The legacy of The International and its gargantuan prize pool continues. As of around 2:30 a.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, August 26th, the prize pool for the tenth iteration of the Dota 2 world championship tournament broke the all-time record, surpassing the previous mark of $34,330,068.
The International retains its crown as the single most lucrative esports event in history. (Photo courtesy Valve)
This means that as of the time of writing, Dota 2 players around the world have so far contributed more than $32 million to the pot via the TI10 Battle Pass released on May 25th this year. Publisher and developer Valve placed the base value of the prize pool at $1.6 million, the same amount as in previous years, upon unveiling the Battle Pass in May. Likewise, this also marks the ninth year in a row of The International’s reign as the single most lucrative event in esports history. The Fortnite World Cup came close to beating this record in 2019, but was overtaken by TI9 shortly before the former began.
According to the Dota 2 Prize Pool tracker created by Team Secret manager and community figurehead Matthew “Cyborgmatt” Bailey, the current prize pool is around $2.2 million more than where it was at the same time last year.
The timing of the prize pool surpassing the previous record is quite surprising, however, given that Valve recently announced that they had not yet decided on whether or not The International 10 would indeed be held this year or next year. So far there are no invited teams, no scheduled qualifiers, and no finalized location — and yet the pot has already grown to the largest sum the esports industry has ever seen thus far.
Regardless, with 24 days remaining in the Battle Pass period (the pass itself expires on September 19th) and more goodies still to be released, there’s still some time for the total to eclipse the $35 million mark and beyond. Perhaps Valve will implement one final Battle Points sale to cap off this year’s crowdfunding campaign in order to boost sales some more?
For a full list of cosmetics, features, and other bonuses included in the 2020 Battle Pass, check out all the details on the official landing page.
