Riot Games Opens Up Gambling Sponsorship Deals  

Esports organizer Riot Games is poised to sanction teams playing in its League of Legends (LoL) and Valorant competitions to negotiate sponsorship deals with betting companies.

The move applies strictly to elite tier one teams competing in Asia, the Middle East, the Americas and Europe, and with key restrictions as to how this may appear. 

More pertinently, Riot Games-owned broadcasts and social media channels will remain free of betting advertisements and content, with any sponsored branding, advertising, and content restricted to each team’s own digital, broadcast, and social channels

Furthermore, Riot Games will vet all prospective gambling-based team partnerships before approval and mandate integrity checks for every team.

While limited to tier one teams, tier two teams will benefit from a portion of all Riot Games revenue from sports betting sponsorships, which will be reinvested into training, prize money, tournament infrastructure, integrity, and other important aspects.

Following the move, Riot Games president for publishing and esports, John Needham, stated, “Historically, this has been a restricted sponsorship category, and Riot has not engaged with betting companies. Teams have asked us to reconsider our stance, and after years of analysis to ensure we got it right, we agreed it was time to open up this category to create more revenue opportunities for teams.”

“Sports betting – and more specifically, esports betting – is a space that more fans choose to engage with every year. According to Sportradar, the total betting turnover globally involving just LoL Esports and VCT reached $10.7 billion in 2024. But here’s the problem: 70% of bets across all sports are placed in unregulated markets with bookmakers who aren’t licensed.”

“We believe it’s better to engage in allowing betting sponsorships — thoughtfully, carefully, and with the right protections — than to sit on the sidelines while risks to fans and integrity go unchecked.”

This move comes at a time when Riot Games has ambitions to grow its own partnership portfolio. Recently, the organiser enlisted T/Squared, an arm of the TEAM Group marketing agency, to grow its presence  globally, with the agency tasked with generating sponsorship sales with the support of Riot Games’ Berlin-based esports business development team. 

According to ASN data, esports has seen investment of US$53.3m in Asia since Q422, with an average quarterly investment of US$4.4m during this period. However, sponsorship have veered below this average from Q224 onwards, seeing investment between US$1.6m and US$3.7m, and the forecast for Q325 is poised to reach almost US$2.5m, and this set to grow as betting companies get involved.