AI film contests with cash prizes

AI Video Contest 2026: Win $10,000 With Your AI Short Film

Pippit AI

Enter the 2026 AI storytelling contest to showcase your amazing short films! Create cinematic stories with Pippit's advanced video generator and win up to $10,000. The contest focuses on narrative cohesion and requires at least 70% of the footage to be generated natively on the platform.

Busan International AI Film Festival (BIAIF) 2026

Busan Cinema Center

Third edition of Busan's AI film festival, hosted by the Busan Cinema Center, screening films that use AI partially or fully in the creative process. Every selected film receives a USD 1,000 screening grant and the audience-voted favourite earns an additional USD 3,000.

AI Song Contest 2026 — Bangkok

AI Song Contest

The original international AI music competition returns for its 2026 edition — Eurovision-style, but every song is co-created with AI. Winners fly to Bangkok on Nov 29 for the live Award Show and take home $1,000 cash plus global recognition. Submissions close Sept 27, 2026 — the deadline that put AI songwriting on the world map.

We Are Human Festival – Film & AI International Open Call 2026

Film Resource Africa

The We Are Human Festival invites filmmakers to submit works that explore the intersection of humanity and AI. The festival emphasizes human creative direction in AI-generated works and offers a range of prizes for outstanding submissions. Selected films will be screened internationally.

Call for Films AI 2026

We Are Human Foundation

This international call invites filmmakers to explore the connections between AI and human rights through audiovisual creation. Works must incorporate human/AI hybrid creation and will be screened in Paris and other partner cities. Selected films will contribute to a collective reflection on the future of our societies.

Runway AI Film Festival

Runway

The Runway AI Film Festival showcases innovative films that utilize AI tools in their creation. This annual festival features a screening in New York City, providing filmmakers with significant industry exposure. Submissions are open to all genres, emphasizing creativity and the use of AI technology.

FESTIAV 2026 — Valencia International AI Film Festival (2nd Edition)

Galaxia Televisión, S.L.

Second edition of Valencia's AI-generated cinema festival, running October 26-30, 2026 with screenings and an awards ceremony. Films up to 15 minutes made wholly or partly with AI compete in Fiction, Historical, Comedy, Horror and Valencian-language categories for €2,250 in prizes, alongside the 24-hour FESTIAV LAB challenge.

Slamdance Film Festival — DIG (AI Films Encouraged) 2027

Slamdance

The legendary indie festival Tarantino and Russo Brothers came up through is actively encouraging AI-made films in its DIG category. Winner package includes the $25,000 AGBO Fellowship from the Russo Brothers plus a Utopia theatrical distribution deal — one of the most career-defining wins in indie cinema. Deadline October 6.

PixLight 2026

PixVerse

PixLight 2026 is an annual AI film contest seeking genre pilots and feature screenplays. The contest aims to greenlight innovative projects, with a total prize pool of $300,000. Winning projects will receive development and production support.

2026 AI Horror Film Competition — Curious Refuge

Curious Refuge + partner

The AI Horror Film Competition returns for its 4th year — the biggest cash pool yet, and the deadline is closer than you think. Halloween-week screening, community judged, and past winners have used it as a launchpad into Curious Refuge features. Fully AI, hybrid, whatever haunts you — bring it.

OpenCV AI Competition 2026

Open Source Vision Foundation (OpenCV)

This global competition invites developers to create applications using image or video analysis to solve real-world problems. Prizes total $12,000, with $5,000 for first place. The competition runs from August 26 to October 26, 2026.

HKBU Future Film Fest 2026 (3F) – AI Shorts Category

School of Creative Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University

The HKBU Future Film Fest 2026 invites filmmakers aged 30 and under to submit AI-driven shorts. The competition emphasizes the use of generative AI as the core mechanism, with a total prize pool of $66,000. Winning films will be showcased at the festival in Hong Kong.

2026 AI Holiday Film Competition — Curious Refuge x Epidemic Sound

Curious Refuge x Epidemic Sound

The largest prize pool ever for a fully AI-generated holiday short — Epidemic Sound and Curious Refuge return with $7,500+ in cash for winners. Warm, weird, or wildly cinematic — make something people rewatch every December. Deadline December 6.

JIFF World AI Cinema Competition 2027 — Jaipur

Jaipur International Film Festival (JIFF)

India's biggest film festival adds a dedicated AI cinema competition — ₹1,00,000 prize pool and a global Jaipur showcase Jan 8–12, 2027. Final deadline December 21, 2026. Open to filmmakers, students and creators from every continent working in AI-driven or AI-assisted storytelling.

Runway Hundred Film Fund

Runway

Rolling grant fund offering $5K–$1M+ per project plus up to $2M in Runway credits. Decisions within ~14 days.

Chroma Awards — Season 2

ElevenLabs, Google Cloud, Fal, Freepik, Dreamina, CapCut

Season 2 of the global AI competition across Film, Music, and Games. This competition celebrates creativity in AI-driven projects and includes a selective program featuring top AI film directors worldwide.

AI Film Fest Monaco 2026

AI Film Fest Monaco

Global AI film festival requiring AI-generated content for short films. Screens at festival in Monaco.

Global AI Music Video Awards (GAIMVA) 2027

GAIMVA / Festhome

The first international awards festival dedicated exclusively to AI-generated and AI-assisted music videos. Deadline January 1, 2027. Welcomes fully AI-generated, hybrid, experimental, narrative, performance-based, animated, vertical, student-made, and human+AI collaboration works — the widest AI music video category set anywhere.

Hollywood AI Short Film Awards (HASFA) 2027

Hollywood AI Short Film Awards

Second season of the Hollywood AI Short Film Awards, honouring films that make meaningful creative use of AI across development, production, post, animation, visual design and audio. The 2027 ceremony runs during Super Bowl Weekend at the London West Hollywood Screening Room on 13 February 2027.

Ai Film Festival — IMDb-Qualifying Screening 2027

Ai Film Festival

IMDb-qualifying AI festival run by LundinStudio with staged monthly cutoffs (Oct 15, Nov 19, Dec 17 and a final deadline of 21 January 2027) leading to a screening event on 18-19 March 2027. Best AI Short Film requires an original script with AI-generated shots in every scene, 1-10 minutes including credits.

Cannes Film Awards 2027 — New AI Category

Cannes Film Awards

Cannes Film Awards just opened dedicated categories for AI films, VR, games, and 360° video for the very first time. Event date: June 26, 2027 on the Riviera. $1K+ cash and $25K+ in promotional/partner awards on the line. If you want a Cannes credit on an AI short, this is the cleanest entry point on the calendar.