ESL confirms six Counter-Strike 2 tournaments for 2028 season

ESL has announced its calendar dates for 2028, with it featuring six ESL Pro Tour Counter-Strike 2 Tier 1 tournaments with a possibility of one more.

The events will be held between January and October, with a short break in May-July.

With six tournaments confirmed, ESL plans to run one fewer competition than in 2025 and in the next two years. However, in the announcement, the organizer said it may add one additional Tier-1 event.

Currently, only the dates for the six planned competitions have been confirmed, with more information expected to become available in the future.

With the announcement, ESL has CS2 esports events lined up for the next three years, but there is only one remaining this season.

Succeeding ESL Pro League Season 22, Intel Extreme Masters Chengdu is the seventh and final ESL-organized event of 2025.

Scheduled to take place on November 3-9, the Chinese tournament will feature 16 teams vying for a share of the US$300,000 prize pool.

IEM Chengdu will follow the same format as previous IEM events, with two GSL-format best-of-three groups of eight teams, leading into single-elimination best-of-three playoffs with a best-of-five grand final.

The best esports bookmakers have already opened markets for the Chinese event, pricing Team Vitality as the main favorites at +250.

They sit ahead of Team Spirit and Team Falcons at +400, with FURIA (+600), The MongolZ (+750), and MOUZ (+750) rounding up a list of dangerous outsiders.

ESL 2028 event dates

• ESL Event #1 – January 26-6
• ESL Event #2 – March 3-19
• ESL Event #3 – April 10-16
• ESL Event #4 – August 2-13
• ESL Event #5 – September 16 – October 1
• ESL Event #6 – October 23-29