The full lineup for Thunderpick World Championship 2026 has been officially announced. The tournament will take place from October 14 to 18 at the BLAST Arena studio in Malta, featuring 8 teams competing for a total prize pool of $1 million.
This will also be one of the last important opportunities for teams to earn Valve points before the November 2 Singapore Major invitation deadline.
Falcons and defending champions FURIA will headline the tournament as the only two world top-five teams in the field. In addition, Legacy, fresh off winning FISSURE Playground S3, and Aurora bring the total number of world top-ten teams competing to four.
South American team 9z and two Russian teams BETBOOM and PARIVISION have also received invitations to the tournament.
The final spot belongs to Virtus.pro. They successfully broke through the closed qualifier, and with this qualification have entered the global VRS top 30.
This will also be Virtus.pro's first major international LAN event since IEM Chengdu 2025. Only b1st and tO0RO remain from that lineup on the current roster.
This edition of the Thunderpick World Championship will start with two double-elimination groups, with two teams from each group advancing to the semifinals, followed by a single-elimination playoff.
Except for the Grand Final, which uses BO5, all other matches are BO3.
The participating teams for Thunderpick World Championship 2026 are as follows: