date.

2017 Mid-Season Invitational

MSI 2017 was hosted in Brazil between April 28-May 21 2017. The event featured 13 participating regions, with the LPL, LCK and EULCS automatically seeded into the main event. The remaining ten teams played through a play-in stage to determine the three participants heading into the Main Event stage.

SKT T1 defeated G2 Esports 3:1 in the final. This event marked the first time a team successfully completing a back-to-back championship run at the Mid-Season Invitational.

2018 Mid-Season Invitational

MSI 2019 was hosted in Germany and France between 3-20 May 2018. The event featured 14 participating regions, with the LPL, LCK, EU LCS and NA LCS automatically seeded into the main event. The remaining ten teams played through a play-in stage to determine the two participants heading into the Main Event stage.

Royal Never Give Up defeated Kingzone DragonX 3:1 in the final. It marked the first time an LCK team lost a major event at the hands of a non-LCK team in over three years.

2019 Mid-Season Invitational

MSI 2019 was hosted in Vietnam and Taiwan between 1-19 May 2019. The event featured 13 participating regions, with the LPL, LEC and LCK automatically seeded into the main event. The remaining ten teams played through a play-in stage to determine the three participants heading into the Main Event stage.

G2 Esports defeated Team Liquid 3:0 in the MSI final, in the fastest international event series to date. G2 is currently the reigning MSI champion.

2021 MID-SEASON INVITATIONAL

Following the cancellation of MSI in 2020, the international tournament returned in 2021 in Reykjavík, Iceland. Despite being a fully offline event, Riot Games made sure that the various teams were able to play safely in what was essentially a ‘bubble’. Therefore, no fans were allowed in the studio.

Nonetheless, the international tournament showcased great matches all round, especially from the Rumble stage onwards. All the teams from the major regions were able to take victories off of each other, showing that the west could battle it out with the stronger eastern teams.

MAD Lions, PSG Talon, DWG Kia and Royal Never Give Up were the 4 teams that qualified for the knockout stage, with the latter two fighting in the event’s finals. In the end, RNG defeated DWG Kia 3-2 to become the 2^nd ever organization to win two MSI titles.