Brazil Decree Formally Brings Esports Into National Sports System
Brazil’s president signed Decree No. 13,138 on October 14, 2026, formally defining esports as a competitive sporting activity and allowing esports organisations to join the Sistema Nacional do Esporte (Sinesp), the country’s national sports system, for the first time.
The decree regulates Law No. 14,852 of May 3, 2024, which created Brazil’s legal framework for the electronic games industry.
A dedicated chapter of the new text, Chapter IV, "Dos Esportes Eletrônicos" (On Electronic Sports), sets out the government’s first formal recognition of esports as a sport under federal regulation.
What The Decree Actually Says
Article 18 of the decree defines esports as "a competitive sporting manifestation, carried out individually or collectively through the use of electronic games, according to previously established rules and result criteria."
The accompanying clause extends that definition to leagues, championships and tournaments run by any recognised esports organisation, while preserving those organisations’ autonomy over their own formats.
Article 19 is the operative change: esports organisations "may join" Sinesp under existing sports legislation, provided their technological, competitive and organisational specifics are respected.
A single paragraph then tasks Brazil’s Ministry of Sport with integrating esports into public sports policy, covering athlete development, competition support, research, innovation, integrity, inclusion and accessibility.
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Why It Took Until Now
Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies had flagged the gap years earlier.
A special subcommittee on esports reported that neither the 1998 Pelé Law nor the 2023 General Sports Law (Law No. 14,597) mentioned electronic games at all, leaving esports organisations outside the same federal sports system that governs football, volleyball and Olympic disciplines.
The subcommittee’s own report cited Article 217 of Brazil’s constitution, which grants sports bodies autonomy over their own structure, as one reason a dedicated legal basis was needed before any formal integration could occur.
Decree 13,138 closes that gap through secondary legislation rather than a new statute, building directly on the powers Law 14,852 already gave the executive branch.
Other Provisions In The Same Decree
The decree is broader than esports alone.
It also instructs Brazil’s federal tax authority to simplify customs procedures for importing game-development tools (Article 3), directs Brazil’s patent office (INPI) to streamline intellectual-property registration for electronic games (Article 20), and applies the child and adolescent protections set out in a separate March 2026 decree to the games sector (Article 22).
The Betting Angle
Brazil’s regulated fixed-odds betting market, overseen by the Secretaria de Prêmios e Apostas since 2024, already lists esports among the sports disciplines licensed operators can take bets on.
Formal Sinesp membership does not directly change betting law, but it gives esports organisations access to the same governance and integrity apparatus as traditional sports federations for the first time, filling a gap that regulators and sports betting sites have had to work around when handling esports integrity cases.
The Ministry of Sport’s mandate to fold esports into "integrity" policy under Article 19 is the clearest signal yet that Brazil intends to treat match-fixing and governance questions in esports the same way it treats them in football.
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