Anyone can enter, nobody can qualify from the wrong region, and the money is split in ways that surprise newcomers. A primer on how competitive Fortnite is organized.
Finding the event is the easy part. Registering, showing up prepared, and surviving your first bracket take a little more care.
Three wins advance, three losses go home, and a strength-of-schedule number picks your next opponent. A primer on the format that now runs esports' biggest qualifying stages.
Open qualifiers, closed qualifiers and regional finals are the ladder between a team's home region and the world stage — every major title runs a different version, and the details decide who gets a chance.
Publisher guarantees, crowd funding and state-backed mega-events: the three funding models behind esports prize pools produce wildly different numbers — and the biggest pool is almost never the healthiest scene.
Play-ins, a Swiss stage and an eight-team knockout: the Worlds format is a month-long funnel that turns twenty qualified teams into one champion — here is how each stage filters the field.