Xolo puts €7,000 on the table for independent workers across Europe, closing 15 October
Xolo has opened XoloVerse, a competition offering €7,000 in prizes for short pieces of content about what independent work actually looks like. Submissions close on 15 October 2026, with winners announced in mid-October. Remote Work Europe is flagging it because the entry bar is unusually low and the money is real.
This is a Europe-wide call, not a Spanish one. One of the three judges is Luzu, one of Spain’s biggest digital creators, which has led to some assumption that the campaign is aimed at Spain alone. It is not. Xolo operates across Europe and the open call is addressed to independent workers anywhere in it – freelancers, solopreneurs, consultants, creators, one-person companies and small business owners. You do not need to be a Xolo customer to enter.
How the €7,000 splits
There are three prizes and two ways to win:
- €1,000 – jury prize for the best entry in Behind the Scenes
- €1,000 – jury prize for the best entry in The Hustle / The Pitch
- €5,000 – decided by public vote, across every approved entry
A single entry competes in both its category’s jury track and the public vote. The jury is Kaja Aulik, senior brand creative at Bolt; Mikko Teerenhovi, Xolo’s chief executive; and Luzu.
What you actually have to make
Very little, which is the point. Entries can be a short video of fifteen to twenty seconds, a photograph, a meme, an AI-assisted image or a mix. Vertical and mobile-first works best. Xolo has said explicitly that AI-assisted entries are welcome and that the idea matters more than the production budget – but the idea has to be yours, and copied or borrowed work will not be approved.
The two categories are Behind the Scenes, for what the work really looks like with the filter off, and The Hustle / The Pitch, for the effort behind winning the client.
Why it is worth ten minutes of your time
The €5,000 prize is decided on votes, and every approved entry gets its own shareable voting link. That makes it a very different proposition from a competition judged behind closed doors: anyone with a community around them – a group, a newsletter, a few hundred followers, a WhatsApp thread of other freelancers – is in a strong position. It is still early, and the entries published so far are carrying single-digit vote counts.
For the people Remote Work Europe writes for, there is a second reason. Most of us have four years of photographs on our phones of exactly what this competition is asking for: the kitchen-table client call, the laptop balanced somewhere absurd, the invoice chased for the third time. The material already exists.
The declaration
Xolo is a Remote Work Europe partner, and we hold an ambassador arrangement with Xolo Spain. We are not paid per entry and we have no role in judging. We are covering this because €7,000 open to any independent worker in Europe, with no requirement to buy anything, is worth knowing about – and we would have said so about anybody’s competition on those terms.
What to check before you enter
Read the campaign rules on the XoloVerse page before submitting, particularly the clause confirming that Xolo may display, promote and reuse your entry in campaign materials. If you are not comfortable with your face or your home appearing in a marketing campaign, enter with something that does not show either – a meme or a photograph of the desk will do.