ALGS 2024 Championship ranks among Japan’s Top 5 most popular esports events

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The professional Apex Legends scene has been growing steadily worldwide, and this time, Japan joined the action in a big way. The Apex Legends Global Series: 2024 Championship recently concluded in Sapporo, where the world’s top teams battled it out for a share of the $2 million prize pool in what was the season’s most intense tournament. With high stakes and fierce competition, the event marked a thrilling end to an incredible year of esports action.

This is the first time Japan is hosting such a big LAN tournament for Apex Legends, and while esports are still growing in the country, the ALGS: 2024 Championship attracted a huge crowd of dedicated fans. This massive turnout shows just how quickly esports are expanding in Japan, with the event capturing the attention of audiences despite the challenges faced by local teams.

A total of 40 teams qualified for the ALGS: 2024 Championship, earning their spots through ranking points and regional qualifiers. The competition featured teams from top organizations like FaZe, Cloud9, TSM, Fnatic, Team Liquid, Team Falcons, and many more. 

In the end, it was GoNext Esports — a European squad made up of former Blacklist International players — that emerged victorious. To be in contention for the tournament win, each team had to earn at least 50 points from kills and placements across the rounds. After reaching that threshold, they needed to take first place in the last final round, beating out other teams that also had 50 points. GoNext Esports hit the 50-point mark last minute in round 8, then took the win in round 9. In the end, they ended up ahead of teams with higher total scores, like Alliance and Team Falcons.

GoNext Esports' win was a major surprise, as the team was considered an underdog heading into the tournament: none of its players had ever achieved results like this in a major event before.

Состав GoNext Esports / Photo: ALGS

The ALGS: 2024 Championship drew fewer viewers than past World Championships, but the drop wasn’t huge. That’s especially true when you consider the tournament was held in a time zone that wasn’t exactly convenient for European fans. The average viewership on English-language streams dropped by 42%. Overall, the ALGS series continues to maintain steady audience numbers year after year.

It’s worth noting that the ALGS: 2024 Championship took place in January, while previous world championships were held in the summer or fall. The organizers didn’t explain the reason for the schedule change, but Apex Legends fans suspect it’s connected to work on a new anti-cheat system. Plus, players were given extra time to secure their visas for Japan.

ALGS: 2024 Championship Viewership Statistics

One of the standout features of the ALGS: 2024 Championship was the remarkable dominance of Japanese broadcasts. Compared to last year’s World Championship, their share skyrocketed from 25.8% to 49.7% of total watch time. Japanese broadcasts even outperformed English ones in terms of viewership. Additionally, local streams led in both average and peak viewership, with these numbers rising by 50.5% and 110.5%, respectively, compared to the previous year.

Seven out of the top 10 most popular channels covering the ALGS: 2024 Championship were Japanese. Some of the top community casters included Chikara ‘’Shaka’’ Kawakami, Yuta ‘’stylishnoob’’ Seki, Junichi Kato, and Shibuya HAL. On the English side, Jack ‘’Nice Wigg’’ Martin drew the biggest audience. Ludwig ‘’Ludwig’’ Ahgren and Charles ‘’Cr1TiKaL’’ White Jr. also pulled in strong numbers while streaming matches for their team, Shopify Rebellion, which also competed in the tournament.

The ALGS: 2024 Championship became the third most popular esports event ever held in Japan. The top spot in viewership went to VCT 2023: Masters Tokyo, which hit 830,369 viewers at its peak. When looking at just traditional PC games, the ALGS 2024 Championship ranked second.

Most Popular Esports LAN-tournaments Held in Japan

In ALGS Year 5, the organizers rolled out a range of exciting updates to the competition and program, including a completely new LAN format, legend bans, a new map, changes to the point systems, expanded prize pools, and a consolidation of regions. The first games of the Preseason Qualifiers kick off on February 22 — registration for regional tournaments is now open! For more details, check out the official game website. You can track results and viewership stats for all esports leagues and events in the tournaments section on Esports Charts.