Kling joins the $450K Chroma Awards, but most of the cash is tied to sponsor tools

At 12:18 UTC on Monday 2 November, Kling's account on X told its roughly 138,000 followers that "Season 2 of the Chroma Awards (@chromaawards) is here, in partnership with Kling AI!" The post promised "$450K+ in cash prizes" and student internships, and closed with the offer that matters most to anyone who makes work with the tool: "Use Kling AI in your submission and share your work on social media to unlock additional prizes and perks."

The competition is real, free to enter and genuinely large. ElevenLabs, which incubates it, opened Season 2 on Monday 19 October across five divisions: Film, Music Videos, Advertising, Games and Behind-The-Scenes. But when we opened all 74 prize pages on the competition's site and added them up, the headline number split into something more useful to know. Most of the listed cash goes to entries built with a particular sponsor's tool, and the money any filmmaker can win with any workflow is closer to $120,000 than $450,000.

Where the $450K actually sits

The stated prize totals on the official pages come to $453,250, which is where the "$450K+" comes from. ElevenLabs' own announcement is more careful than Kling's post: it describes "over $450,000 in cash prizes and travel perks." The cash actually listed on the prize pages adds up to $366,250. The gap of about $87,000 is travel to the in-person gala and other perks whose value is never itemized, so that figure is our arithmetic, not an organizer number.

Of the $366,250 in listed cash, $191,750 (52%) sits in 27 sponsor awards that only go to entries using that sponsor's tool. Another $55,000 is ten $5,500 student stipends meant for a Summer 2027 internship, open to entrants aged 18 to 24. That leaves $119,500 in tool-agnostic genre prizes across 32 categories, most of them paying $2,000 for first place, $1,000 for second and $500 for third. Season 1 paid exactly those amounts in each film category.

• Bucket: 27 sponsor tool awards. Listed cash: $191,750; Who can win it: Entries that use that sponsor's tool significantly, tag it and prove it
• Bucket: 32 genre categories, five divisions. Listed cash: $119,500; Who can win it: Any entry, made with any tools
• Bucket: Ten student fellowships. Listed cash: $55,000; Who can win it: Entrants aged 18 to 24
• Bucket: Division "of the Year" awards. Listed cash: No cash listed; Who can win it: Sponsor tool required; prize is a gala trip, a speech and a year of the tool
• Bucket: Stated totals minus listed cash. Listed cash: About $87,000; Who can win it: Travel and perks, value not itemized (our arithmetic)

What Kling actually put up

The Kling Awards pool is $11,000: $4,000 for first, $2,000 for second, $1,000 for third and $500 each for fourth through eleventh. The prize page says the award is sponsored by Kling and that entrants "must use their tool in a significant way." Kling also attaches its name to the Ad of the Year award in the Advertising division, which carries no cash at all, only a VIP trip to the gala, an acceptance speech and a year of Kling.

That makes Kling one of 27 tool sponsors rather than a co-host. Eight other pools are exactly the same size (Alibaba Cloud, Creatify, Dreamina, Floyo, Hyper3D, Magnific, Meshy and OpenArt), while ElevenLabs, CapCut and Cantina each put up $22,000. The "in partnership with" wording isn't unique either: Alibaba Cloud used the same line on Thursday 29 October, and LTX, Runware, VEED and Floyo posted near-identical partner announcements the same week. Runware says it is the title sponsor. We couldn't confirm Kling's sponsorship tier, because the sponsors page shows logos only.

Kling's post was the reach event of the launch. It had 7,822 impressions and 126 likes in its first 18 hours or so, while the competition's own account, with about 1,659 followers, draws between about 40 and 860 views a post. No trade outlet has covered the partnership, so every public account of it comes from the organizer or a sponsor.

The rule that makes it worth entering

The official FAQ is plain about tools: "No, you're free to use any AI or creative tools." Sponsor awards sit in a separate layer on top of the genre prizes. To qualify for one, the FAQ says, "you must use the sponsor's tool in a significant way, include the relevant 'Tool Tag', and provide proof in the form of a brief explanation, screenshot, or estimated percentage." There is no separate entry. A project goes into one genre category, and if it was made with Kling, ElevenLabs and CapCut, it is in the running for all three tool awards as well.

Entry is free and there is no cap on the number of projects, as long as each one is substantially different from the others. ElevenLabs pitches that openness as the point: "Free trials remove the cost of entry, unlimited submissions remove the pressure of a single shot, and the curated judging panel means the work is judged with taste." Projects made after 1 February 2026 are eligible if they were never entered in a previous season. Unlicensed IP and voice or visual deepfakes of real people are out, music must be original, licensed or fully AI-generated, and the rules say entries "must prioritize human-led storytelling."

One date needs care before you plan around it. The first paragraph of the ElevenLabs announcement says submissions close on 1 January 2027, but the same post's entry section, Kling's post and the FAQ all say Thursday 7 January 2027 at 11:45pm Pacific time. The FAQ is the authority, so 7 January is the deadline.

