The 10 Highest Esports Prize Pools

The top esports games span the entire breadth of gaming, but only a handful titles go that bit further, and have prize pools that break records. Looking at games that have the highest prize pool in esports, there’s some titles which dominate. Games which have more money flowing to winners than most of the major titles put together. But the highest esports prize pools do include quite a few major events.

These are the highest we’ve ever seen! We’ll be covering individual events here though. The esports events with the highest prize pools ever, not their yearly instalments. Otherwise, this would simply be a list of various Dota 2 esports events. These are the top esports with the highest prize pools ever:

Highest Prize Pool in Esports

10 Esports Events with Highest Prize Pools

10. Peacekeeper Elite League 2022 Spring

This PUBG event might not make the top 10 if we include duplicate events, but it has been one of the most lucrative if we only give one slot to each tournament. This event was a seasonal split or PUBG Mobile. Featuring a prize pool of over $4 million. Which makes it one of the esports events with the highest prize pools.

9. PUBG Global Championship 2021

Next is another PUBG tournament, the 2021 Global Championship. This had a prize pool of over $4 million too! It was a lengthy, multi-stage tournament of teams from around the world. This prize pool, like a lot of the biggest esports prize pools, was boosted by crowdfunding too.

8. Call of Duty League Championship 2020

Call of Duty is one of the best-selling video game franchises of all team, but compared to some games, its esports have sometimes lagged behind a bit. The Call of Duty League tried to make up for lost time though, growing to become one of the esports events with the highest prize pools in 2020. This season of the Championship concludes with a $6,000,000 prize pool.

7. LoL World Championship

The World Championship for League of Legends has risen to make the list of esports events with the highest prize pools! But its prize pool has gone down in more recent years. It was just under $6.5 million in 2018. It dropped after this, with crowdfunding making up an increasing part of the prize pool.

You’d think a game as big as LoL would have more tournaments with the highest esports prize pools. But only Worlds has cracked the list so far.

6. PGI.S 2021 Main Event

The 2021 PGI.S was the Global Invitational for PUBG. Where the best 32 teams from across the globe competed in a tournament together. It features a prize pool that was above $7 million! The highest esports prize pool for PUBG to date.

5. King Pro League Grand Finals 2024

A lot of the esports events with highest prize pools are from past years, with tournaments seeing their prize pool drop in the years afterwards. This is one of the most recent tournaments to crack the top 10 though! Proof games are still putting up the highest prize pool in esports.

The King Pro League Grand Finals or 2024 had a prize pool of just under $10 million for the top Honor of Kings players.

4. Honor of Kings International Championship

Next is the International conclusion to Honor of Kings. One of the esports events with the honor of having multiple instalments crack the top 10 highest prize pools. This event’s biggest prize pool to date was $10 million in 2022. With another prize pool of just a few hundred thousand lower in 2023.

3. Riyadh Masters 2023

The 2023 Riyadh Masters makes another Dota esports tournament that cracks the top 10 esports events with the highest prize pools. It’s not quite on the level of the International. But the Riyadh Masters has managed one of the highest prize pool in esports overall.

2. Fortnite World Cup

Back in 2019, Epic launched Fortnite esports with a huge commitment to funding. The first big international event was the World Cup, which had a total prize pool of over $15 million or Solos, and the same for Duos. For over $30,000,000 overall.

It’s a figure that they’ve never matched since. We now get FNCS events, which have millions in prize money but not on this level. The prize pool made Bugha one of the highest earning players. Fans are always eager to see the World Cup format return, but Epic’s gone a different way since.

1. The International

First place will be a surprise to no one. The International.

The finale for Dota 2 has long held onto the title of esports events with the biggest prize pool. Year after year. The singular event with the highest esports prize pool was 2021. Where the International reached a staggering $40 million. This proved to be a watershed year though. After this, the prize pool stopped exceeding its record each year.

Newer Internationals events have beaten a lot of the other highest prize pool in esports for other games. But they haven’t beaten the 2021 record. If we were listing the individual tournaments with the highest esports prize pools, the Internationals’ various editions would be most of the top 10. Even with total coming down lately.

Highest Esports Prize Pools Overall

Those are the events with the highest prize pools, but what about the highest overall prize pools? If we don’t limit each event to its biggest year, then this is what the top 10 looks like: