The International 2019

The International 2019
Tournament information
SportDota 2
LocationShanghai, China
DatesAugust 20–25, 2019
AdministratorValve
Tournament
format(s)
Venue(s)Mercedes-Benz Arena
Participants18 teams
PurseUS$34,330,068
Final positions
ChampionsOG
1st runner-upTeam Liquid
2nd runner-upPSG.LGD

The International 2019 (TI9) was the ninth iteration of The International, an annual Dota 2 world championship esports tournament. Hosted by Valve, the game's developer, the tournament followed a year-long series of awarding qualifying points, known as the Dota Pro Circuit (DPC), with the top 12 ranking teams being directly invited to the tournament, which took place in August 2019 at the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Shanghai. In addition, six more teams earned invites through regional qualifiers played in July 2019. The grand finals took place between Team Liquid and OG, who had respectively won the International's 2017 and 2018 events. There, OG defeated Team Liquid 3–1 in the best-of-five series to become the first-ever repeat champion of an International.

As with every International from 2013 onwards, the prize pool was crowdfunded by the Dota 2 community via its battle pass feature, with the total at over US$34 million. In addition, various related activities were also held during the event, such as an all-star game and cosplay and submitted short film contests. The event had over a million concurrent viewers during the grand finals on the livestreaming platform Twitch.