What we still don't know

Season 2 judges are listed as "will be announced soon" on every prize page. ElevenLabs says each category will get four judges from traditional and AI backgrounds across three rounds, and finalists also face a public vote between 21 January and 11 February, with no published weighting between vote and jury. Several of the previous judges listed on the homepage work at companies that sponsor prizes this season, and Chroma's own staff judged too. That's worth knowing before you enter, not evidence of a problem.

Season 1 also ran late. The 3 November 2025 deadline reported at launch stretched to 18 November, and the winners livestream promised for 7 December arrived around 21 December. This time ElevenLabs says winners will be named "on or around" Thursday 11 February 2027, with an in-person gala in April 2027 and no date yet. We also didn't verify the "$1M" in free trials and promotions, because the trial pack sits behind a login, and one reply under Kling's post says the promotional credit isn't available yet.

The scale claims belong to the organizer. ElevenLabs says Season 1 drew more than 6,600 projects from over 5,550 creators in 122 countries and paid out over $190,000, and the homepage calls Chroma the world's largest AI film and media competition. We found no independent count to check those figures against.

What it means for AI creators

The prize list works better as a menu than as a jackpot. If your workflow already runs through a sponsor's tool, the stacking rule is real value: one film can collect a $2,000 genre prize and several tool prizes on top, for no fee. If you work across tools or avoid the big platforms, your realistic target is a share of roughly $120,000, split into small purses.

• Tag every sponsor tool you genuinely used and keep proof as you go: a screenshot or a rough percentage of shots is enough under the FAQ.
• Pick your one genre category with care, since a project can only enter one, and split different projects across categories instead.
• Check the student fellowships if you are 18 to 24: each of the ten $5,500 stipends is bigger than any first prize in the genre categories.
• Treat 7 January as the deadline and check the official site before you lean on any other date, given how Season 1 slipped.

Chroma also sits in a crowded winter. Creators' own contest roundups on X list it beside PixLight's $300,000 pool, which is PixVerse-only, and an AI film award advertising $1 million with 70% of it tied to Seedance. Against those, Chroma is the broadest any-tools option, even if its any-tools slice is smaller than the headline suggests.

Our take

Chroma is a sponsor marketplace with a real festival inside it. The festival part, $119,500 judged on the work rather than the workflow, is the reason to enter. Kling's $11,000 is a bonus for people already using Kling, and nobody should switch tools to chase it.

Timeline

• Date: 2023. Event: Competition starts life as Project Odyssey (organizer's claim); Source: chromaawards.com
• Date: Mon 6 Oct 2025. Event: Season 1 call reported, with a 3 Nov deadline and a 7 Dec livestream; Source: No Film School
• Date: Tue 18 Nov 2025. Event: Season 1 submission window actually closes; Source: Devpost
• Date: Around 21 Dec 2025. Event: Season 1 winners announced on livestream; Source: Devpost update; Chroma LinkedIn
• Date: Mon 19 Oct 2026. Event: ElevenLabs opens Season 2 across five divisions; Source: ElevenLabs; FAQ
• Date: Tue 27 Oct to Fri 30 Oct 2026. Event: Sponsors post partner announcements, including LTX, Runware, VEED, Alibaba Cloud and Floyo; Source: X
• Date: Mon 2 Nov 2026. Event: Kling announces its partnership and the $11,000 Kling Awards; Source: Kling on X; prize page
• Date: Thu 7 Jan 2027, 11:45pm PT. Event: Submissions close; Source: FAQ
• Date: Fri 8 Jan to Thu 21 Jan 2027. Event: Shortlisting; Source: Homepage timeline
• Date: Thu 21 Jan to Thu 11 Feb 2027. Event: Judging and public vote for finalists; Source: Homepage timeline
• Date: Thu 11 Feb 2027 (on or around). Event: Winners announced on livestream; Source: FAQ
• Date: April 2027, date TBA. Event: In-person awards gala; Source: Homepage timeline

Sources and what is unconfirmed: ElevenLabs Season 2 announcement, 19 Oct 2026 (updated 28 Oct); chromaawards.com FAQ, homepage, mission page and all 74 prize pages, read 3 Nov 2026; Kling on X, 2 Nov 2026, with metrics from the X API on 3 Nov; partner posts from Alibaba Cloud, LTX, VEED, Magnific and Runware on X; No Film School, 6 Oct 2025; chromaawards.devpost.com; SIGGRAPH Digital Arts Community bio of Matty Shimura. Unconfirmed: Kling's sponsor tier, the $1M in trials, the value of the travel perks (our $87,000 is stated totals minus listed cash), the Season 2 judges and the vote weighting. We did not ask ElevenLabs, Chroma or Kling for comment.

Your Voice

Quoted from public posts on X and credited by handle. If one of these is yours and you want it removed, message @the__generated on X and it comes down.

Got something to say? Tag @the__generated on X