About Arena of Champions
World of Warcraft, Blizzard Entertainment’s online role-playing game first released in 2004, has arenas: short team fights between players. Arena of Champions takes that one part of the game and builds a free fan-made game around it. Every match is a fight between players. The game launched around 29 October 2026.
There are nine classes, each with a single specialization: Arms Warrior, Fire Mage, Discipline Priest, Assassination Rogue, Marksmanship Hunter, Holy Paladin, Affliction Warlock, Restoration Druid and Restoration Shaman. Each class has an eight-slot action bar of classic-style abilities. You queue for 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3 matches, and each bracket has its own rating, which starts at 1500. Between matches you wait in a shared town, where you can chat with other players and add friends.
The town and heroes are built from Warcraft III art, so the game looks like a Warcraft III custom map rather than World of Warcraft itself. It is a fan project, not made or endorsed by Blizzard, and the site doesn’t name its author.
How it runs in your browser
Arena of Champions plays right here in the player above, loaded from arenaofchampions.live. The client is a Rust program compiled to WebAssembly, about 45 MB, and it draws with WebGL. It needs a desktop browser with WebGL 2 and hardware acceleration turned on.
The first load can take a while. The game can show nothing but “Loading…” for 10 to 30 seconds while the client downloads. When we loaded it on desktop Chrome on 31 October 2026, it took about 13 seconds and then showed a sign-in panel with “Play as Guest”, email sign-in, an option to create an account and a “Download for Windows” button. Guest play needs nothing at all, and the account is optional.
Every match is online against other people, so a stable connection matters. The game recommends its optional Windows app if your ping is high in the browser. Only download it from arenaofchampions.live. That address is the only one that belongs to the game: arenaofchampions.com is a parked domain for sale and has nothing to do with it.
Controls and devices
You need a keyboard and mouse. The key bindings for the action bar aren’t listed here, so learn them in the game before your first rated match. It hasn’t been tested on phones, and Chromebooks haven’t been confirmed.
Tips
- Give the first load up to half a minute before deciding something is wrong.
- Start as a guest. The sign-in panel says you can save your progress any time, and an account only needs an email address and a password.
- Each bracket keeps its own rating, starting at 1500, so 1v1, 2v2 and 3v3 are tracked separately.
- If matches feel laggy in the browser, try the Windows app from the game’s own site.
If the Warcraft III look appeals to you, Warcraft III itself also runs in a browser, with melee and custom maps.
Is Arena of Champions Free, Safe and Official?
Is Arena of Champions free to play?
Yes. You can jump in as a guest with no account. If you want one, an optional account uses an email address and a password, and the sign-in panel says you can save your progress at any time.
Is Arena of Champions made by Blizzard?
No. It’s a fan project in the style of World of Warcraft’s arenas, built from Warcraft III art. It isn’t made or endorsed by Blizzard Entertainment.
Is arenaofchampions.com the same game?
No. Only arenaofchampions.live is the game. arenaofchampions.com is a parked domain for sale with no connection to it, so download the Windows app only from arenaofchampions.live.
