This paper explores the integration of esports into educational strategies to enhance digital literacy and foster global competencies among learners. As a rapidly evolving digital phenomenon with a global audience, esports transcends traditional boundaries of sports and education, defined as organized competitive video gaming at a professional level, offering innovative pathways to engage digital natives. By leveraging its broad appeal, esports creates opportunities for addressing critical societal challenges such as climate change, social justice, and cross-cultural understanding. Through its capacity to foster critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaborative skills, esports uniquely contributes to educational engagement and learner outcomes, particularly within science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Beyond STEM, the paper examines the potential of esports to address broader socio-political issues and cultivate a globally competent citizenry equipped to tackle pressing global challenges. Additionally, we explore how esports can be integrated into curricula to foster a digital European identity that aligns with broader educational goals of developing inclusive and diverse digital cultures. This dual focus on European identity and global citizenship highlights esports as a tool for transcending geographical and cultural boundaries, fostering shared global responsibility and community. Finally, the paper examines existing pedagogical approaches and best practices that educators can adopt to incorporate esports into their teaching methods, transforming learning environments and preparing students as both digital citizens and global stewards in an increasingly interconnected and digital world.

Keywords: Academic Esports, Digital Literacy, Global Competencies, STEM Education, Global Citizenship.