Invites for StarLadder Budapest Major 2025

Europe remains at the top of the Counter-Strike hierarchy, and the region will receive 16 of the 32 spots on offer for the StarLadder Budapest Major.

Qualification is a little different for this Major compared to the previous iteration. With Regional Major Ranking (RMR) tournaments fully phased out, Valve have also decided to do away with the Major Regional Qualifiers (MRQ) for Stage 1, leaving all of the Major invitations up to the Valve Regional Standings (VRS).

Europe will receive 16 direct invites to the Major via the VRS. The top five teams will go straight to Stage 3, with the next best five going to Stage 2, while the final six invitees head to Stage 1.

The Americas will receive 10 berths for the StarLadder Budapest Major. Two of those invitations will be reserved for Stage 3, with two more allocated for Stage 2 of the Major, while the remaining six invites will be for Stage 1.

While North and South America used to be treated differently for the purposes of Major qualification, this newly revamped system groups both regions together as the "Americas," no longer requiring separate regional qualifiers like at the BLAST.tv Austin Major.

The Asia-Pacific region will be sending six teams to the Major. The region's top team in the VRS will earn a direct invite to Stage 3, while the second-best team will head straight to Stage 2. The remaining four sides will start their StarLadder Major Budapest campaigns in Stage 1.

In the same way that the Americas used to be treated as separate sub-regions, the Asia-Pacific region has also been consolidated from the former system, which previously split up teams from Mongolia, China, Oceania, and Southeast Asia for Major qualification.