GeoGuessr walked so Excel could also become an extremely dorky “esport”

If you’re getting stressed out from all the sexism and Saudi Arabia stuff going on in mainstream esports, fear not… A computer-game-turned-esport is here to remind you of what the industry was supposed to be about: celebrating nerds.

The Microsoft Excel World Championship recently took to the stage, shining a light on a bunch of organization-obsessed dorks who can make incredibly complex Excel sheets beyond anything you could ever imagine wasting your time doing.

Every year, there is a debate over whether Excel should be called an esport – or an “e-sport,” as normies call it. I personally do not think anything you can do on your computer automatically makes it an esport – just as not everything you do in real life is a sport (although it can be gamified, sure). However, some believe that Excel is an esport, so I’ll just assume it’s partially an esport based on some definition somewhere.

But this isn’t a new argument.

Why must everything be called an esport?

In the past, an esport colleague and I discussed the frustration of outsiders calling competitive tag an esport. Why? Because it appeared on Twitch. Competitive tag is cool, in my opinion, but it’s not an esport. Just as your nephew screaming high-pitched slurs in a Fortnite lobby and streaming it to his two followers on Twitch is also not an esport.

Then we faced the same debate when chess went mainstream. Instead of a bunch of nerds playing it at some exclusive European mansion somewhere, some top chess players decided they wanted to get in some fresh faces and make chess “cool,” prompting them to start streaming on Twitch. This got events to start including chess tournaments for big money, which in turn got broke esports organizations to quickly snag chess players to compete.

Chess is a competitive game and it has a computer version. But is it a video game? I’d personally say no once again, but many argue that chess is an esport because it can be played virtually. I mean, you can virtually play Neopets as well. If I try to get a high score playing Meerca Chase II, is that an esport? When does it end?

Another game that’s often seen as an esport is GeoGuessr. I actually like watching GeoGuessr streams and watching clips of guys guessing they are in the Chipata, Zambia based on a zoomed-in image of a grain of sand. That amount of memorization and geographical knowledge is clearly impressive. But is that an esport? A game where you just click on something once? Again, I’d say no.

Part of the argument for these games being an esport is that they have organized tournaments. The GeoGuessr World Championship 2026 location was just announced: Berlin’s Tempodrom, which can seat up to 3,500 people. The event plans to be a festival with tons of activities alongside the competition. Which sounds awesome.

But I still am not convinced.

Some people think that any virtual game you can compete in is a tournament. In that sense, GeoGuessr and chess and basically anything you want is an esport. But my definition is the top players of a competitive multiplayer game or a competitive fighting game competing in an organized circuit or tournament. This would mean that Dota 2 is an esports title while Sims 4 is not, even if you hosted a tournament where people made a house as fast as possible.

Why are we mad that everything is called an esport?

Let’s be real: the esports community is full of gatekeepers.

Esports is a niche subset of gaming that is more than just people enjoying a game. It’s more than just people playing a game competitively. Esports is organized circuits and tournaments that feature the best players in the world doing things in games that most of us could never do. These players get signed, have contracts, get traded, practice all day, compete on stage…

Most gamers do not watch esports. They may watch streamers, but not esports. Even recently, I watched the Halo World Championship’s opening game to see what stupid project would be revealed – it was just a campaign remake basically – and all of the comments in chat were basically the same: “We don’t care about this match, we just want the announcement!”

Esports is just not as big as the industry believes it is.

But I think that’s made the people passionate and dedicated to esports all the more protective of it. To be taken seriously, you need to define yourself, stick to that definition, and grow it. Having boomers and random journalists call every little computer-related thing an “esport” can be damaging to the esports scene, similar to how football fans would be mad if foosball was shoved onto ESPN and continuously called a sport until outsiders believed it.

There are bigger issues going on in the world, but most people have the capacity to care about more than one thing. We are able to discuss small issues without forgetting the larger problems around us. Okay?

With esports being so new and niche, many people are often confused as to what it is and why they should care – and why they should take it seriously? If we are calling everything on Twitch an esport, we are watering down what esports truly are and making it seem like more of a joke than it already is. We already can’t get anyone outside of South Korea to care that Faker is winning every League of Legends event ever – so why do we also want them to believe that someone clicking on an Excel sheet cell is also an esport? How does that help?

It doesn’t.

I’m not saying we can’t have fun and be silly and give Microsoft Excel a tournament. I get it. I understand what whimsy is and I love celebrating nerds for things that would often get overlooked. And I can see an argument for attempting to make esports more “mainstream” by accepting every little competitive thing into the industry to pick up more fans and money.

But I’m sorry, I just can’t say these things are true esports. I just won’t. Just like fighting game players are mad at Riot attempting to sell out the FGC with Chipotle sponsorships, I don’t want to sell out the esports industry by saying me quickly typing a paragraph on a Google Doc is an esport.

These things will never be an esport to me. But I respect them.