On 24 July 2024, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) made history announcing its unanimous decision to create the world’s first Olympic Esports Games. The inaugural Olympic event is set to be held in Saudi Arabia in 2025. 

The IOC has taken an interest in esports since 2018 and this marks a significant milestone in its efforts to modernise the Olympics by bringing esports and a broader community of fans and players into its array of events. IOC President Thomas Bach said “This is truly a new era for the IOC. With the confirmation by the IOC Session of the creation of the Olympic Esports Games, we are keeping up with the pace of the digital revolution." The IOC’s official announcement can be read here.

What are esports? 

“Esports”, short for electronic sports, is a term used to describe individual or team competitions in various video game titles. As a rapidly growing industry valued at approx. USD1.72 billion per annum, esports attract millions of viewers annually. Professional players and teams often compete in organised leagues which resemble traditional sports systems. 

What has the IOC decided?

In a unanimous vote at the 142nd IOC Session in Paris, the IOC endorsed a proposal brought by the IOC Executive Board to create an Olympic Esports Games. 

The decision follows a successful Olympic Esports Week hosted in 2023 in Singapore by the IOC, where over 130 athletes from 57 nations competed across 10 gaming events at the 2023 Olympic Esports Week.

As a result of the IOC’s decision, esports will not become an additional event at the existing Olympics, but will instead have its own Olympic Games held every two years in-between the traditional Summer and Winter Olympics. 

Additional details are still emerging on exactly how the first Olympic Esports Games will be framed up, with only the year and the host country being decided. We understand that the IOC will now begin selecting a host city, the qualification processes, and which esports titles will be considered. 

While the IOC has not yet indicated which games and sports will be included, it is likely the games will include those featured in the Olympic Esports Week in 2023, being: 

• Archery;
• Baseball;
• Chess;
• Cycling;
• Dance; 
• Motor Sport;
• Sailing;
• Shooting;
• Taekwondo; and 
• Tennis. 

These events were a combination of digital only games played on mobile devices and gaming controllers, as well as games that included a physical exercise element. Emerging technologies were also on display at the 2023 Olympic Esports Week, with the Taekwondo event incorporating virtual reality and motion capture to push the boundaries of traditional gaming playstyles. As the esports industry is so broad, there may be a large selection of games combining many different playstyles with some events being exclusively digital and others being a mix of digital and physical activity. 

The 2023 Olympic Esports Week also featured exhibition events for some of the most popular esports titles, including Rocket League, Street Fighter 6 and NBA 2K23. Given the IOC has indicated the Olympic Esports Games are intended to make younger generations interested in the Olympics, it’s possible that these titles may also be included as events at the games, which could increase the viewership numbers significantly. 

Next steps

The IOC has emphasised that it will engage with international federations that offer electronic versions of their sports and national Olympic committees that are already including esports in their Olympic programmes. 

New Zealand Esports (New Zealand’s national esports federation) was involved in advocating for the inclusion of esports into the Olympics through international meetings with Olympic committees, so New Zealand may have a part to play in shaping the inaugural event. 

For sports organisations, technology companies, and gaming businesses, the Olympic Esports Games presents a valuable commercial opportunity to bring their brands onto one of the world’s biggest sporting stages and engage new cross-generational and international audiences. 

Esports is a rapidly growing industry with large sporting organisations around the world creating their own teams and sponsoring players in competitions. There may also be opportunities to licence intellectual property for use in the virtual sports, and the ability to collaborate with global brands for sponsorship, broadcasting and related opportunities. Sporting organisations may be consulted on the best way to create digital versions of their sports, and the esports events could be valuable marketing opportunities to promote traditional sports to a digital audience. 

If you’d like to discuss the Olympic Esports Games, or have any questions relating to your organisation’s role to play, get in touch with one of our subject matter experts. 

This article was co-authored by Thomas Anderson, a Solicitor in our Corporate and Commercial team.