League of Legends Championship of the Americas 2025: Teams, Format, Divisions and more

League of Legends

31 Oct

Foo Zen-Wen

As reported earlier this year, the former leagues of the LLA, CBLOL, and LCS will all be dissolved effective end of 2024. In their stead, a new combined league has risen that will include former member organizations from those dissolved leagues.

A total of 16 teams will compete starting in 2025, separated into 2 ‘conferences’. Let us take a closer look at what it all entails and what 2025 League of Legends will bring.

A Total Rebuild Across the Board - Press that big RESET button

Riot are hitting the big reset button when it comes to their League of Legends leagues (see what I did there?). After the inarguable superior success found by their new esport title VALORANT and the introduction of the partner leagues there in late 2022, it felt almost inevitable that Riot would attempt to replicate their success while simultaneously hiding the older models in the back.

So, as a result, the LEC and the LCK have already announced new formats earlier this week. But for the LCS especially, larger systemic changes needed to come in. Despite improvements and a slight resurgence in interest from the community for the now defunct league, the LCS’ model showed its age and it needed to be taken behind the shed.

In its place, we have the League of Legends Championship of The Americas. Much like VCT Americas in VALORANT (which includes 12 teams as of 2025), the Championship of The Americas is Riot’s new model for the combined North and South American regions.

LTA North and LTA South

Right, so the League of Legends Championship of The Americas, or LTA for short, will include 2 ‘conferences’. That being LTA North and LTA South. LTA North includes 6 LCS partner teams, an LLA partner, and a guest team. Similarly, LTA South includes 6 CBLOL partner teams, an LLA partner team, and a guest team. That makes for a total of 8 teams per conference, or 16 teams in total in the LTA.

Credit: Riot Games

LTA North

LTA South

Disguised and Isurus will perform in the ‘Guest Team’ slot in 2025. According to the Riot Games edict, they will compete in the league as per usual during the year. However, at the end of the 2025 season, Disguised will have to defend their slot in the league for the next season from representatives of the NACL (North American Challengers League) and LRN (Liga Regional Norte). Meanwhile, Isurus will have to do the same against representatives of the CBLOL Academy and LRS (Liga Regional Sur).

Moreover, 100 Thieves has elected to sell their slot back to Riot Games and Riot Games has agreed to the sale. For 2025, 100 Thieves will still have access to the LTA and international tournament but it will mark the final year of their involvement with League of Legends for the foreseeable future most likely, as they will not be eligible to participate in the Promotion Tournament at the end of 2025 in case they change their mind.

One Year, Three Splits - LTA Year One

The format for the LTA for 2025 (both leagues) will be as follows:

3 splits
Live audience in attendance (unclear if it's for the whole stretch but most likely will be)
Competition will largely be kept within their respective conferences, with successful teams at the end of each split converging for a separate clash.

Split 1 will begin with a double-elimination Bo3 tournament in Fearless Mode, pitting all 8 teams per conference into one double bracket. The top 4 teams to emerge from each bracket will then meet in Brazil and compete against one another. This next stage includes a single-elimination in Bo3 format. Finals will be Bo5 format and the winner earns the spot to the new international event reported on earlier.

In Split 2, teams will play in a double round-robin Bo1 format. The top 6 teams from each conference will enter into a double-elimination playoffs bracket (separate conferences). The winner is crowned the conference champion and earns a spot to the Mid-Season Invitational (MSI).

In the final split, Split 3, there will be an introduction to a new format, dubbed ‘Pick & Play’. The Bo3 format will be kept but at the end of each week of competition, teams will select their opponents for the following week live on stage. Opening matchups will be determined based on Split 2 rankings and teams with the worst match and game records will be the ones to challenge teams with better records.

Few rules:

Teams aren’t allowed to challenge an opponent they’ve already faced.
Standings from Split 2 serve as tiebreakers.

Road to Worlds

In the final part of the season, there will be a culmination in the form of a new tournament called the Americas Regional Championship. This doesn’t include the top seeds from each conference, who get automatic qualification to Worlds. For the remaining 14 teams, they will have to duke it out for one single spot and the LTA Championship trophy while they’re at it. Fun times.

Residency Rules

Something interesting that was included with the latest news is that teams will be allowed to select one of their players to act as their ‘local resident’. That allows teams flexibility in constructing their roster, as long as the nationality of their ‘local resident’ is not overridden as the majority. So, if you have a North American player as the designated ‘local resident’, the team can’t then field 3 Koreans. But 2 North Americas, a Brazilian, and 2 South Koreans is perfectly acceptable.

Rotating Arenas

As part of Riot’s efforts to improve viewing opportunities and cross-regional support, each year will see a rotation of locations for key events on the LTA calendar. For example, in 2025, the Split 1 Playoffs (see section on Split 1) will take place in Brazil, while the Americas Regional Championship (see section on Split 3) will take place in North America.

An Interesting Refresh, Potential for Better Competition, and a Needed Change

The LCS has seen a consistent decline in recent years in terms of viewership. Meanwhile, for the esports fans, the LCS, CBLOL, and LLA teams have not been able to field competitive teams that can actually contend with the best teams in the world (except for FlyQuest at this Worlds).

The hope is that with a better qualification process and fewer slots to Worlds, the batch of teams that do go to international events will improve. Moreover with the ability to build more cross-regional teams, the hope is that the level of teams and competition will improve overall.

For the latest League of Legends news, follow Strafe Esports. To follow everything on Worlds 2024, check out our full guide. Also follow the Strafe YouTube channel for exclusive interviews with your favorite players and coaches.

Featured Image Credit: Riot Games

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