Starting this July, the Esports World Cup will commence – a unique “Esports Olympics” featuring over 20 different disciplines, many of which often remain less visible to our community. Using the EWC as a prime example, we decided to delve into which countries exhibit dominance in specific esports disciplines. For this analysis, we selected eleven popular games that will be featured in Riyadh.
Note: Qualifiers for EWC 2025 are not yet concluded in all disciplines, so in some instances, we will refer to statistics from the previous year`s EWC (this will be indicated separately).
Specific Discipline Analysis [1]
This discipline generally has four regions: America, China, EMEA, and Oceania. Despite the abundance of players from the USA, recent trophies have been split between teams from China and Asia, and mixed European rosters.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Unexpected Countries:
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Mobile Legends
In Mobile Legends, representatives from Southeast Asia have long reigned supreme, contesting all the major trophies among themselves. Teams from the CIS region sometimes attempt to challenge their dominance. North America and Europe (with the exception of Turkey) are practically unrepresented in the top tier here.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count in 2024:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Unexpected Countries:
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PUBG Mobile
A noteworthy fact: the prize pool for the mobile PUBG tournament is larger than that for the PC version event. As is common in most mobile games, the professional PUBG Mobile scene features numerous representatives from Southeast Asia. However, Brazilians and, surprisingly, Mongolians also stand out significantly here.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count (2024):
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Unexpected Countries:
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PUBG (PC)
Although the prize pool for the PC version of PUBG is a million dollars less compared to the mobile version, significantly more players will be featured in the tournament, as rosters here consist of five esports athletes (whereas in PUBG Mobile, they are four). Here, Brazil didn`t even make it into the top three countries with the highest number of players, taking an honorable eighth position.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count (2024):
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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League of Legends
In League of Legends, things remain largely consistent: Koreans dominate, while Chinese teams strive to challenge them. Europeans primarily play a secondary role.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Specific Discipline Analysis [2]
Despite broad representation from North America, last year only “one and a half” rosters from this region made it into the top 5 — the remaining spots were taken by Europeans and CIS players. In 2025, the number of US representatives will be almost double that of 2024.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Unexpected Countries:
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Free Fire
Here is another mobile “battle royale.” This game once actively sought to enter the CIS market, but currently, there are no representatives from our region at the top level. This also holds true for North America, China, and Europe. However, for instance, Free Fire has separate qualifiers for Pakistan and Bangladesh. In the latter, for example, 24 professional teams competed to secure a spot at the EWC. But the discipline`s leaders are, of course, representatives from Thailand.
Top 3 Countries by Player Count (others have significantly fewer):
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Call of Duty: Warzone
In Call of Duty: Warzone, the primary regions are North America and Europe. Slots for the tournament are also allocated to representatives from MENA (specifically two spots), South America, and Oceania. Players completely absent from this discipline are those from the CIS, China, and Southeast Asia. Surprisingly, English players appear in significant numbers here, which is rare to find in other disciplines.
Top 5 Countries by Player Count:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Dota 2
In Dota 2, mononational teams exist only in the CIS, China, and Peru, although the latter have declined this season despite consistently ranking among the top in terms of representatives at events like TI over the past three years. China, however, will be represented by only one team at EWC 2025, and even that team includes Singaporean player Poloson, resulting in only four players from the Celestial Empire.
Top 3 Countries by Player Count:
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CS (Counter-Strike)
Modern CS is one of the most diverse disciplines in esports. At the tier-1 level, teams from the CIS, Europe, North and South America compete, and recently, even Asia has joined through Mongolians and China. Both mononational rosters and diverse mixes have always been plentiful here. Therefore, no single country currently dominates in CS.
Top 3 Countries by Player Count:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Specific Discipline Analysis [3]
Top 5 Countries by Player Count in 2024:
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Previous Year`s Winner:
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Unexpected Countries:
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