We’ll be able to play this “greatest hits” version of League of Legends by the end of the month
Riot Games has fully unveiled League of Legends Classic after teasing it a couple of weeks ago. It’s coming out sooner than expected. It’s being added to the game for free on July 29 as part of Patch 26.15.
These new details were revealed during the MSI 2026 Finals for LoL Esports, where an exhibition match for the new mode was also held. An FAQ on League of Legends Classic’s official website confirms it will be integrated right into the Riot Client players already use for League of Legends and is more of a melting pot of classic features than a complete reset to the 1.0 version of the game.
Executive Producer Paul Bellezza revealed more about League of Legends Classic during a brief interview at the MSI Finals. He explained that the idea first emerged during a “Thunderdome” hackathon at Riot Games, when a group of developers built a prototype based on Season 3 (2012-2013) of the game.
He also clarified that it would be a “greatest hits of League” from around Season 3 rather than a completely faithful throwback. It’ll launch with not just the original 40 champions but also 20 additional “classic” ones. Classic will bring back the old way of selecting champions and runes as well as the offense, defense, and utility skills trees for the mastery system.
League of Legends Classic is part of a wave of throwback modes or re-releases of earlier versions of long-running live-service games. World of Warcraft Classic most famously kicked off this trend, but we’ve also seen the likes of Fortnite OG, EverQuest Legends, and Overwatch: Classic pop up in the years since. It’s fascinating that these live-service games have been running for so long that they have older versions players are nostalgic for and excited to revisit.
Thankfully, we won’t have to wait long to see if League of Legends Classic lives up to the anticipation around it, as it’ll be added to the game client at 8 a.m. PDT on July 29.
