The GT World Challenge Europe — formerly the Blancpain GT Series and before that a collection of separately-run series — is structured around two distinct race formats: five Sprint Cup weekends featuring one-hour races, and five Endurance Cup weekends featuring three- to twenty-four-hour races. Rather than treating the two formats as entirely independent championships, SRO Motorsports Group unified them under a combined overall standing so that the most versatile and consistently excellent drivers and teams are rewarded across the breadth of the season.
The overall championship concept crystallised when the two strands were formally integrated in 2016 under the Blancpain GT Series umbrella, with Laurens Vanthoor becoming the first driver crowned under the unified framework. Previously the sprint and endurance championships had operated more independently.
Points earned at both Sprint Cup and Endurance Cup rounds count toward the overall standings, with no events excluded and no drop scores. The 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps, the Endurance Cup's flagship round, awards the most points of any single event in the championship, making it an especially high-value target for overall contenders.
Only cars entered in the Pro class — which carries no driver rating restrictions — compete for the overall drivers' and teams' championships. Entries in Gold, Silver, and Bronze class compete exclusively for their respective subsidiary titles within the same races. At the 24 Hours of Spa, Pro cars are limited to a maximum of three drivers, a regulation designed to encourage teams to balance experience and cost within their driver lineups.
The overall championship thus demands excellence across a range of race formats: the short-distance pace and tactical precision needed for one-hour Sprint races, and the stamina, strategy, and team coordination required for endurance events up to twenty-four hours. This dual requirement makes the SuperCup the most demanding target in the series and distinguishes GT World Challenge Europe from championships that focus on a single format.
The unified overall championship was introduced in 2016 when SRO merged the Blancpain Sprint Series and Blancpain Endurance Series into the Blancpain GT Series. The 2016 overall drivers' title was won by Laurens Vanthoor, marking the beginning of the modern era where the combined championship became the primary measure of GT3 excellence in Europe.
The championship maintained its structure through successive rebrands: Blancpain GT Series (2016–2019), GT World Challenge Europe (2020), and GT World Challenge Europe Powered by AWS from 2020 onward following Amazon Web Services' appointment as official presenter. Fanatec served as an additional title sponsor from 2021 to 2024.
By 2026 the overall championship framework remained intact, with the series fielding record-breaking grid sizes — 45 entries for the Sprint Cup — reflecting the championship's position as the world's largest and most competitive GT3 series. Points from both cups continue to determine the overall SuperCup standings each season.
The Overall SuperCup title is the benchmark of GT3 achievement in Europe. Winning it requires a team to be competitive in two fundamentally different race environments: quick enough to fight at the front in sprint events and sufficiently organised, reliable, and strategically astute to succeed in endurance racing. The combined structure has made the GT World Challenge Europe appealing to factory programmes from a wide range of manufacturers — Audi, BMW, Ferrari, Lamborghini, McLaren, Mercedes-AMG, Porsche, and others — each aiming to use the championship to demonstrate the breadth of their GT3 cars' capability.