League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics both coming to mobile next year

(Image credit: Riot Games)

Surprising no one, both League of Legends and its offshoot autochess mode Teamfight Tactics are getting mobile versions. "It turns out that you guys actually do have phones," said one Riot developer during the livestream.

During LoL's tenth anniversary celebration livestream, developer Riot Games confirmed what everyone had suspected for a long time along with an extended peek at what else it is working on.

Though League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics are treated as different modes of the same game on PC, on mobile they'll be two separate games. League of Legends' version is called Wild Rift and it's an entirely redesigned game made for consoles and phones that recreates the core LoL experience but with a new map that caters towards shorter 15- to 18-minute games. Given how much is changing with Wild Rift, it makes sense that it won't have any cross-play functionality with the PC version of League of Legends. Nor will it have the same skins and unlocks, and progress can't be carried over from PC, given how different the titles are.

That isn't the case for Teamfight Tactics' mobile version, however. Considering both of its competitors are already available on iOS and Google Play, TFT is joining late but will let you play with PC players in most regions. Little has apparently changed about this version beyond a new UI and controls adapted for phone screens.

Both Wild Rift and TFT mobile are slated for a full release sometime in 2020 but you can preregister today on Google Play by clicking on the links. Pre-registration on iOS will begin tomorrow.

This news comes live from League of Legends' tenth anniversary, so we'll update this story with more information as it becomes available. For now, check out what else was announced, including a radical reworking of the map.

Here's a video for the Wild Rift announcement. Below it, a vid for the Teamfight Tactics announcements.

With over 7 years of experience with in-depth feature reporting, Steven's mission is to chronicle the fascinating ways that games intersect our lives. Whether it's colossal in-game wars in an MMO, or long-haul truckers who turn to games to protect them from the loneliness of the open road, Steven tries to unearth PC gaming's greatest untold stories. His love of PC gaming started extremely early. Without money to spend, he spent an entire day watching the progress bar on a 25mb download of the Heroes of Might and Magic 2 demo that he then played for at least a hundred hours. It was a good demo.