The Round 1 matchups for the 2026 Demacia Cup Global Invitational are set. The twelve invited teams open the online Swiss Stage on October 3 with six best-of-ones. With the same-region avoidance rule in place, every opening matchup pits two different regions against each other:
The LPL and LCK only cross paths once in Round 1, and it comes with the hosts involved. JD Gaming, who stage the knockout rounds at their home arena in Beijing, take on HANJIN BRION, the LCK's third seed at the event. With a single game to settle it, the loser starts the Swiss Stage on the back foot before the BO3s even begin.
Team Vitality get a Korean opponent straight away. The LEC's fifth seed face BNK FEARX, sixth in the LCK Season, in a Europe-versus-Korea tie that offers an early read on where the two regions stand at this event.
From Round 2 onwards, the rest of the Swiss Stage switches to best-of-three series and two wins are enough to advance. Teams that drop to 0-2 are not out yet — they enter a round robin that decides the remaining spots. Eight teams in total will reach the offline knockout stage in Beijing, played from October 12 to 17 with every series a best-of-five.
