Riot Games will shut down League of Legends Classic at the end of Season 3, in early January 2027. The throwback mode launched in July, and Riot says player interest fell off soon after release.
Classic let players return to League of Legends as it played in earlier years. Riot built the mode around nostalgia for its long-running MOBA, which first launched in 2009. Roughly six months after its debut, the studio is winding it down, although it has left the door open for a comeback.
Why Riot is ending League of Legends Classic
In a blog post, the development team said interest in Classic waned quickly after launch. According to Riot, many players “have gone back to other parts of League.”
That drop in activity created a practical problem. In some regions, there are no longer enough people in the Classic queue to fill matches quickly, so wait times have grown long. Riot’s answer for the remaining months is to add windowed queues in those regions.
With windowed queues, matchmaking for the mode opens only during set periods instead of around the clock. As a result, the players who still want Classic games are grouped into the same time slots, which should shorten waits.
What changes before the January shutdown
Classic will keep receiving updates until it closes. Riot plans to add more champions to the Classic pool in the patches still scheduled for 2026, so the roster will continue to grow through the end of the year.
After Season 3 ends, the mode goes offline. Riot has not given a specific date beyond early January 2027.
A possible return as an event mode
Riot does not plan to discard the work that went into rebuilding older versions of the game. The studio said it aims to bring League of Legends Classic back in the future, “likely as an event mode with adjustments and additions” based on feedback from this first run.
The studio has not shared a timeline for that return or said which changes it has in mind. However, an event mode runs for a fixed period by design. That format would avoid the thin queues the permanent version ran into this year.
Heavy promotion, short run
Riot promoted the mode heavily from the moment it was announced. That push included a live show match with ten retired professional players at this summer’s Mid-Season Invitational tournament.
Other studios have tried to win back long-time players by turning the clock back on a live game. Blizzard Entertainment released World of Warcraft Classic in 2019, recreating the original version of its MMO, and later added Classic versions of several expansions. That project has held an audience for years.
Riot’s attempt followed a different path. Interest in League of Legends Classic dropped within months of its launch, by the studio’s own account, and the permanent mode now ends alongside Season 3 in early January 2027.