Immediately following the 2022 League of Legends Championship, Riot Games announced the Play-In and Group Stage groupings for the 2022 World Championship. Determined via a lottery-style drawing at the annual Worlds Draw Show, this year’s groups definitely will not disappoint.

Play-In Groups

The preliminary event, which kicks off on September 29th in Mexico City, Mexico, will determine which four of the twelve lowest seeded teams at the event will qualify for the main event (the Group Stage). Called the Play-In stage, this event is identical to the play-ins seen in traditional sports. It is designed to weed out the weakest teams and produce teams that will make the Group Stage much more competitive.

This year, the three pools used to create the groups were as follows:

Pool 1

  • LPL4: Royal Never Give Up (RNG)
  • LCK4: DRX
  • LEC3: Fnatic
  • PCS2: Beyond Gaming

Pool 2

  • LEC4: MAD Lions
  • LCS3: Evil Geniuses
  • VCS2: Saigon Buffalo
  • LJL1: DetonatioN FocusMe

Pool 3

  • LCO1: Chiefs Esports Club
  • TCL1: Istanbul Wildcats
  • LLA1: Isurus
  • CBLOL1: LOUD

Using these pools, the teams were distributed into one of two groups: Group A and Group B. The teams from the first pool were drawn first. The odd-numbered teams were placed into Group A, and the even-numbered teams were placed into Group B. This process was repeated with Pool 2 and Pool 3 until every team had been assigned a Group.

Because the LEC3 and LEC4 teams had been drawn into the same group, MAD Lions—the second of the two to be drawn—was automatically reassigned to the opposite group as Fnatic (Group B) as teams from the same region cannot be placed into the same group.

The groupings determined from the draw were as follows:

Group A

  • Fnatic
  • Beyond Gaming
  • DetonatioN FocusMe
  • Evil Geniuses
  • LOUD
  • Chiefs Esports Club

Group B

  • DRX
  • RNG
  • Saigon Buffalo
  • MAD Lions
  • Istanbul Wildcats
  • Isurus

Current community predictions favor Fnatic, RNG, DRX, and MAD Lions to make it out of the Play-In Stage based on the strength of their regions relative to the rest of the teams.

Group Stage Groups

The main event, which kicks off on October 7th following the conclusion of the Play-In Stage, will take place in three different cities. The Group Stage and Quarterfinals will be held in New York, New York at the Hulu Theater in Madison Square Garden, The Semifinals will be held in Atlanta, Georgia at the State Farm Arena: the home of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks. And the Finals will be held in San Francisco, California at the Chase Center: home of the NBA’s Golden State Warriors.

This year, the three pools used to create the groups were as follows:

Pool 1

  • LPL1: Jingdong Gaming/JDG Intel Esports Club/JD Gaming (JDG)
  • LCK1: Gen.G
  • LEC1: Rogue
  • LCS1: Cloud9 (C9)

Pool 2

  • LPL2: Top Esports
  • LCK2: T1
  • LEC2: G2 Esports (G2)
  • PCS1: CTBC Flying Oyster (CFO)

Pool 3

  • LPL3: EDward Gaming (EDG)
  • LCK3: Damwon Gaming KIA (DWG KIA)
  • LCS2: 100 Thieves
  • VCS1: GAM Esports

Drawn in the same style as the Play-In Stage, these twelve teams were put into four groups of four. While there are 16 total slots and only twelve teams to fill them, each group retains a vacancy for one of the four teams that qualify from Play-Ins. These vacancies will not be filled until the conclusion of play-ins and still follow the same regional rules as the play-ins with the exception of LEC3 and LEC4. If both MAD Lions and Fnatic qualify, one of them is allowed to be placed in the same group as another LEC team.

The groupings determined from the draw were as follows:

Group A

  • Cloud9
  • T1
  • EDG
  • TBD *MAD Lions or Fnatic

Group B

  • JDG
  • G2
  • DWG KIA
  • TBD *MAD Lions or Fnatic

Group C

  • Rogue
  • Top Esports
  • GAM Esports
  • TBD *DRX

Group D

  • Gen.G
  • CFO
  • 100 Thieves
  • TBD *RNG

Although the Play-Ins are by no means guaranteed to go as the asterisks suggest, these teams are considered the strongest of the twelve Play-Ins teams. The reason RNG and DRX and guaranteed Groups D and C, respectively, is because those are the only groups without an LPL or LCK team. Because of the groupings rules for teams of the same region, these are the only available groups for these two teams to go to.

MAD Lions and Fnatic, on the other hand, can go into either Group A or B. While Group B contains a LEC team already (G2), the same-region rule will not apply to one of MAD Lions or Fnatic. The team that it does apply to will go to Group A. Similarly, if Evil Geniuses make it out of Play-Ins over MAD Lions or Fnatic, they will go to Group B, and the LEC team will go to Group A.