PARIVISION and Team Spirit sent to qualifier rounds for The International 2026

The International 2026 direct invites were announced by Valve earlier in the day, along with the full team list for regional qualifiers.

Two big names were missing from the direct invites list, namely PARIVISION and Team Spirit. The former had just won DreamLeague Season 29, a day before the TI 2026 direct invites were announced, while Team Spirit placed third in the same tournament and, overall, had a year with many ups and downs.

While both PARIVISION, who will compete for a spot at TI 2026 under the Team Vision tag to circumvent betting regulation in China, and Team Spirit have both done enough in ESL Pro Tour to receive a direct invite to the Esports World Cup (EWC), they will now have to fight for a ticket to the most prestigious Dota 2 event of the year, The International.

- Read also: The International 2026 direct invites announced

They will both be competing in the Europe Region, which this year has the Western and Eastern Europe regions merged into a single qualifier. The silver lining is that there are four slots up for grabs, the most from all regional qualifiers. The next region to have received more than one slot is China. Two more teams will join Xtreme Gaming in Shanghai, ensuring that the host country will have a total of three teams fighting for the Aegis of Champions this year.

Much like back in the day, when TI 2019 was also hosted in Shanghai, and the Chinese organisations made every effort to have their flags represented at the most important tournament of the year, this year we will see some old names return by signing stacks at the very last minute.

In 2019, it was Newbee who signed the North American roster of a defunct Forward Gaming. This year, it’s LGD Gaming who jumped in to sign the ex-Heroic line-up, which will fight in the regional qualifiers from South America.

- Read more: LGD Gaming return to Dota by signing ex-HEROIC

The International 2026 regional qualifiers teams and schedule

June 15-18: China | 2 slots

• Vici Gaming
• Roar Gaming
• Yakutou Brothers
• Team Resilience
• +4 Open Qualifier teams

June 15-19: South America | 1 slot

• LGD Gaming
• PlayTime
• Estar Backs
• Red Hot Chili Pibble
• Amaru Gaming
• Hokori
• +4 Open Qualifier teams

June 19-23: Southeast Asia | 1slot

• REKONIX
• OG
• Execration
• Team Nemesis
• GLYPH
• +5 Open Qualifier teams

June 21-28: Europe | 4 slots

• TEAM VISION
• Team Spirit
• MOUZ
• Natus Vincere
• Nigma Galaxy
• Virtus.pro
• enjoy
• Power Rangers
• +8 Open Qualifier teams

June 24-26: North America | 1 slot

• GamerLegion
• +3 Open Qualifier teams

The International 2026 will kick off on the 3rd of August with a three-day, five-round Swiss bracket, followed by five elimination matches. The top eight teams will head to the SPD Bank Oriental Sports Center in Shanghai for the playoffs stage which will run August 20 - 23.