ESL announces dates for three IEM events in 2026

The 2026 Counter-Strike 2 calendar continues to take shape. The next slate of events that have been announced and promised include three tournaments from ESL, specifically fitting into the Intel Extreme Masters format.

The tournaments will be taking the action to the United States, Brazil, and China. The first of 2026 will be IEM Brazil, with this planned for April 13-19, with the exact location to be confirmed at a later date.

Following up to this will be IEM USA between May 11-17. While the finer information has yet to be revealed once again, it might be worth noting that this year's IEM Dallas happened at DreamHack Dallas in May, and there has been a DreamHack event in the US around the May period for some years. Perhaps we're in store for a team up once again.

Lastly, IEM China will happen between November 2-8 and we'll get to learn additional information in the near future too.

Each event, being an IEM tournament, will offer a $1 million prize pool, with 16 teams qualifying and battling it out for a slice of the pie. The format will reflect current IEM tournaments too, meaning we can expect "two groups of 8 teams playing double-elimination. Each group will see the top three placed teams advance to the playoffs. The playoffs will feature 6 teams, play out in a single-elimination bracket and feature a third place decider match. All matches will be played best-of-three maps, except the Grand Final which is best-of-five."

The ESL will share more information about its 2026 and 2027 calendars in the future.