The League of Legends World Championship is the annual professional League of Legends world championship tournament hosted by Riot Games and is the culmination of each season. Teams compete for the champion title, the 70 pounds (32 kg) Summoner's Cup, and a US$1 million championship prize. In 2017, the finals were watched by 60 million people, breaking 2016's finals' viewer record. The tournament has been widely praised for its ceremonial performances, while receiving attention worldwide due to its multiple dramatic and emotional series.
The League of Legends Championship Series (LCS) is the name of two professional League of Legends eSports leagues run by Riot Games. Twenty teams compete in two separate competitions in Europe and North America, with ten teams per continent. Each annual season of play is divided into two splits, spring and summer and conclude with play-off tournaments between the top six teams from each region respectively. At the end of the season, the winner of the summer split, the team with the most championship points, and the winner of the gauntlet tournament in each league qualify for the annual League of Legends World Championship.
The LCS represents the highest level of League of Legends play in Europe and North America. The European League of Legends Championship Series (EU LCS) has a promotion and relegation system similar to that found in many other European sports, such as football: The bottom teams in the EU LCS from each split compete with the top teams from the European Challenger Series (EU CS) to compete for spots in the next split of the EU LCS. The European Challenger Series is composed of six teams: three teams which failed to advance in the previous promotion tournament, one team from the previous EU CS split, and the top two teams from ranked ladder play in the public League of Legends online game server. The North American League of Legends Championship Series (NA LCS) has a franchised league, consisting of 10 teams. However, even franchised teams can still be expelled from the NA LCS for poor performance. Contrary to the EU LCS, this does not happen through a promotion and relegation tournament against the top teams from the secondary league, and expelled teams are unable to re-enter the NA LCS.
With the exception of some touring events, all games of the LCS are played live at Riot Games' studios in Adlershof, Berlin, Germany and Los Angeles, California, United States. In addition to a small studio audience, all games are streamed live in several languages on Twitch.tv, YouTube and Azubu, with broadcasts regularly attracting over 300,000 viewers.
The popularity and success of the LCS has attracted significant media attention. On September 30, 2016, the French Senate unanimously adopted the last version of the Numeric Law, significantly improving the visa process for LCS players and eSports athletes in general, giving a legal frame to eSports contracts, introducing mechanisms to ensure payment of cash prizes, specifying rights for minor eSport athletes, and more. A few months before, France also introduced a new eSports federation, France eSports, which has the duty to be a representative body of eSports towards the government and serve as a Partner of the French National Olympic and Sports Committee for all matters relating to the recognition of electronic sports as sport in itself. The US government is also granting athlete visas for LCS competitors. The first LCS player to be awarded a P visa was Danny "Shiphtur" Le. The LCS has attracted sponsorships from Acer, Coca-Cola, and American Express. "League of Legends Championship Series" is a Delaware limited liability company.