It was the record-setting match where GM Hans Niemann, yes him, was in a room at the Web Summit taking on 107,000 people with AI on their side. And Niemann won.

At World Chess, we love to put on a show—and Hans Niemann vs. You was one of our best.

Now the moment when GM Hans Niemann, the controversial "bad boy of chess", took on more than 106,000 people helped by AI (and won) has scooped a prestigious W3 Award.

It was a stunt—a fun piece of theatre to put chess in the spotlight at the last November's Web Summit in Lisbon. And it worked.

Over 106,638 people from 132 countries took on GM Hans Niemann.

World Chess produced the event in partnership with it.com Domains. The W3 honour it got was for Web Experiences – Games by the Academy of Interactive and Visual Arts.

The W3 Awards honour creative excellence on the internet, and the recognition places World Chess’s recent project alongside leading names in digital media, product design, and interactive technology.

The Web Summit is one of the world’s largest gatherings of technology and business leaders—exactly where you want to showcase the excitement of online chess.

Particiapants in the hall voted for moves on their phones.

We invited chess fans around the world to join forces—alongside an AI advisor—and vote in real time to challenge Grandmaster Niemann in a live match.

Over 106,638 people from 132 countries took up the call, making it the largest known online simultaneous chess match in history. You can view it all and review the game here.

Players had 30 seconds to vote on each move, choosing from Grandmaster, Advanced, or Amateur suggestions provided by an AI system based on Stockfish.

Niemann had five minutes per move to respond. The match, which lasted 71 moves and 42 minutes, was broadcast globally and commentated live by American FIDE Master James Canty III.

Niemann won a spicy game.

Canty was enormously entertaining and tried to guide the fans, but could not stop Niemann.

Here's Ilya Merenzon, CEO of World Chess, explaining exactly why we did it: “This recognition affirms something we’ve believed for a long time: chess is evolving. The success of this event—both in participation and in execution—shows that the game has room to grow in the digital public sphere, not just as sport, but as a structured, interactive experience.”

Andrey Insarov, CEO of it.com Domains, added: “Our goal was to create something that invited participation at scale without sacrificing depth. This award reflects the care we took in designing that experience—and what’s possible when tradition and technology meet with intent.”

Whatever will we do next?