How Rainbow Six Siege esports is organized in the 2026/27 season

Rainbow Six Siege runs its competition on several levels at once. A team can play in a regional league, a Major on another continent, a multi-game festival and a world championship in the same season, and every one of those results feeds a single global table. For a fan, a player looking for a team or an organization weighing an entry into the game, the circuit only makes sense once its pieces are seen together.

This guide explains how the 2026/27 season is built, from the documents Ubisoft, the game's publisher, has published itself: its season announcements, the Global Rulebook of the circuit and the rulebook of the Europe MENA League. It covers who runs the competition, the five regions, the licenses that decide who plays in a league, the calendar, the two Majors, the place of the Esports World Cup, the points system, the 20 places of the Six Invitational 2027, promotion and relegation, and the rules on rosters and transfers.

BLAST R6 Global Rulebook, Season 2026, last updated September 2026; Ubisoft's Six Invitational 2027 announcement, September 22, 2026.

Ubisoft and BLAST: who runs what

Two companies share the work. Ubisoft owns the game and the competition: it sets the structure, invites the partner teams and decides on licenses. BLAST, the tournament organizer, runs the global circuit on its behalf, and the competition carries its name. The rulebooks are titled BLAST R6, and the two Majors of the season are BLAST R6 Majors.

The arrangement started in 2023. In February 2026, during the Six Invitational 2026 and ahead of its grand final, BLAST announced that the partnership had been extended until the end of the 2028/29 competitive season, Esports Insider reported on February 16.

The division of roles shows in the small print. Under the Global Rulebook, a license can change hands only with the approval of Ubisoft and BLAST, and Ubisoft keeps what the rulebook calls its sole and absolute discretion over such approvals. Ubisoft also announces the format of the Six Invitational itself, while the seeding of the Esports World Cup tournament belongs to the Esports World Cup Foundation, which organizes that event.

China is a case of its own. The Global Rulebook lists the CN League, the league of mainland China, as operated by Tencent, the Chinese technology group.

From nine leagues to five regions

The map of the circuit was redrawn twice in two years. In November 2024, Ubisoft announced that the nine leagues it then ran around the world would be consolidated into four regions for the 2025 season.

Ubisoft's 2024 announcement described the merged regions in detail:

• the Europe MENA League, or EML, joined Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, and Turkey;
• the South America League, or SAL, merged Brazil with the rest of South America;
• the North America League, or NAL, brought in Central America, Ecuador and Colombia;
• the Asia Pacific League, or APL, kept three subdivisions: APAC North for Korea and Japan, Asia for South-East and South Asia, and Oceania for Australia, New Zealand and Polynesia.

The fifth region was announced in February 2026. When the BLAST renewal was announced, Ubisoft and BLAST said the circuit would expand to five global regions in the 2026/27 season with the CN League, a ten-team professional league that receives qualification slots for global events, according to Esports Insider. The Global Rulebook for Season 2026 confirms the count: five regions, the APL with its three subregions, the CN League, the EML, the NAL and the SAL.

Who holds a place in a league

A place in a regional league is not just a result. It is a license, and the Global Rulebook defines three kinds. A Partner license goes to a team invited by Ubisoft into the R6 SHARE Partner Program. An Affiliate license goes to a team in the R6 SHARE Affiliate Program or to one that qualified through the Challenger Finals, the promotion tournament. A Standard license goes to a team outside R6 SHARE, invited or qualified through the Challenger Finals.

R6 SHARE is the publisher's partnership program with teams. In its November 2024 announcement, Ubisoft said 20 teams would be partners in 2025, and launched an Affiliate Program alongside it for up to 23 organizations: five each in North America, Europe and South America, and eight in Asia-Pacific. The money side works through in-game items. Partner teams put a percentage of the sales of their own pro-team bundles into a fund, Ubisoft adds a percentage of the sales of all esports bundles, and affiliate teams receive an equal share of that fund. Ubisoft did not publish either percentage. The items named in that announcement included team-branded items, operator portraits, drone skins and pro-team charms.

The CN League joins the program on a delay: Esports Insider reported in February 2026 that its teams become eligible for revenue sharing from 2027 onward.

The rulebook gives the make-up of each league for the 2026 season.

