LoL’s 2025 season cinematic is one of Riot’s best ever—and its viewership shows it

Though a yearly endeavor, it appears Riot Games has truly hit the home run with their latest League cinematic, with the 2025 season trailer already miles above the previous season’s in terms of viewership, boosted by Arcane and its sheer quality.

Compared to 2024’s Still Here trailer, which amassed an impressive 131 million views over the course of the last year, 2025’s Welcome to Noxus trailer has already shot up to around 170 million, despite being out for less than a week. The new season’s cinematic showcases numerous characters and is wrought with references to popular media, including Riot’s own Arcane series, whose style and tone it appropriates with stellar effect. It grants us valuable insight into the characters of Trundle and Darius, the Noxus mentality, gives us Eyes Wide Shut-inspired shots of Katarina and Elise, and simply breathes life into the world of Runeterra more than any other Riot cinematic. The incredible accompanying track “Bite Marks” by TEYA also adds to the cinematic’s quality and gives it replay value if for no other reason than the song.

Welcome to Noxus is also entirely canon, which is a novel concept for Riot’s seasonal trailers, as everything that we see happening in it are actual events from Runeterra’s lore. Given how well the trailer was made in every respect, especially in terms of storytelling and animation, it might also serve as a teaser for upcoming projects akin to Arcane. Riot’s execs have previously commented on the possibility of a new series (thanks IGN), and we have speculated on what region they would take place in, Noxus being one of them. The devs also claimed the trailer is not a prelude to an upcoming yet-to-be-released League series, but even if that were the case, it’s highly likely that we will nevertheless see a Noxus-themed adaptation at some point.

Whatever the future might entail, it’s undeniable that Riot is one of the leading companies in animation at the moment, with its latest seasonal trailer being a testament to how good animation can captivate the masses.