LPL Summer Playoffs 2016: Schedule, bracket and how to watch

It’s that time of the League of Legends calendar -- playoffs are starting all around the world, with domestic championships and spots at Worlds on the line. This week, China’s LPL kicks off postseason play, with eight teams competing, the largest field of any premier region.

China’s regular season splits teams up into two groups, and the results in those groups determine playoff seeding. The winners of each group receive direct byes to the semifinals, while the second-place teams go straight to the quarterfinals. The third-place team of one group plays the fourth-place team of the other in the first round in what’s called a weighted best-of-five, where the better-seeded team (the third-place one) starts with a 1-0 game lead.

Defending champions Royal Never Give Up (13-3) and EDward Gaming (16-0) enter the tournament as strong favorites to win it all, and Team WE (10-6) is probably the team most likely to give either a run for their money.

All series are best-of-five. All games can be watched on the LPL1 Twitch stream.

Here’s how the bracket shakes out:

And the schedule:

Round 1

Wednesday August 10

1 a.m. ET Game Talents (1-0) vs. Vici Gaming

5 a.m. ET I May (1-0) vs. Invictus Gaming

Quarterfinals

Friday August 12

1 a.m. ET Snake eSports vs. I May/IG winner

5 a.m. ET Team WE vs. Game Talents/Vici winner

Semifinals

Sunday August 14

1 a.m. ET Edward Gaming vs. Team WE/GT/Vici winner

5 a.m. ET Royal Never Give Up vs. Snake/I May/IG winner

Third-place

Monday August 15

5 a.m. ET Semifinal loser vs. Semifinal loser

Final

Friday August 26

4 a.m. ET Semifinal winner vs. Semifinal winner