Honor of Kings creates new global esports league for 2026

Joey Morris
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Honor of Kings regional leagues structure changes 2026 announcement graphic featuring in-game champion
Image credit: Level Infinite

Level Infinite has announced that it will be rolling out regional league structure changes for the Honor of Kings 2026 global competitive season.

The main decision is the creation of a new cross-regional league, the Honor of Kings Major League (KML), which will merge three existing leagues, the WKS, KMW and KME.

The developer has also shared updates to its roster rules in its efforts to create ‘a more evenly matched competitive landscape’ and allow ‘local talent to shine.’

According to the announcement, alongside the KML, there will still be four national leagues featured in 2026. These leagues are for Indonesia (IKL), Philippines (PKL), Malaysia (MKL), the new league (KML) and Brazil (CHOKBR)

As a result of the changes, the Wildcard Kings Series (WKS – Southeast Asia except Thailand and Vietnam, Hong Kong and Macau ), Major West League (KMW – Europe, CIS, Turkiye, and combined Americas) and Major East League (KME – Korea, Japan, South Asia and MENA) have all merged into the singular global league.

Furthermore, Level Infinite also shared that professional Honor of Kings esports teams from Macau and Hong Kong will return to the Chinese Mainland esports ecosystem.

These changes are the latest in Honor of Kings’ plans for global esports expansion to better support its worldwide market. This takes Level Infinite’s global esports ecosystem from seven leagues to five.

Alongside these leagues, Honor of Kings also has its own franchised league that is based in China, the King Pro League (KPL).

Roster Rules for 2026

In addition to the regional League structure changes, Level Infinite provided updates to its roster rules for the 2026 Honor of Kings season.

As listed in a post online, participating teams must have a minimum member-count of five players and a maximum of seven. Furthermore, each team can register one player who is not a resident of the home regional division.

However, each squad must have at least two players who are residents of the country the team is representing and at least four players in total who are residents of the regional division.

There will also be restrictions in place on players from the Greater China division, a region the esports title dominates in, where they will be classified as import players in all other divisions ‘without exception’.

Joey Morris

Staff Writer
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Joey has been writing about gaming since 2024 with features, reviews, and the latest news. Since early 2025, he has been covering the world of esports, reporting tournament results, partnerships, interviewing players, and more.
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