2025 promises to be an exciting year for Counter-Strike. We're hosting the first Major in the US since the ELEAGUE Boston Major, the tournament is more packed than ever, and tournament organisers such as PGL will be adding to the circuit for more than just Valve Majors.
Alongside Starladder, PGL will be returning to the CS landscape in 2025, a huge break from their previous three tournaments, the PGL Major Stockholm, the PGL Major Antwerp, and the PGL Major Copenhagen.
The Romanian tournament organiser has now announced when those events will be, with ten events total coming across 2025 and 2026.
PGL will return to CS by hosting four tournaments across 2025. With their return promising 'global tournaments across iconic landmarks', that much is evident with their opener being staged in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
They will then be back in full force in 2026, delivering six tournaments to what will surely be one of the busiest calendars in CS history.
PGL promises to deliver huge prize pools to their CS events, similar to those that are on offer at the Valve Majors.
As a result, the prize pools will be broken down as follows:
This means that each event will have a prizepool of $1,250,000, and the total investment from PGL, including the added bonuses for teams in regards to their travel and expenses during events, will be upwards of $17,000,000.
Just like Majors, PGL promises a format that will feature a 16-team Group Stage where teams will take part in a full-BO3 Swiss format.
After that, the top eight teams will advance to single-elimination playoffs, where the quarters and semis will again be BO3s before a BO5 grand final.
Teams sitting within the top 16 on Valve's ranking will be the teams invited to the events, except for those in South America, where the top 14 will be used and the top two teams from South America will take the final two spots.
Also in their press release, PGL says: "In addition to these 10 events, PGL has other surprises for the 2025-2026 calendar that will be announced at a later date."
If you want to read the full press release, including a wider rule set and financial breakdown, you can do so here.
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