One of the most popular Chess events on the annual calendar, the Chess.com Pogchamps, concluded its sixth edition on May 2. Although its livestreaming numbers were nowhere near the series' COVID-19 lockdown era peak, the participation of numerous celebrities, including some of the most prominent streamers, and some buzzworthy moments ensured this event caught the attention of fans of the game.
PogChamps 6 saw top content creators like Macaiyla, Filian, Nicholas "SapNap" Armstrong, and Inès "Inoxtag" Benazzouz join stars from other fields like Stephen Nedoroscik and Linnea "Linzor" Klemets as they battled it out for a $100,000 prize pool. Crystal Palace and England winger Eberechi Eze took home the Championship Bracket trophy and winner's prize of $20,000, while Kyle "Mongraal" Jackson clinched the Consolation Bracket title to take home $10,000.
In terms of viewership, PogChamps 6 recorded 38,453 Peak Viewers (PV) and 515,194 Hours Watched. One reason for the lower audience reach compared to previous editions was the condensed schedule of the competition that lasted four days, which was why the airtime was the least in the series.
Among the other five iterations held so far, the one with the lowest broadcast time was Chess.com Pogchamps 2, which ran for 44 and a half hours. It ran for two weeks, which has been the usual length for most editions of this Chess tournament series, which began in 2020.
With such a low airtime, PogChamps 6 also recorded the lowest watch time numbers for any competition in the series. Every other iteration crossed the one million HW mark before the 2025 one.
The PogChamps series has seen some pretty popular winners over the years, including the popular IRL creator Connor "CDawgVA" Colquhoun, who clinched the title in the fifth edition. The list of participants and finalists includes star names like Frank "Franks-is-heres" Woodley, Charles "MoistCr1tikal" White Jr., Rainn Wilson, Félix "xqc" Lengyel, Rubén "Rubius" Doblas, and Thomas "Sykkuno."
Among the more noteworthy moments from the sixth iteration of this Chess tournament was Lydia "LydiaViolet" Wilson's surprisingly easy win over Filian that set up a Consolation Bracket final against her Group Stage tormentor, Mongraal. However, despite a tactically astute first game from players, which saw the Brit take a hard-fought win, the second one was much more one-sided as Mongraal found a good tactic to seal a 2-0 victory.
Fans also witnessed a massive upset when Sapnap beat a massive rating gap and Wolfe "WolfeyVGC" Glick 2:1 via tiebreak to enter the Championship Bracket final. The Minecraft star even busted out the Fried Liver in the tiebreaks, which surprised WolfeyVGC enough and showed that, at times, competitors can play above the level expected of an influencer-led event like PogChamps.
However, perhaps the biggest talking point to come out of this tournament was the disqualification of Benjamin "DrLupo" Lupo for "a fair play violation." In essence, the popular YouTuber was fired from the event for cheating, having taken help from the chat window while playing.
Despite this being a more relaxed competition akin to many exhibition events, Chess.com was not happy with what transpired. The organizer was quick to let fans and viewers know that "DrLupo was removed from the tournament for a fair play violation." The American star was replaced in the Consolation Bracket by countryman Sapnap, who participated in previous editions of this series.
In the end, Chess received another massive livestreaming fillip thanks to PogChamps 6, attracting the attention of various online outlets and streamers. Eberechi Eze's win was also well-received, as his previous experience playing the game showed that, despite the smoke and mirrors, such events require a certain level of skill and talent if the participants are to succeed.
