The Prize Pool for Dota 2’s The International 8 Has Hit a Staggering Total After Just 24 Hours

The Dota 2 community appears to be on track to break the prize pool total of The International 8 yet again after hitting an incredible total in less than 24 hours.

Every year one esport tournament stands head and shoulders above all others in terms of the prize money that it pays out as Dota 2’s “The International” reaches staggering figures thanks to crowdfunding.

The initial prize pool starts at $1,600,000 but that quickly rises as a percentage of all Battle Pass and Compendium sales are added to the total to make The International the most heavily crowdfunded event in all of esports.

In 2017 Dota 2 fans helped the total to reach almost $24,787,916. To put that into perspective, that’s significantly more than the prize pools for a number of major sporting events, including The Open in Golf.

2018 looks set to be another record breaking year, despite some community members expressing concerns about the game’s popularity falling, as The International 8’s prize pool has already broken $5,000,000 after less than 24 hours of crodfunding.

This is the fastest that the total has ever hit the $5 million mark and veteran esports journalist Rod ‘Slasher’ Breslau has stated that, at this rate, Dota 2 will have awarded more prize money than CS:GO, Call of Duty, League of Legends, Overwatch, StarCraft, Smash, and Street Fighter combined by the end of 2018.

Of course there’s a lot of time left until the final figure will be confirmed, and at least another $20 million before the record is broken again, but the outlook is certainly a promising one for anyone involved.

With the success of The International’s crowdfunding year in, year out, it almost beggars belief that Valve still haven’t considered doing a similar thing with their other major esports title, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.