The license types matter beyond the label. A Partner license renews automatically as long as the team's R6 SHARE revenue sharing and license agreement is in effect. When a Partner or Affiliate license is sold, the rulebook says Ubisoft's approval of the transfer does not carry the R6 SHARE agreement with it: the buyer joins as a Standard team by default. Partner and Affiliate teams must also prove they exist as a company, with a certificate of incorporation.

A season from March to February

The Global Rulebook says Season 2026 begins in March with the Off-Season Transfer Window and ends after the Six Invitational 2027. Ubisoft and BLAST call the same cycle the 2026/27 season. In December 2025, Ubisoft described it as one connected global journey with a year-long calendar.

Two changes from 2025 stand out. The season used to open in May with Reload, an event in Brazil reserved for the 20 partner teams, and to close with the November Major, regional finals and last chance qualifiers, according to Ubisoft's 2024 announcement. The Kickoff now opens the year in April. The regional finals are gone: "Regional league finals will not return in 2026," Ubisoft wrote in December 2025.

How a regional league stage is played

Each region plays three events: the Kickoff, Stage 1 and Stage 2. The Europe MENA League rulebook, last updated in March 2026, shows how they work in that region. Formats are set league by league, so the details below belong to the EML.

The Kickoff splits the ten teams into two groups of five, drawn at random. Each group plays a single round-robin, meaning every team meets every other team once, in best-of-one matches, a single map each. The top four of each group go through and the fifth is out. The eight survivors play a modified GSL bracket, a double-elimination format in which a team is knocked out only after two defeats, in best-of-three matches. In the EML, the group phase ran from March 30 to April 8 and the playoffs from April 13 to 17.

Stages 1 and 2 use one table of ten. All ten teams play a single round-robin of best-of-one matches; the top six advance and the teams placed seventh to tenth are eliminated. The six then play the same kind of double-elimination bracket in best-of-three, with a best-of-five Grand Final. The rulebook, in its March version, sets Stage 1 for June 8 to July 1, with playoffs from July 6 to 14, and gives Stage 2 provisional dates of September 7 to 30, with playoffs from October 5 to 14.

Each event in the region carries its own prize money, and each of the two stages pays more than three times the Kickoff.

Every team that plays is paid something. The winner of the Kickoff receives US$12,000 and the teams placed ninth and tenth US$2,000 each. In each stage, first place is worth US$25,000 and the last places US$8,000 each.

Two Majors of twenty teams

The Majors are the circuit's international tournaments, where the teams of all five regions meet. The Global Rulebook states that twenty teams in total attend each BLAST R6 Major. The places come from the regional leagues: the top four teams of a regional Kickoff qualify for the May Major, and the top four of Stage 2 for the November Major. Each of the five regions sends four teams, which makes the twenty.

The rulebook describes the qualification phases. Phase 1 is a GSL double-elimination stage with eight teams. Phase 2 is a Swiss stage of sixteen teams, the top four of Phase 1 among them. In a Swiss stage, teams are paired against opponents with the same win-loss record round after round, so no team needs to play every other. Asia-Pacific teams are seeded on past results: for the May Major, the 2025 APL Regional Final and the Six Invitational 2026, and for the November Major, the May Major and the Esports World Cup.

The first Major of the season was played in Salt Lake City from May 8 to 17, 2026, with a play-in from May 8 to 9, the Swiss phase from May 10 to 13 and the playoffs from May 15 to 17, according to Ubisoft's competition page, which shows a prize pool of US$600,000 and twenty teams. The second is set for Japan from November 6 to 15, according to the February announcement reported by The Esports Advocate.

The Esports World Cup as the mid-season event

One event in the calendar does not belong to the circuit's own organizer. The Esports World Cup is a multi-game tournament run by the Esports World Cup Foundation, and from 2026 Ubisoft integrated it formally into the Rainbow Six circuit as its mid-season competition, played in August.

The deal is specific. The Esports World Cup does not award SI Points across all its placements, Ubisoft said in December 2025. Its reward is a direct one: the winning team becomes the first team of the season to qualify for the Six Invitational. The Global Rulebook lists 22 places for the 2026 tournament, with the top four of each region's Stage 1 among them, and leaves the seeding to the Foundation.

That place has been taken. Ubisoft's announcement of the Six Invitational 2027 states that FaZe Clan secured its spot by winning the Esports World Cup 2026 title.

