AKC Agility Invitational set for Orlando in December 2026
Top five dogs in each breed will chase a December 2026 invite as the 21st AKC Agility Invitational returns to Orlando’s Orange County Convention Center.
The 21st AKC Agility Invitational is headed back to Orlando, with the Orange County Convention Center set for Dec. 11-13, 2026. AKC’s breed rankings page says the qualifying window runs from July 1, 2025, through June 30, 2026, and the top five dogs in each breed at the end of that period will receive invitations, with alternates moving up if any invite is declined.
That invitation math is what makes this one of the sharpest pressure points on the agility calendar for handlers running intense, high-drive dogs. AKC keeps a separate exhibitor catalog for the event and lists agilityinvitational@akc.org for questions, but the real currency is placement: five spots per breed, earned over a yearlong qualifying run and then carried into a national showcase that has become a recurring destination for the sport.
Orlando fits the scale. The Orange County Convention Center says it offers seven million square feet of combined meeting and public space across its West and North/South buildings, Greater Orlando Sports describes it as the second-largest meeting and competition facility, and Visit Orlando places it about 15 minutes from Orlando International Airport and in the middle of more than 46,000 hotel rooms. For agility, that means room to stage rings, warm-up areas, vendors, and spectators without shrinking the sport down to a local trial feel.
The recent course history shows what the dogs and handlers will likely have to solve. AKC’s past-events pages show the 2025 and 2024 Invitationals in Orlando used Time-2-Beat, Jumpers With Weaves, Standard, Hybrid, another Jumpers With Weaves round, and Finals. That mix rewards quick acceleration, clean weaves, and the ability to keep a dog reading the handler after multiple rounds of speed work. For teams that live on momentum, the Invitational is not just about being fast once. It is about staying sharp through a full weekend of pressure.
Orlando has already hosted the 2025 event from Dec. 12-14 and the 2024 edition from Dec. 13-15, and AKC also lists the 16th AKC Junior Agility Competition alongside the 2026 AKC National Championship. The 21st Invitational arrives with enough history behind it to feel like a fixture, and enough selectivity in the breed rankings to keep every qualifying run in play long before December.
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