The final six teams for the North American Valorant Challengers league will be decided through two Challengers NA Open Qualifiers. Here is everything you need to know about the qualifying events before they kick off.
The Valorant Challengers NA league is the tier-two league below the VCT Americas league that features teams that have partnered with Riot Games. Teams who prevail in the league will participate in Challengers Ascension for a chance to enter into the partnered league. But, to make it into NA Challengers, teams need to be invited or qualify through a gauntlet of over 250 signed, free-agent and amateur teams in these upcoming tournaments.
The format is reminiscent of the previous Valorant Champions Tour tournaments in North America from 2021 and 2022 in which teams would battle through an open qualifier to make a Challengers tournament to qualify for international events. With the new league system, however, teams only need to qualify for the Challengers league to be locked into one split of competition before competing in another open event.
Below you can find all you need to know about the Valorant Challengers NA Open qualifiers.
Valorant Challengers NA Open Qualifier: How to watch
The open qualifiers will be streamed on the Knights Arena Twitch channel. Not all of the matches will get a stream, even from co-streamers, so some fans will have to follow their favorite team on the tournament page.
Many of the lower bracket matches will not be streamed, according to the tournament page, so fans should expect the broadcast to dedicate most of its time to the top teams in the upper bracket.
Challengers NA Open Qualifier: Format and schedule
The schedule and format of the open qualifiers will be as follows from the tournament page:
Challengers NA Qualifier #1 Day 1 (January 9th)
6:00PM EST Round of 256
8:15PM EST Round of 128
10:30PM EST Round of 64
Re-seed final 32 teams into double elimination bracket for Stage 2
STAGE 2 DOUBLE ELIMINATION
ALL GAMES ARE BEST OF THREE – all games are broadcasted unless specified otherwise
Challengers NA Qualifier #1 Day 2 (January 10th)
6:00PM EST Round of 32
8:15PM EST Upper Round of 16 || Lower Round 1 (off-stream)
Challengers NA Qualifier #1 Day 3 (January 11th)
6:00PM EST Quarter Finals 1 || Quarter Finals 3 (off-stream) || Lower Round 2 (off-stream)
8:15PM EST Quarter Finals 2 || Quarter Finals 4 (off-stream) || Lower Round 3 (Losers of QF 1 + 3) (off-stream)
Immediately after QF 2+4 — Lower Round 3 (Losers of QF 2 + 4) (off-stream)
Challengers NA Qualifier #1 Day 4 (January 12th)
6:00PM EST Upper Semis 1 (Winner of this game qualifies to Challengers)
8:15PM EST Upper Semis 2 (Winner of this game qualifies to Challengers) || Lower Round 4 + 5 games off stream
Challenger NA Qualifier #1 Day 5 (January 13th)
6:00PM EST Lower Round 6 Game 1 (Winner of this round qualifies to Challengers)
8:15PM EST Lower Round 6 Game 2 (Winner of this round qualifies to Challengers)
Challengers NA Open Qualifier: Teams
Over 250 teams have registered to compete in the first open qualifier, so almost every organization that wants to be in North American Valorant that isn’t already a VCT partner or a Challenger League invitee will be represented.
Here is a list of some of the major teams – from women’s squads and free-agent teams to signed rosters – that will battle it out for spots in NA Challengers.
Team
Players
Soniqs
runi, shonk, mina, nerve, PureR
DarkRatio
Trick, Ange, ZexRow, Drone, Will
Misfits Black
Slandy, Verinaa, Zoe, kxtieoh, edith
Complexity GX3
sloth, rayse, clawdia, L4CE, karra
NeverDone(VersionX)
florescent, Noia, meL, sarah, alexis
Nearest Airport
c4lypso, jmoh, acrian, geeza, Precision
City Boys
Rawkus, ZachaREEE, Paincakes, Kanpeki, Poach
Disguised
XXiF, steel, clear, genghsta, Exalt