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The International is an annual electronic sports Dota 2 championship tournament hosted by Valve Corporation, the video game developer behind Dota 2, in which sixteen teams are personally invited to compete. The tournament began as the debut of Dota 2 in August 2011 at Gamescom, with a total prize pot of $1.6 million and a grand prize of one million dollars.

The International 2011
Valve announced the first edition of The International on August 1, 2011. 16 teams were invited to compete in the tournament, which would also serve as the first public viewing of Dota 2, and it was streamed online with commentary in four languages; English, Chinese, German, and Russian. The tournament was funded by Valve, including the $1 million USD grand prize, with Nvidia supplying the hardware. It took place at Gamescom in Cologne from August 17 to 21 the same year.

The tournament started with a group stage in which the winners of each of the four groups were entered into a winner's bracket, and the other teams entered the loser's bracket. The rest of the tournament was then played as a double-elimination tournament. The final of this first tournament was between Ukrainian team Natus Vincere and Chinese team E-Home, with Natus Vincere winning the grand prize after beating E-Home in three out of the four matches. Runner's up E-Home won a second place prize of $250,000 USD and the other top eight teams split the remaining prize pool of $350,000 USD.

The International 2011 serves as a focal point for the 2014 documentary Free to Play, which explores the lives of three of the players.

The International 2012
The International 2012 was announced in May 2012 and held during PAX Prime alongside Riot Games' League of Legends tournament. The event was held at the 2,500 seat Benaroya Hall in Seattle from 31 August to 2 September, with teams situated in glass booths on the main stage. The total prize pool remained $1.6 million USD, with $1 million USD for the winning team, and it was again broadcast in multiple languages.

The previous winners, Natus Vincere, were beaten 3-1 by Chinese team Invictus Gaming in the final. In November 2012 Valve released a documentary following the event online for free featuring interviews with the teams and following them from the preliminary stages through to the finale.

The International 2013
Valve announced The International 2013 on April 25, 2013. It was again hosted at the Benaroya Hall in Seattle from August 7 to 11. The first team to be invited were the defending champions, Invictus Gaming. Sixteen teams participated, thirteen of which received invitations, and the final three being decided in two qualifying tournaments and a match at the start of the tournament. On May 6, it was announced that an interactive compendium would be available for purchase, detailing and cataloging the progression of The International, in addition to allowing for extensive interactivity to be made. A quarter of the revenue from the compendium was added to the prize pool for the tournament, thereby extending the winnings of the participating teams. Via the sales of interactive compendiums, The International reclaimed its previous title as the largest prize pool in electronic sports history, exceeding the two million dollar prize pool from the League of Legends Season 2 World Championship. The total prizepool awarded to the winners was $2,874,381.

The International 2014
On March 31, 2014, Valve announced The International 2014, which would take place from July 18 to July 21 at the KeyArena, which is a venue with a significantly larger capacity than Benaroya Hall from the previous two years. Unlike the previous three events, there would be three tiers for admissions, including general admission, floor seating and VIP passes. For The International 2014, eleven teams would receive direct invites, with an additional four spots determined by regional qualifiers taking place between May 12 and May 25. The sixteenth spot would be determined by a wild card qualifier between the runner-ups from the regional competitions.

Secret Shop
Starting with The International 2012, Valve decided to set up a shop inside the tournament venue of Benaroya Hall. The shop itself is named the Secret Shop, a reference to one of the in-game locations where players can purchase more powerful basic items. The shop sells various Dota 2 related merchandise including apparel, drink-ware, posters, character Plushies as well as SteelSeries computer accessories with a Dota 2 theme. Pieces of physical merchandise sold at the Secret Shop are also packaged with redeemable codes for digital rewards and in-game awards. Many of these virtual rewards include items used to customize characters and are only obtainable during the tournament itself and are generally seen as rarity within the game's community. The Secret Shop was also present during The International 2013 and is expected to return during The International 2014.

Reception
Community acceptance of the Secret Shop and its merchandise has been overwhelming positive, with some individuals purchasing merchandise in order to gain access to the exclusive online content. While much of the merchandise from past International tournaments has been restocked and is now available on Valve's online store page, select items sold at the Secret Shop are shown as sold out or unlisted.

During The International 2013, Arsenio Navarro, a merchandise licensing representative from Valve, states that a lot of positive feedback has been given to more sophisticated apparel with subtler Dota 2 references and intends to push further in that direction.

Weta Partnership
Best known for their work in the Lord of the Rings, the New Zealand prop company, Weta, announced that they would be partnering with Valve to create and market collectible statues, weapons and armor from Dota 2 after working with Valve on various replica projects over the year 2012. During The International 2012, Weta showcased their range of DotA 2 collectibles as well as a brand new Championship trophy designed after one of the in-game items. The tournament trophy, Aegis of Champions, has since become an iconic symbol in the subsequent International tournaments, the backside of the trophy engraved with the names and handles of each player on the first place team.

Media Coverage
The primary medium for The International coverage is through the Internet. Throughout each year, tournament coverage is done by a selection of online gaming and e-sports organizations who provide live streaming, commentary and articles surrounding games in the progress, similar to sports commentators and analysts. Multiple commentators from North America, China, Russia, Ukraine and Korea were present at The International in both 2012 and 2013. It is also reported that there were over one million concurrent online viewers during The International 2013, many utilizing live streaming websites like Twitch.tv to watch from their homes.

News Coverage
KCPQ news anchor, Kaci Aitchison, acted as a host to The International 2013 and provided behind-the-scenes commentary and interviews with professional players and analysts before subsequently working on a news story outlining the event. Paige Cornwell of The Seattle Times also wrote an article following The International 2013, saying: "The biggest sporting event in Seattle on Thursday wasn’t at Safeco Field or CenturyLink Field. It was at Benaroya Hall."