International Esports Federation

So far, there are 130 member nations in IESF:[1]

Continent	Member Nations
Africa (20)	Algeria,  Burkina Faso,  DR Congo,  Chad  Djibouti,  Egypt,  Ghana,  Guinea,  Ivory Coast,  Libya,  Mauritania,  Mauritius,  Morocco,  Namibia,  Niger,  Nigeria,  Senegal,  Somalia,  South Africa,  Tunisia
Americas (21)	Argentina,  Bahamas,  Brazil,  Canada,  Chile,  Colombia,  Costa Rica,  Dominican Republic,  Ecuador,  Guadeloupe,  Guatemala,  Haiti  Honduras,  Jamaica,  Mexico,  Panama,  Peru,  Suriname,  Trinidad and Tobago,  United States,  Venezuela
Asia (40)	Afghanistan,  Bahrain,  Bangladesh,  Brunei,  Bhutan,  Cambodia,  China,  Chinese Taipei,  Hong Kong,  India ,  Indonesia,  Iran,  Iraq,  Japan,  Jordan,  Kazakhstan,  Kuwait,  Kyrgyzstan,  Laos,  Lebanon,  Macau,  Malaysia,  Maldives,  Mongolia,  Myanmar,    Nepal,  Pakistan,  Palestine  Philippines,  Qatar,  Saudi Arabia,  South Korea,  Sri Lanka,  Syria,  Tajikistan,  Thailand,  Turkmenistan,  United Arab Emirates,  Uzbekistan,  Vietnam
Europe (47)	Albania,  Armenia,  Austria,  Azerbaijan,  Belarus,  Belgium,  Bosnia and Herzegovina,  Bulgaria,  Croatia,  Czech Republic,  Denmark,  Estonia,  Finland,  France,  Georgia,  Germany,  Greece,  Hungary,  Iceland,  Ireland,  Israel,  Italy,  Kosovo,  Latvia,  Lithuania,  Luxembourg,  Malta,  Moldova,  Monaco,  Montenegro,  North Macedonia,  Netherlands,  Norway,  Poland,  Portugal,  Romania,  Russia,  San Marino,  Serbia,  Slovakia,  Slovenia,  Spain,  Sweden,  Switzerland,  Turkey,  Ukraine,  Wales
Oceania (2)	Australia,  New Zealand
Affiliate Members are eSports Middle East, Fighting Esports Group Korea (FEG) and ADRIA Esports Federation(AEF).

The International Esports Federation was founded on August 8, 2008, by nine esports associations from Denmark, South Korea, Germany, Austria, Belgium, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Vietnam and Taiwan, and held its first general meeting in November of the same year.

A year later, on December 12, the IeSF was able to host its own international tournaments, starting with the "IeSF challenge" in 2009, followed by "IeSF Grand Finals" in 2010, and the "IeSF World Championship" in 2011 and onward.[2]

2012 saw a massive breakthrough for esports and the IeSF, as the IeSF 2012 World championship presented an esports tournament for women for the first time.

On July 7, 2013, IeSF was selected as counterpart for the electronic sports discipline of the 4th Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games.[3] This was a big breakthrough for esports and the IeSF, as the branch was introduced in an Olympic event for the first time.

In May 2013, IeSF was approved as the official signatory of the World Anti-Doping Agency in the branch of e-Sports.[4]

In July 2013, IeSF submitted an application to join Sport Accord, and is expected to be approved as a temporary member in April 2014.[5]

In November 2013, IeSF saw a successful overseas launch of its events, as the IeSF 2013 World Championship and the 2013 General Meeting was held in the city of Bucharest, Romania, in what was the first time of an IeSF event held outside of South Korea.

In May 2014, IeSF was approved for membership by TAFISA. The IeSF will be represented at the 2016 TAFISA World Games for All, to be held in Jakarta.[6]

In 2014, IeSF restricted female players from participating in the Hearthstone tournament, as part of the World Championship division of tournament into male and female sections. IeSF later revised the policy, uniting the section into open-for-all tournaments while maintaining female-only tournaments with smaller prize pools.[7]

In the 2015 World Championship, an esports panel was hosted with guests from international sports society to discuss the future recognition of esports as a recognized, legitimate sporting activity worldwide.[8]

The four federations which are newly represented in the IESF are Colombia's Federación Colombiana de Deportes Electrónicos (FEDECOLDE), Kazakhstan's Qazaq Cybersport Federation (QCF), Turkey's Turkish Esports Federation (TESFED), and Ukraine's Federation of E-Sport of Ukraine (UESF).[9]

The addition of four more countries brings the IESF's total count of member nations to 60, with six continents represented. Asia and Europe make up the bulk of the numbers with 24 and 22 respectively, with Macau's arrival in 2016 marking the last time a new member joined until now.[9]

In July 2016, Macau became the 56th member nation of the IESF.[10]

The International eSports Federation (IeSF) has voted to accept the United States eSports Federation (USeF) as a full member. The decision, taken at the IeSF General Meeting in Kaohsiung in Taiwan, means that USeF is the official recognized national governing body of esports in the US.[11]

Esports is set to expand across the Middle East with Korean non-profit International Esports Federation (IESF) recently announcing plans to enter the region. IESF has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the UAE's Motivate Media Group, parent company of Gulf Business, to expand regionally. Currently, the Esports category has over 300 million gamers across the Middle East alone.[12]

World Esports Championships

So far, the IESF has held fourteen World Esports Championships:

Year	Title	Location	Titles played	Winner	Runner up
2009	IeSF 2009 Challenge	Taebaek, South Korea	FIFA Online	South Korea	China
2010	IeSF Grand Final	Daegu, South Korea	FIFA Online, WarCraft III: The Frozen Throne	South Korea	Romania
2011	IeSF World Championship	Andong, South Korea	StarCraft II, FIFA Online	Sweden	South Korea
2012	IeSF World Championship	Cheonan, South Korea	Alliance of Valiant Arms, StarCraft II, Tekken Tag Tournament 2	South Korea	Austria
2013	IeSF World Championship	Bucharest, Romania	League of Legends, StarCraft II, Tekken Tag Tournament 2, Alliance of Valiant Arms	South Korea	Sweden
2014	Esports World Championship 2014	Baku, Azerbaijan	Dota 2, Hearthstone, Ultra Street Fighter IV, StarCraft II, Tekken Tag Tournament 2	South Korea	China
2015	Esports World Championship 2015	Seoul, South Korea	League of Legends, StarCraft II, Hearthstone	Serbia	South Korea
2016	Esports World Championship 2016	Jakarta, Indonesia[13]	Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, League of Legends, Hearthstone	South Korea	Finland
2017	Esports World Championship 2017	Busan, South Korea	Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, League of Legends, Tekken 7	South Korea	Philippines
2018	Esports World Championship 2018	Kaohsiung, Taiwan	Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, League of Legends, Tekken 7[14]	South Korea	Finland
2019	Esports World Championship 2019	Seoul, South Korea	Dota 2, Tekken 7, eFootball Pro Evolution Soccer 2020	Japan	Sweden
2020	Esports World Championship 2020	Eilat, Israel	Dota 2, Tekken 7, eFootball Pro Evolution Soccer 2020	Postponed	Postponed
2021	Esports World Championship 2021	Eilat, Israel[15]	Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Tekken 7, eFootball	Sweden
2022	World Esports Championship 2022	Bali, Indonesia	Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Tekken 7, eFootball, PUBG Mobile, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang	Indonesia[16]	Kazakhstan[16]
2023	World Esports Championship 2023	Iași, Romania[17]	Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, Tekken 7, eFootball, PUBG Mobile, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang

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