The First Olympic Esports Games Go to Riyadh in Twenty Twenty-Seven and the Winners Get Trophies Instead of Medals
The IOC has committed to a twelve-year partnership running to 2037, with the Esports World Cup Foundation providing the organisational backbone and a Road to the Games qualifying programme feeding it.
The inaugural Olympic Esports Games will be held in Riyadh in 2027, under a twelve-year partnership between the International Olympic Committee and Saudi authorities that runs to 2037. Winners will receive gold, silver and bronze coloured trophies rather than Olympic medals.
What is settled
| Item | Status |
|---|---|
| Host | Riyadh, Saudi Arabia |
| First edition | 2027 |
| Partnership | Twelve years, to 2037 |
| Organiser | Esports World Cup Foundation providing backing |
| Awards | Trophies, not Olympic medals |
| Qualification | A Road to the Games programme |
| Titles | Not yet announced |
The trophy detail is the whole argument
Not awarding medals is the IOC drawing a line it can hold. A medal is the Olympic movement's own currency and handing one out for a video game title published by a private company creates a precedent that is hard to walk back. A trophy is a competition prize. It lets the IOC run the event, take the audience and keep the medal table clean.
The Esports World Cup Foundation link
The same foundation that runs the Esports World Cup is providing organisational backing, and the IOC is leaning on qualification frameworks it already oversees. That is a practical decision. Building an international qualifying structure for a dozen game titles from scratch would take longer than the gap to 2027, and the foundation has already done it at scale, including a 2026 Esports World Cup in Paris that reported 850 million viewers.
It also means the Olympic esports project inherits the criticism attached to Saudi investment in sport. The sportswashing objection is the one raised most often, and a twelve-year host commitment rather than a rotating host city makes it harder to answer.
What is not settled
The title list. Reporting has pointed to battle royale, MOBA, first-person shooter and racing titles, and named League of Legends, Valorant and Rocket League as likely, but none of that is confirmed. The publisher relationships are the hard part of the negotiation, because each title is owned outright by a company that can decline.
Where it sits on Playdash
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Partnership length, awards format, organiser and qualification details as published in IOC announcement coverage. The title list is unconfirmed and the games named above are reported expectations, not confirmations. Correct at the time of writing on 29 August 2026.