How SI Points decide the season

Everything else runs through points. SI Points, short for Six Invitational Points, are the circuit's season-long currency, and Ubisoft called them in December 2025 the primary way teams qualify for the Six Invitational. Every placement in the regional stages earns points.

The Global Rulebook calls the system the Global Point System. It ranks all the teams of Season 2026, and teams holding a license earn points from the three regional events (Kickoff, Stage 1 and Stage 2) and from the Majors. The resulting table, which Ubisoft calls the Global Points Standings, is the same for every region: a team in Oceania and a team in Europe climb the same ladder.

Points follow the license. When a license is transferred, the rulebook says, the SI Points it has accrued go to the team that acquires it.

Ties are settled in a fixed order. The rulebook goes through head-to-head results, then the number of global competitions attended, then points from global competitions, then the percentage of matches, maps and rounds won. The last step is a best-of-three tiebreaker match, for teams from the same region.

The same table also decides who is at risk at home. The teams with the lowest total of SI Points in each region over Season 2026 go into promotion and relegation for the next season.

The twenty places of the Six Invitational

The Six Invitational, often shortened to SI, is the world championship. Ubisoft's page describes it as the event where, once a year, the top teams of every region play for the title of world champion. The 2027 edition is set for February 1 to 14 in São Paulo, with a US$3 million prize pool, and the last six teams play in front of spectators at the Suhai Music Hall.

Its twenty places come from three routes, and the balance between them has changed a great deal in a year.

Under the 2025 system, nine teams qualified directly and eleven through points. In 2026/27, fourteen come through the points table, and the rulebook holds one Last Chance Qualifier in each of the five regions, APL, NAL, SAL, EML and CNL, between December 2026 and January 2027, each sending its winner.

The tournament keeps a familiar shape. Ubisoft's announcement places the twenty teams in four groups of five, each playing every other once. The top four of each group advance and the last is eliminated. The sixteen remaining teams play a double-elimination bracket. Every playoff match is a best-of-three except the Grand Final, a best-of-five.

Promotion, relegation and the Challenger tier

Below the regional leagues sits a second tier of Challenger circuits. At its top is the Challenger Finals, the tournament that hands out the last league places. Ubisoft's 2026 calendar still called it the Challenger Series, played in February and March and open to the best second-tier teams of 2025, open qualifier rosters and teams relegated from the top tier. The Global Rulebook records the change of name to Challenger Finals.

The rules of the climb are set out in the Global Rulebook. A winner of the Challenger Finals in the EML, the SAL or the NAL receives an Affiliate license, and a winner in the APL a Standard license. A team sent into promotion and relegation loses its license as soon as Ubisoft or BLAST tells it that it must attend. The number of places at stake in each region is to be communicated later.

The second tier has its own season. In Europe MENA, Ubisoft announced on March 2, 2026 the EML Challenger Circuit, with a €75,000 prize pool and a season-long points table that leads toward the Challenger Finals 2027. Tournaments run by outside organizers can award those points if they follow the secondary circuit's rules, are played on PC between March and October 2026, and obtain a license from Ubisoft.

Roster rules and transfer windows

The Global Rulebook sets the same player rules for every region. A roster has five to seven players: five starters and up to two substitutes. Each roster has one coach, and a team adds a team manager and any number of support staff. A substitution is requested by the coach or the manager at least 60 minutes before a best-of-one match, and before the first map of a series.

Coaches have more room: they may work remotely for online matches but must be present in person at offline events. Players also need a Ubisoft account in good standing and valid work and immigration documents. A player's in-game name is fixed for the season, and may change only after a transfer in a transfer window.

Rosters move only in set windows. The rulebook lists three mid-season windows for 2026: May 18 to June 3, August 15 to 31, and November 16 to December 2. The off-season window runs from February 15 to March 1, 2027. In a mid-season window a team can make up to three roster changes, and a change of coach counts as one. In the off-season, licensed teams have no limit.

The last mid-season window has a special rule tied to the world championship. During it, and only then, a licensed team that has qualified for the Six Invitational may request a player loan, provided the lending team has not qualified and does not play the Last Chance Qualifier with that player.

Outside the windows, rosters are locked. For licensed teams, no change is possible until the next window; for teams without a license, the roster is locked for the whole of their regional or global participation. When the off-season window opens after the Six Invitational 2027, the next season begins.

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