IOC signs 12-year deal with Saudi Arabia for Esports Olympics

18 July 2024

We have recently covered several Esports World Cup events. Last week, for example, we wrote about PSG Talon Esports winning the South Korean Closed Qualifier to become South Korea’s official Rainbow Six Siege representative at the 2024 Esports World Cup. The week before that, we published an article about the announcement of the FIFA x Rocket League World Cup, the first edition of which will be played later this year.

This time, it’s not about an international esports world cup event, but about the first official edition of the Olympic Esports Games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has just announced that they have signed a 12-year deal with Saudi Arabia to host the event, starting with a first edition in 2025. While the IOC and the country itself are happy with the agreement, the deal has also already received considerable criticism due to Saudi Arabia’s more than worrying record on human rights.

Inaugural Olympic Esports Games 2025

There has been talk of an official Olympic event for esports for a while now and it was towards the end of last year, during the opening ceremony of the 141st International Olympic Committee session in Mumbai (India), that the IOC announced its plans to hold a large-scale Olympic event. Now, a bit more than a half year later, it turns out that it wasn’t just an empty promise as Saudi Arabia has been named to host the Olympic Esports Games for the next twelve years. According to Saudi Arabia’s National Olympic Committee (NOC), the idea is to hold the event regularly, though no dates have been named yet.

All we know for now is that the official inaugural Olympic Esports Games event will take place in 2025 and that it will be in Saudi Arabia. Not much more has been revealed in terms of exact dates, which esports titles will be involved, and how much the country is planning to spend on it all. This is all part of Saudi Arabia’s so-called “Vision 2030”, a plan to move its own economy away from the almost total dependence on the sale of fossil fuels.
“We are very fortunate to be able to work with the Saudi NOC on the Olympic Esports Games, because it has great – if not unique – expertise in the field of esports with all its stakeholders”, says IOC President Thomas Bach, “The Olympic Esports Games will greatly benefit from this experience. By partnering with the Saudi NOC we have also ensured that the Olympic values are respected, in particular, with regard to the game titles on the programme, the promotion of gender equality and engagement with the young audience, which is embracing esports.”

Vision 2030 versus sportswashing

While the announcement of the first official Olympic Esports Games is great news for the international esports community, not everyone is happy with Saudi Arabia as the host for the first twelve years. The country clearly sees international esports (and sports in general) as an important part of its previously mentioned Vision 2030, but critics say that there is more at play than that. According to them, Saudi Arabia is not only using esports to move its economy away from oil dependence, but also as a way to divert attention away from the fundamental lack of respect for human rights in the country.