With 2020 over and all notable esports events on hold ahead of the launch of the 2021 Dota Pro Circuit season, Liquipedia has tallied the top-earning Dota 2 teams of the year.
Though the list largely reads as a who’s who of the most successful teams in Dota 2’s history, the list actually stands as an indictment of the state of the Dota 2 pro scene. Not necessarily because of who is on the list, but because of who isn’t. Here’s the top 10:
- Team Secret ($1,017,940)
- Team Nigma ($497,614)
- PSG.LGD ($481,706)
- Virtus.pro ($475,000)
- Team Liquid ($414,424)
- OG ($385,272)
- Alliance ($359,199)
- Vici Gaming ($322,203)
- Invictus Gaming ($305,648)
- Evil Geniuses ($260,500)
While none of these teams’ inclusion, it highlighted the huge disparity in earning potential region by region. While Europe and CIS had a handful of massive events towards the end of the season that inflated the numbers and China had a hyperactive schedule that gave teams an opportunity to make a solid amount of cash, Southeast Asia and the Americas were getting crumbs.
Evil Geniuses is the highest-earning North American team at 10th place, with $160,000 of their earnings coming from their second-place performance at the DreamLeague Season 13 Major in Europe, which took place in January. Quincy Crew was unstoppable during the online league portion of the season, winning nine events and finishing second in four. Despite that, the team ranked just 17th in yearly winnings.
Southeast Asia was even worse off. Fnatic enjoyed a very strong run outside the DPC including winning the first five online regional leagues and notching strong placements in a number of other tournaments. They came in 15th, with TNC Predator coming in 20th at $154,500.
At the very bottom is South America, which didn’t see a single team in the top 20. The top-earning team from the region was Thunder Predator, which brought home just $113,453 to share among its roster of players.
Who is the richest Dota 2 player?
The players from the two-time The International-winning roster of OG remain the top-earning players in Dota 2. Johan “N0tail” Sundstein is the top-earning player, with career prize pool winnings of nearly $7 million
Team Secret enjoyed a very strong 2020, which included the team breaking a number of records en route to winning eight events in a row. That saw the team become the only side to earn over $1 million in 2020, with nobody else even totalling half of that number. Clement “Puppey” Ivanov is the top earner on Secret thanks to his long and illustrious career that has seen him rake in almost $3 million.
