Magic: The Gathering World Championships

The Magic: The Gathering World Championships (Worlds) have been held annually since 1994. It is the most important tournament in the game of Magic: The Gathering, offering cash prizes of up to $50,000 to the winners. With the exception of the first edition, Worlds is an invitation-only event, and from 1996 to 2011 World was the last event of each Pro Tour season. The invitees were mostly top finishers from the National championships, the top-ranked players of the DCI and high-level pro players.

After the first five World Championships were all held in the United States, Worlds were held in various places outside the US, most of which were either in Europe or Japan. Besides the main event Worlds were always a huge gathering of Magic players, who came to watch the pros and compete in side events.

After the 2011 season the World Championship was briefly replaced by the Magic Players Championship. The top 16 pro players tournament selected due to various criteria were invited to the Players Championship. For 2013 the tournament was renamed to 'World Championship' once again, and for 2014 the tournament offered invitations to 24 pros instead of 16.

After the decision to abandon the large World Championship and in part due to heavy demand by the players it was decided that the team portion of the Worlds was too important to be abandoned. Instead a new team competition, the World Magic Cup was established in 2012.

The first World Championship was held in 1994 at the Gen Con fair in Milwaukee. The tournament was open to all competitors, its mode was single-elimination, and it featured just one format, Vintage (then known as Type I). The 1994 tournament varied considerably from later Worlds. Starting with the 1995 Worlds, all subsequent Worlds were open to invited players only. Also beginning with the 1995 edition, all Worlds were events with multiple formats, two in case of the 1995 tournament, and three since. The team portion of Worlds was introduced in 1995 as well.

With the introduction of the Pro Tour in 1996, the World Championship became the final stop of each Pro Tour season. As the final event to award Pro points every season, Worlds also hosted the Pro Player of the Year award ceremony. Traditionally held in August, Worlds was moved to the end of the year between 2004 and 2006, when the Pro Tour season was adjusted to the calendar year. Since the inception of the Hall of Fame in 2005, Worlds also hosted the induction ceremony of each year's class.

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