League of Legends fans are interested in the LPL again as the league attracted its highest viewership outside of China in the last couple of years.
Excluding the hard-to-verify Chinese viewership, the LPL 2026 Split 1 final drew in a peak audience of over 251k viewers, making it the most-watched LPL event since Spring 2024’s peak of over 292k according to Esports Charts.
Two of China’s biggest teams, Bilibili Gaming (BLG) and JD Gaming (JDG), clashed in a five-game thriller during the LPL 2026 Split 1 final. The fact that it was two prestigious orgs and a full five-game series heavily benefited the viewing figures. Plus, the two behemoths had not faced each other in a final since Spring 2023.
Meanwhile, the LPL’s peak viewership came in 2020 at just shy of 350k when Top Esports and JDG clashed in the Summer Playoff finals. This was during the league’s heyday, coming off the back of LPL teams winning the previous two LoL Worlds tournaments (Invictus Gaming in 2018 and FunPlus Phoenix (FPX) in 2019. Before that, an LPL team had never lifted the Summoner’s Cup.
Only one other LPL team has won Worlds, and that was EDward Gaming in 2021. Though Weibo Gaming and BLG finished as runners-up in 2023 and 2024, respectively.
LPL struggles
There have been concerns over the future of the LPL for a while now, with petering interest and financial issues.
In 2025, Riot decided to stop running an official English broadcast for the LPL itself. Instead, it opened up the co-streaming rights and a lot of up-and-coming broadcast talent banded together to create their own broadcast while mastering their craft.
Additionally, this year’s LPL features two fewer teams after the departures of two of its most high-profile organisations, former World Champions FPX and one of China’s most decorated teams in Royal Never Give Up.
Despite this, the league is still going strong and big-name players like Zhuo ‘Knight’ Ding and Chen ‘GALA’ Wei continue to draw viewers in.
Plus, the league has been boosted by the co-streams of Brazilian creator Gustavo ‘baiano’ Gomes, whose LPL streams overtook that of Marc ‘Caedrel’ Lamont in terms of hours watched.
Still, it will always be difficult for the LPL to compete with the dedicated Western audience that South Korea’s LCK has. Especially with T1 and Lee ‘Faker’ Sang-hyeok.
Do you enjoy watching the LPL or just wait for international tournaments? Let us know on the Insider Gaming Discord.
And find out who LPL finalists BLG and JDG will face in the LoL First Stand opening matches.
