TI 2026 Teams — Invites, Qualifiers & the Roster Shuffle

The roster of TI 2026 teams is half-settled: seven organisations hold direct invitations and two more — LGD Gaming and Vici Gaming — have qualified, while the remaining berths are still being decided across Europe, North America and Southeast Asia.

Sixteen sides will eventually fill the Shanghai field, and watching it assemble is part of the fun. The invitations went out in late May, the qualifier routes are filling the rest, and the late-spring roster shuffle reshaped several line-ups before any of this began. This page keeps the confirmed names, the pending slots and the shuffle context apart so you always know what is real. The qualifier tracker follows the open spots in detail.

The TI 2026 teams that earned a direct invite

The The International 2026 teams that received direct invitations were announced around 26 May. Six of the seven are European organisations — Aurora Gaming, BoomBoys, Team Falcons, Team Liquid, Tundra Esports and Team Yandex — while Xtreme Gaming carries the Chinese invitation. These sides skipped the qualifier grind entirely on the strength of their season, and they form the backbone of the field that the qualifier winners will join.

Counting heads is the easy way to track the TI 2026 participants as the field fills. Seven invited sides plus the qualified pair already make nine of the sixteen, leaving seven berths for the unfinished regional brackets to award. That running total is the cleanest snapshot of how complete the line-up is on any given day, and it grows only when a result is real rather than rumoured.

How the post ti shuffle reshaped rosters

The post ti shuffle is the off-season churn that always follows a championship, when players move between organisations and fresh line-ups form. Several of the invited sides carry rosters that look different from the squads fans remember, which is why we describe lineups carefully — Tundra's listed five, for instance, is best read as the invited Tundra roster rather than assumed unchanged. If a confirmed roster is in any doubt, this page hedges rather than states.

That caution matters more than usual this year because the field is still forming. A direct invite guarantees a slot but not a frozen line-up, and every confirmed TI 2026 roster can still change a player right up to a registration deadline. The results tracker will show how these lineups actually perform once the group stage begins, which is the only real test of any shuffle, and the home overview keeps the confirmed names in one place as they settle.

The TI 2026 direct invites versus the qualifier slots

Separating the TI 2026 direct invites from the qualifier path keeps the picture honest. Seven sides were handed places; nine more must earn them. Two of those nine are now filled by LGD Gaming and Vici Gaming, leaving seven berths in play across the unfinished regional brackets when this snapshot was taken. No Southeast Asian representative existed yet, so any claim of a completed field would have been premature.

• Seven direct invites, six European plus Xtreme Gaming from China.
• LGD Gaming in from South America; Vici Gaming in from China.
• Seven qualifier spots still open at this snapshot.
• No PH-region side confirmed; SEA bracket still running.

For the running tally of who has joined since, the home page overview and the odds guide both reflect the confirmed names as the field closes. We add sides only when their qualification is real, never on the strength of a strong run alone.

If following the roster drama tips into staking money on it, keep GamCare bookmarked for sensible, no-pressure guidance on staying in control.