DreamHack comes to Birmingham, and will host ESL One Europe 2026 in Dota 2

The ESL One circuit is coming to Birmingham in the United Kingdom next year, as ESL One Birmingham 2026 is scheduled for March next year. Hotspawn attended a press event pertaining to DreamHack Birmingham at the F1 Arcade today, where ESL FACEIT Group Vice President of Festivals Shahin Zarrabi announced ESL One’s next European destination.

“The UK has one of the world’s most passionate gaming communities, yet it’s still underserved when it comes to festivals that unite every part of gaming culture,”

said Zarrabi in the press release accompanying the announcement.

ESL One Birmingham will be a Dota 2 tournament operating under the DreamHack Birmingham umbrella. DreamHack itself is the largest LAN party and gaming convention in the world, and typically plays host to several esports competitions throughout its duration. Incidentally, this is the first time that DreamHack will be held in the UK, with Birmingham joining the long list of cities to do so from both Europe, North America, and Asia. ESL One, however, has been to Birmingham thrice now.

Preliminary information

The tournament itself will feature 16 teams, first playing in a round robin group stage where half of the field will be eliminated. The surviving teams will then move on to an eight-team playoff bracket. The event will take place between March 22nd to the 29th, and will be held inside bp pulse LIVE — an indoor venue with a seating capacity of nearly 16,000. However, only the final three days of the event will be held in front of a live audience, so it’s possible that the group stage will be conducted in a different, so far undisclosed location.

Interestingly, this means that despite being branded as part of DreamHack Birmingham, ESL One Birmingham won’t actually take place in the same venue as DreamHack. The festival will be centered around the National Exhibition Centre, but it seems that some of the esports events will be held in separate places.

At any rate, ESL FACEIT Group did not mention if the tournament would be invitation-only or it will feature qualifier legs. Previous iterations of ESL One in Birmingham, the most recent one being held in April last year, did have qualifiers — but since there are 16 teams this time around instead of 12, things might change in this regard.

We’ll have the usual round of updates on the details when more information is available.