The South Korean national esports delegation claimed a total of five medals—two gold, one silver, and two bronze—at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games. Following their achievements at the Hangzhou Asian Games, Fighting Games and League of Legends stood at the top of the podium for the second consecutive event.
The Korea e-Sports Association (KeSPA) announced on October 6 that the national delegation concluded its esports schedule, which took place over 11 days from September 22 to October 2 at the Aichi Sky Expo in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. South Korea fielded a total of 41 athlete and staff members across nine medal events.
The team's first gold medal came in Fighting Games. Yeon Je-gil competed in Street Fighter 6, Bae Jae-min in Tekken 8, and Lee Kwang-no in The King of Fighters XV. After defeating Kazakhstan and Hong Kong in the group stage, the national team bested Chinese Taipei and Saudi Arabia in the knockout rounds. In the final against Japan, they pulled off a 5-2 comeback victory.
The League of Legends national team dominated the group stage, defeating Chinese Taipei in 26 minutes, India in 18 minutes, and Hong Kong in 22 minutes. In the semifinals, they swept Saudi Arabia 2-0, and in the final, they defeated Chinese Taipei 3-0 to capture the title without dropping a single game.
In Puyo Puyo Champions, which made its debut as an official Asian Games medal event, Kang Dong-shin secured a silver medal. Kang advanced to the quarterfinals as the group runner-up and went on to defeat Indonesia and Chinese Taipei in succession. However, he finished in second place after facing 11-year-old Japanese national team player Yuki Kurihara in the final.
Active race car driver Kim Young-chan, competing in Gran Turismo 7, earned the bronze medal by placing third overall with 25 points. After advancing to the finals in first place during qualifying, he recorded 6th, 1st, and 5th-place finishes across three races, pulling off a dramatic comeback in the second race to take 1st place by a margin of 0.054 seconds.
The Pokémon UNITE team added another bronze medal. After advancing through the group stage in second place, they defeated Singapore in the quarterfinals before falling to Japan in the semifinals to finish third overall. Honor of Kings and Identity V reached the quarterfinals, while PUBG Mobile finished 6th overall and the eFootball series concluded its run in the group stage.
The delegation held title-specific training camps in Busan and Seoul from August 17 to September 25. The League of Legends national team also played two public exhibition matches.
KeSPA established two base camps locally in Japan. Four specialists from the Korea Institute of Sport Science provided psychological support, stretching, and physical conditioning, while three dedicated team trainers holding physical therapy qualifications assisted with injury prevention and recovery. A total of four performance analysts were assigned to League of Legends and PUBG Mobile to support match analysis and strategy formulation.
