Where and how to watch The International 2017, Dota 2’s $24 million tournament

Starting 10 AM PT on Monday, August 7, Valve will once again kick off the main event of the biggest esports event of the year — at least with regards to cash at stake. After last week’s group stages, 16 teams will battle it out for approximately $24 million in cash at this week’s International 2017 Dota 2 Championships, or TI7 for short.

Thankfully, there are a lot of ways to watch across a variety of platforms. even if you aren’t here in Seattle to check it out in person.

As with just about any competitive video game now, the easiest way to watch The International is probably Twitch.tv, at twitch.tv/dota2ti. But more importantly for Dota 2 newcomers who are nonetheless interested in checking the tournament out, Valve is bringing back the popular Newcomer stream after a year hiatus, which includes special play by play and explanations tailored to those watching for possibly the first time. You can find the newcomer stream at twitch.tv/dota2ti_newcomer.

However, there are arguably better ways to watch the most financially lucrative esports tournament ever. Valve is once again streaming every game of TI7 within Dota2.com, at http://www.dota2.com/international/live/. In addition to multiple versions and languages for each stream, you can also view each match with accompanying real-time information about the game in question, including hero levels, a real-time mini-map, XP and gold graphs and more.

Meanwhile, if you’ve purchased the International Battle Pass within the Dota 2 client, not only have you contributed money to TI7’s massive prize pool, you’ve also bought a ticket to watch the tournament in game. Watching in-game allows you complete control of your view of the action, while also providing the same professional spectator experience and casting you’d get on Twitch or Dota2.com. Viewers who watch within Dota 2 can also earn prizes for specific events in game, and can also make predictions on various aspects of each match and win battle points and more prizes.

But if you’ve got an HTC Vive and have Dota 2 installed, Valve has created a unique spectator experience just for you. I’ll let my colleague Ben Kuchera tell you about it:

"Watching battles take place around you is thrilling, even though it can be a bit hard to keep track of everything that’s going on. The interface makes it easy for you to switch views or jump back and forth from the in-person view to the lobby as well; it only took me a few minutes to get used to moving back and forth to get the best view of the action. It's like being able to watch a football game on TV with the ability to jump onto the field at any time to see what it looks like from the quarterback's point of view."

For more on how to watch competitive Dota 2, check out our introductory primer.