How to Qualify for the MTG Pro Tour?

The Pro Tour is the most iconic Magic the Gathering tournament, where hundreds of players compete for monetary prizes and glory. The tournament went on a hiatus during the pandemic years, but has since returned recently in 2023. You might want to test your Magic prowess and battle against the best players yourselves, so you’re wondering, how to qualify for the Pro Tour?

There are multiple ways to do so, and since some can be quite convoluted, we gathered all the information and presented it in a simple manner. You’ll be able to each way on how to qualify to the PT in this article.

To quickly recap, the five ways to get to the MTG Pro Tour are:

Finish in the top X (number varies) at a Regional Championship
Reaching 7 wins on a Day 2 of the Arena qualifier
Winning a Pro Tour qualifier
Doing well on previous Pro Tours
Being in the MTG Hall of Fame

We’ll first take a look at each of those, and then we’ll talk about which one is the “easiest” way of achieving your goal.

Regional Championship

Doing well at the Regional Championship will reward you with a Pro Tour qualification. There are twelve different RCs around the world, and you can find them in the following table:

Region	Organizer	Invites
Australia/New Zealand	Good Games	8
Brazil	City Class Games	8
Canada (East)	Face to Face Games	8
Canada (West)	Face to Face Games	8
China	Kadou	8
Chinese Taipei (Taiwan)	Game Square	1
Japan/Korea	Big Magic	12
Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA)	Legacy	36
Mexico/Central America/Caribbean (MCAC)	Yellow Rabbit	2
South America	Magicsur	4
Southeast Asia	Oracle Events	8
USA	Dreamhack US	48

As you can see, the numbers of invites vary from region to region. In China, you’ll have to finish in the Top 8, while in EMEA region a 36th place would be enough. Besides the qualifications, this tournament also offers monetary prizes, which makes it quite enticing.

You also have to qualify for the Regional Championship. You can do so by playing in a Regional Championship Qualifier. Use Wizards’ Store Locator to find those. Additionally, you have the option of qualifying via MTG Online. You’ll be able to find more information about how to qualify for the RC in a separate article, which will be posted in the following days.

Arena Qualifier

The other common option to qualify is via MTG Arena’s Qualifier. That is a 2-day event that happens during the weekend, once per month.

On Day 1, you need to win seven matches, before you lose two. If you manage to achieve that, you are eligible to play on Day 2. There, the same scenario occurs. You need once again win seven matches, before you lose two. Your reward is a qualification for both Pro Tour and Arena Championship.

However, you can’t just enter the Arena Qualifier. You need to qualify for it also. The most common ways to do so are by finishing on the top 250 spots of the Ranked Ladder (either in Constructed or Limited) or by winning a Qualifier Play-In event.

Pro Tour Qualifier

This is a tabletop, one day event with a simple premise. You win the tournament, and you’re qualified for the Pro Tour.

The problem with Pro Tour qualifiers is that they are extremely rare.

These three paths are the only option for a newcomer. However, there are other ways of getting a PT qualification, which we’ll just quickly mention, since they are applicable for a much smaller group of players.

Excellent Results on Previous Pro Tours

Once you manage to get to that first Pro Tour, you unlock another qualification path, by having excellent results on the PT itself.

If you manage to get to 10 or more wins in a Pro Tour, you are qualified for the next one. (This is a 10-6 result or better.) This option is pretty straightforward, the next one is a bit more complicated.

Adjusted Match Points

This option is here to reward consistent, but not quite good enough results over the multiple Pro Tours.

Adjusted Match Points (AMP) are the number of match points earned in a Pro Tour after the first 9 match points. So, you could count a number of match points you earned during a Pro Tour, subtract nine, and you get your AMP for that tournament. (The number can’t be negative.) On top of that, players who make the Top 8 get an additional 12 AMP.

If you earned 39 Adjusted Match Points in the last three Pro Tours, you’re qualified for the next one.

Hall of Fame

Finally, the best of the best Magic players get inducted in the Hall of Fame. There used to be a voting process each year, but that stopped in 2019. It’ll be interesting to see if Wizards have any future plans for Hall of Fame, or are just going to leave it as is. Currently, there are 48 players in the HoF.

Each of the players can choose any single Pro Tour in a calendar year and attend it.

The Easiest Way to Qualify for The Pro Tour

Now you know which options you have to qualify for the MTG Pro Tour. But, which one should you choose that you’d give yourself the best odds of achieving this hefty goal?

It has to be said—there is no easy path to the Pro Tour. You’ll have to both play extremely well, and get at least somewhat lucky. Nevertheless, some options will make it more likely for you to succeed than the others.

As we talked about before, the last two options are only applicable when you’re already doing well at the Pro Tour. This means we can cross them off the list.

Pro Tour qualifier seems an unlikely choice. Only one player qualifies, but the bigger problem is that it’s happening so rarely, and only at specific events. Sure, if you’re nearby, go for it! However, it’s probably not the greatest idea to fly across half the globe in hopes of winning a PTQ.

Finally, this leaves us with…

The Two Best Options

If you want to qualify for the Pro Tour, you’ll want to do well at the Regional Championship, or at the Arena Qualifier. Both have their pros and cons.

Arena Qualifier

You can play the Arena qualifier from the comforts of your home. You don’t need to spend money on travel, accommodation, and so on. Besides, it will typically take less of your time. For players who live in more remote areas, Arena qualifier might be the only realistic option.

However, there’s a big downside to it. The odds really aren’t in your favor. For every 1,000 players who enter Day 1, only around 35 make it to Day 2. From among those, only a single player qualifies for the Pro Tour.

So, if we presume all players are of the same skill level, you have around 0.1% chance to qualify via MTGA qualifier. Of course, if you improve your skills, you can increase that percentage slightly, but it’s still a very hard feat to accomplish.

Regional Championship

Your odds improve significantly at Regional Championships. We assumed the maximum capacity for each event (even tough it’s rarely reached), and took into account how many spots each RC awards. Some are more generous than the others, with the best ones qualifying 7.2% and the worst ones 1.6% of the maximum amount of players.

We have to take into account that the number of qualification slots will be reduced (by around 50%) after the third Pro Tour in 2023. They currently qualify more players, to make up for the fact that there aren’t many invites coming from previous Pro Tours. (As there weren’t any between 2019-2022.)

However, even if we look at the worst odds, and split them in half, we get to 0.8% of players being qualified. These odds are eight times better than the ones at Arena qualifier. So, even under the worst circumstances, you’ll have a significantly better chance of getting to the Pro Tour with the Regional Championship.

So the easiest way to qualify for the Pro Tour is via Regional Championship. If that isn’t working for you, the second-best option is via Arena qualifier.