February 2025 saw one of the biggest esports events of the year play out alongside several other prominent tournaments, but who were the absolute biggest winners of the month?
February is the shortest month of the year, but as the traditional landing spot for IEM’s annual Counter-Strike tournament in Katowice, Poland, it’s one of the biggest months in esports regardless. And of course, it’s not alone. Dota 2 held multiple prominent events while Apex Legends crowned a new world champion.
With all those events to account for, here are the biggest winners of the month of February and what they did to bring in their prize winnings.
Vitality vs. Spirit – IEM Katowice 2025 – Grand-final
GoNext Esports’ Apex Legends Team, Tundra Esports’ Dota 2 team, and Team Vitality’s Counter-Strike 2 team stand among the biggest esports winners of February 2025. Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 are two of the biggest esports titles, but Apex Legends has quietly maintained a lucrative competitive scene for its top teams. Here’s what happened during the month, and who the biggest winners are.
These are the top five highest-earning esports teams of February 2025:
That doesn’t tell the whole story, though. Here’s how these top earners worked their way into the top five slots.
The Dota 2 pro scene is fairly active today after years of being slowed down by the onerous Dota Pro Circuit. The scene still heavily favors veteran players with backing from major esports organizations, though. Those who have those benefits have a fairly high ceiling when it comes to earnings.
Tundra Esports is among that lot and the team started Feburary strong by winning Fissure Playground 1 for a cool $400,000. Just a week later, it took home another $300,000 by winning BLAST Slam 2. The team kept its foot squarely on the gas, and is currently competing in DreamLeague Season 25 with eyes on additional winnings.
Final Circles Grand Finals (ft. GoNext, Alliance, Falcons & More ) | Year 4 ALGS Champs
Apex Legends isn’t the best-known esport, but it does have a fairly lucrative scene for top competitors. The 2024 season concluded on February 2 with the Apex Legends Global Series 2024 Championship.
European squad GoNext Esports won the top prize at the event, taking home $600,000. The team immediately dissolved after the victory, and it’s unclear if it will reform for the new season, which is currently in its preseason qualifiers.
MOUZ suffered a disappointing top-16 finish at IEM Katowice 2025 when the team was on the shortlist of favorites heading into the event. While PGL Cluj-Napoca doesn’t have the same prestige as did IEM Katowice, it actually had a similar first-place prize available and a bigger overall prize pool.
Despite falling well short of winning in Poland, MOUZ out-earned IEM Katowice winner Team Vitality in February. The $10,000 it earned from its top-16 finish in Katowice and the $400,000 it received from PGL Cluj-Napoca made it the highest-earning CS2 team of the month.
ESL’s annual IEM Katowice tournament is one of the biggest in Counter-Strike each year, and 2025 was no different. Team Vitality was almost undefeated at the event, going 11-1 on maps and closing the event with a 3-0 sweep in the final over Team Spirit. That was good enough to win the team the $400,000 top prize.
The team took a bit of a break from there, passing on the sizable PGL Cluj-Napoca event. It returns to action in March for ESL Pro League Season 21.
There are benefits to competing in individual esports, as Anders Vejrgang saw in February. The EA FC 25 player won the FC Pro Open and took home its $100,000 top prize. While the players on Dota 2’s Tundra Esports and Apex’s GoNext Esports and Alliance teams were the top individual esports earners of the month, Vejrgang was right behind them.
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