Making up almost half of the Asian Tour's 21-event schedule, excluding Majors, 10 International Series tournaments - elevated competitions with higher prize purses of at least $2 million - give players the chance to secure one of the only routes into the LIV Golf League.
At the end of the Asian Tour's 2024 season, the International Series rankings winner will graduate over to the LIV Golf League for at least the following campaign, as long as they are not already a member of it. Should a current LIV player top the standings, no one new will move across.
Regardless of status, eligible players who end between second and eighth in the International Series rankings earn automatic entry into the second round of this year's LIV Golf Promotions event.
Asian Tour winners - plus the next 31 eligible players in the top 40 of the rankings - will secure a place in the first round of LIV Golf Promotions, which has switched from offering three more spots in the lucrative League for the subsequent season to only one.
This year is only the third time the exclusive card has been available to Asian Tour golfers, with a partnership between the LIV Golf League's backers, the Saudi Public Investment Fund, and the Asian Tour first arriving in February 2022, when only seven tournaments were played.
The inaugural International Series Rankings champion was Zimbabwean Scott Vincent, and he enjoyed two seasons on the 54-hole circuit before finishing in the Drop Zone in 2024. Andy Ogletree earned a card via the International Series 12 months later after a 10-event series and went on to finish 34th in his debut season in the LIV Golf League.
For a long period this year, American John Catlin led the way as he looked to switch his status from LIV Golf reserve to full-time player, but that all changed after the ninth tournament of the International Series in Qatar.
After eight events, Catlin had 900.58 points, less than 90 points ahead of his nearest rival, Ben Campbell. However, it was current LIV Golf star Peter Uihlein who leapfrogged them both to move to the top of the standings after his win at Doha Golf Club.
After Catlin could only finish T19, with Cambpell in T16, Uihlein's five-shot win gave him 450 points to move top of the standings on 1,071.10 points. Catlin is next on the list with 927.46, while Campbell is now in third, on 851.55 points.
Uihlein's victory in Qatar was his second on the International Series this year, after he also claimed the title at its England event. In total, he has played seven of the events, with further top-10 finishes coming in the International Series Oman, the Saudi Open and the International Series Thailand, where he was runner-up.
Given that solid form, with just the Saudi International left to play, he is surely firm favorite to top the rankings. If he does, it'll mean that, as a current LIV golfer, no one will earn a card to the big-money circuit via the International Series, which would leave the likes of Catlin and Campbell needing to win the LIV Golf Promotions event to guarantee a place next sesaon.
Catlin has played in all nine of the elevated tournaments so far and claimed victory at the International Series Macau before losing out in a playoff at both the International Series Morocco and the Black Mountain Championship in Thailand. He'll be desperate to find that kind of form one more time in Saudi Arabia - where the winner will earn 1,000 points - to give him the best possible chance of taking Uihlein's place and earning a LIV Golf contract without needing to rely on the LIV Golf Promotions event.
Below are the current top-10 in the International Series Rankings with just one tournament to come this season.
