- Riot Games will no longer run Rift Rivals events for its play-in regions; Southeast Asia, Japan, Oceania, Brazil, Latin America, Vietnam, CIS, and Turkey.
- A post from Riot Games Oceania cited limited viewership and higher operational costs compared to standard league season play.
- Rift Rivals events between Europe and North America, and China, South Korea, and Hong Kong/Macau/Taiwan will go ahead as planned.
According to several announcements from regional Riot Games 
offices, all but two of the Rift Rivals regional LAN tournaments have been canceled. This affects all play-in regions; referring to League of Legends circuits that do not automatically qualify teams for the World Championship main event, and effectively ends the following competitions:
- Southeast Asia, Japan, Oceania
- Brazil, Latin America
- Vietnam, Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), and Turkey.
A post on the Oceanic Pro League (OPL) website indicated that its event was canceled as “the compelling rivalry still never really eventuated,” and that viewership for the tournament was similar to regular season OPL play, despite the higher operational costs. A similar post from the Liga Movistar Latinoamérica stated that the region was open to other integrated global events in the future.
The Rift Rivals tournaments between Europe and North America, and China, South Korea and Hong Kong/Macau/Taiwan will continue as planned. These regions are considered the strongest competitively in the global LoL esports system, and each are able to directly send their Summer Split champions, and team with the highest number of Championship Points, to the World Championship main event.
Related Article: Esports Essentials: How the League of Legends World Championship Shaped an Entire Esport
The Rift Rivals series is essentially a set of international exhibition matches, first introduced in 2017 to give teams a chance to play internationally outside of the World Championship, the Mid-Season Invitational, and All-Star event. All three of these international tournaments are sponsored by Mastercard, which became Riot Games’ first global partner last year as part of a multi-year deal.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story stated that Rift Rivals was first introduced in 2018, when it was in fact launched in 2017. We have corrected the story to reflect that.
