Halo’s Charlotte Major is almost here, and there are some clear favorites when it comes to which teams will win the HCS event and take a spot in the 2025 Halo World Championship.
Majors are always high-stakes affairs, but the Charlotte Major is a particularly big one. Alongside its $250,000 prize pool, the top eight teams in the major earn spot in the Halo World Championship. So who are the teams most likely to pull this off?
| Event | HCS Charlotte Major 2025 |
|---|---|
| Start date | October 3, 2025 |
| End date | October 5, 2025 |
| Prize pool | $250,000 |
| Teams | 16 |
| Location | Charlotte, NC, USA |
| Venue | Charlotte Convention Center |
16 HCS teams are set to play in the Charlotte Major, but only 12 of them have been confirmed heading into the event. The other four are determined by an open qualifier held on October 3. While four of these teams are confirmed, many of those competing in the qualifier will be random stacks walking in off the street.
There are two clear favorites to win the Charlotte Major; OpTic Gaming and Shopify Rebellion. OpTic is a shade ahead of Shopify, but it’s basically a toss-up between these two teams.
Throughout the year, regional tournaments have largely been a two-horse race between OpTic and Shopify. While Shopify Rebellion got the better of most of their matchups at the start of the year, OpTic pulled ahead in the spring and has held onto that. One of the key exceptions to that was the Salt Lake City Major, which Shopify won. Shopify notably stumbled and landed in fourth in the Dallas Open in May, but that’s the only event this year where the team competed and didn’t take either first or second place.
FaZe Clan, TSM, and Spacestation Gaming all have a credible chance of winning.
The primary reason for that designation is that they’re some of the only teams that have actually been able to take match wins over either Shopify Rebellion or OpTic Gaming. In fact, FaZe Clan and Spacestation Gaming are the only teams that have been able to notch wins over both teams. While the two have steeply losing records against the favorites to win, both have proven themselves capable of pulling off the necessary upsets.
TSM hasn’t beaten Shopify Rebellion this year, but took a 3-2 win over OpTic in the Dallas Open.
Make no mistake, though. While these teams have been able to get wins over the favorites, this event is primarily a two-horse race. The best-case scenario for each of these other teams is Shopify and OpTic picking each other off prior to the final.
The 2025 HCS Charlotte Major uses the same format that was previously seen in the Arlington Major and Salt Lake City Major.
After the final 16 competitors are decided, the event starts with a group stage. Teams are lumped together into groups of four. They play a round robin that both determines seeding for the playoffs and the first four eliminations of the event. From there, it’s a straightforward double-elimination bracket. The top two teams from each group start in the upper bracket, giving them some margin for error.
Similar to fighting game tournaments, the upper bracket winner has a major edge in the grand final. The survivor of the lower bracket has to win two matches in a row in order to claim the championship.
GRAND FINALS Shopify vs OpTic | HCS Salt Lake City 2025
The Charlotte Major will be an absolute sprint for the competing teams. While events like Dota 2’s The International and League of Legends’ World Championship can play out for weeks, Halo’s Charlotte Major is essentially a scramble.
The event takes place over just three days, with the first two days both spanning multiple stages of competition. Teams will have no time to process their pool play performance or look over the tape of the competition. They move directly into the playoffs after qualifying.
While there’s typically some pomp and circumstance to the “finals day” at esports events, that’s not really the case here. Four or five matches will be played in quick succession to sort out where the top four teams finish.
The 2025 Halo Championship Series’ Charlotte Major features a $250,000 prize pool with a $100,000 top prize. While that’s a hefty sum, the money distribution is heavily weighted towards the top of the event. Alongside this, all teams earn Halo Championship Series points, which are used to determine the invitees for the Halo World Championship.
Here’s the full breakdown:
| Place | Prize money | HCS points |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | $100,000 | 100,000 |
| 2nd | $60,000 | 60,000 |
| 3rd | $30,000 | 44,000 |
| 4th | $17,500 | 36,000 |
| 5th-6th | $8,000 | 32,000 |
| 7th-8th | $5,000 | 28,000 |
| 9th-12th | $2,500 | 22,000 |
| 13th-16th | $1,625 | 18,000 |
Worth noting is that both Shopify Rebellion and OpTic Gaming have earned enough HCS points to mathematically guarantee a spot in the world championship. That said, expect them to give their all for both money and pride.
When it comes to Halo betting at this event, it’s best to avoid Shopify Rebellion and OpTic Gaming until at least the playoffs. While the two teams are big favorites to win, they’re such big favorites that some esports betting websites aren’t even accepting bets on them as winners.
It’s arguably worth considering betting against Shopify Rebellion and OpTic Gaming on specific maps. Again, these teams are massive favorites for a reason, but opponents like FaZe Clan, TSM, and Spacestation Gaming are very capable of taking individual maps from the favorites, even if a full series victory remains a longer shot.
Featured image credit: OpTic Gaming
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