The Community Awards are returning as part of the HLTV Awards 2025, featuring five categories decided by the community: Talent of the Year, Event of the Year, Creator of the Year, Streamer of the Year and Skin of the Year.
Voting will take place in two rounds. The first round runs from December 16 at 12:00 to December 23 at 00:00 and will narrow each category from ten nominees down to three. The second, decisive round opens on December 24 at 12:00 and closes on December 31 at 00:00 (Midnight CET); its purpose is to determine the final winners while reducing vote splitting.
Only registered HLTV users who created accounts before the publication of this article will be able to participate in the vote.
Winners of the Community Awards will be revealed during the HLTV Awards ceremony on January 10 in Belgrade, Serbia.
Below we list the nominees for each category and explain the selection methodology used to build each shortlist.
Talent of the Year — methodology: the shortlist was compiled using a point-based system similar to last year. Talents earned 2 points for participation in S-tier events that lasted two weeks or more, and 1 point for other S-tier events. The aim was to produce a top 10, but tied positions could expand the final nominee list.
Talent of the Year — nominees (ordered by S-tier event points): United Kingdom — Freya "Freya" Spiers; United Kingdom — Harry "JustHarry" Russell; United Kingdom — Hugo "Hugo" Byron; Denmark — Jacob "Pimp" Winneche; Australia — Chad "SPUNJ" Burchill; United Kingdom — Alex "Machine" Richardson; United Kingdom — James "BanKs" Banks; Serbia — Janko "YNk" Paunović; Canada — Mohan "launders" Govindasamy; Canada — Conner "Scrawny" Girvan; United States — Alex "Mauisnake" Ellenberg; United States — Tres "stunna" Saranthus.
Event of the Year — methodology: the event shortlist was limited to S-tier LAN events only, excluding online stages, purely online tournaments, group-stage-only competitions and any event that did not feature a live crowd. To ensure representation balance, there is a maximum of two nominated events per tournament organizer; when an organizer had more than two candidates we used peak viewers and hours watched normalized by airtime (data sourced from viewing analytics) to select the top two events per organizer.
Event of the Year — nominees (ordered chronologically): IEM Katowice 2025 (Poland); PGL Cluj‑Napoca 2025 (Romania); PGL Astana 2025 (Kazakhstan); BLAST.tv Austin Major (United States); IEM Cologne 2025 (Germany); FISSURE Playground 2 (Serbia); BLAST Rivals 2025 Season 2 (Hong Kong); StarLadder Budapest Major (Hungary).
Creator of the Year — methodology: HLTV partnered with third‑party analytics specialists to evaluate Counter‑Strike content creators across the year. The shortlist was built using a combination of views, engagement and average watch time throughout 2025. Creators not primarily focused on Counter‑Strike content were excluded from consideration.
Creator of the Year — nominees (alphabetical): 3kliksphilip (United Kingdom); Anomaly (Sweden); bysTaXx (Spain); Cachorro1337 (Brazil); dima_aimbots (Lithuania); Murzofix (Russia); NadeKing (Estonia); shoke (Georgia); Sparkles (United Kingdom); Virre CS2 (Sweden).
Streamer of the Year — methodology: the streamer shortlist was produced with the same analytics partner using airtime, watch time, peak viewership and average viewers to identify the most prominent Counter‑Strike streamers of 2025. Streamers not primarily focused on Counter‑Strike were excluded.
Streamer of the Year — nominees (alphabetical): Vadim "Evelone192" Kozakov (Ukraine); Erik "fl0m" Flom (United States); Luciano "forg1" Forgione (Argentina); Alexandre "gAuLeS" Chiqueta (Brazil); Ömer "imoRR" Karataş (Turkey); Piotr "izak" Skowyrski (Poland); Justinas "jL" Lekavicius (Lithuania); Sebastien "KRL" Perez (France); Mark "ohnePixel" Zimmermann (Germany); Ivan "StRoGo" Shurpatov (Russia).
Skin of the Year — methodology: the Skin of the Year category began with the 41 community weapon finishes that were added to the game in 2025. HLTV staff then conducted an internal vote to reduce that pool to a ten‑item shortlist.
Skin of the Year — nominees (alphabetical by item name): AWP | Ice Coaled (artist: REINCARNATION); AWP | Printstream (JTPNZ); FAMAS | Bad Trip (HEWOK); Glock‑18 | Shinobu (Horameow); M4A1‑S | Liquidation (Mei); M4A4 | Full Throttle (dwern); MAC‑10 | Cat Fight (Maloo); MAC‑10 | Derailment (Tolik_Wask); MP7 | Smoking Kills (48); UMP‑45 | Late Night Transit (cimota).
For more information about the show, the full roster of awards and the history of previous HLTV Awards ceremonies, consult the HLTV Awards information pages on the site.
Player profile — Alex "Mauisnake" Ellenberg (United States): age 32, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.90, maps played: 100, KPR: 0.63, DPR: 0.72.
Player profile — Hugo "Hugo" Byron (United Kingdom): age 28, currently without a team, no competitive Rating 1.0 recorded for the year, maps played: 0.
Player profile — Harry "JustHarry" Russell (United Kingdom): age 27, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.40, maps played: 2, KPR: 0.38, DPR: 0.95.
Player profile — Sebastien "KRL" Perez (France): age 36, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.62, maps played: 25, KPR: 0.45, DPR: 0.79.
Player profile — Mark "ohnePixel" Zimmermann (Germany): age 27, currently without a team, no Rating 1.0 recorded for the year, maps played: 0.
Player profile — Justinas "jL" Lekavicius (Lithuania): age 26, listed with Natus Vincere, Rating 1.0: 1.06, maps played: 911, KPR: 0.72, DPR: 0.67.
Player profile — Luciano "forg1" Forgione (Argentina): age 27, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.72, maps played: 18, KPR: 0.52, DPR: 0.79.
Player profile — Alex "Machine" Richardson (United Kingdom): age 32, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.74, maps played: 2, KPR: 0.44, DPR: 0.64.
Player profile — Mohan "launders" Govindasamy (Canada): age 35, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.76, maps played: 3, KPR: 0.57, DPR: 0.76.
Player profile — James "BanKs" Banks (United Kingdom): age 35, currently without a team, no Rating 1.0 recorded for the year, maps played: 0.
Player profile — Alexandre "gAuLeS" Chiqueta (Brazil): age 42, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.54, maps played: 3, KPR: 0.41, DPR: 0.84.
Player profile — Janko "YNk" Paunović (Serbia): age 33, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.96, maps played: 118, KPR: 0.67, DPR: 0.70.
Player profile — Jacob "Pimp" Winneche (Denmark): age 30, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 1.07, maps played: 983, KPR: 0.72, DPR: 0.64.
Player profile — Chad "SPUNJ" Burchill (Australia): age 36, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.88, maps played: 167, KPR: 0.62, DPR: 0.73.
Player profile — Vadim "Evelone192" Kozakov (Ukraine): age 29, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.85, maps played: 7, KPR: 0.59, DPR: 0.72.
Player profile — Erik "fl0m" Flom (United States): age 33, listed with Mythic, Rating 1.0: 1.00, maps played: 1024, KPR: 0.69, DPR: 0.67.
Player profile — Tres "stunna" Saranthus (United States): age 36, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.64, maps played: 4, KPR: 0.30, DPR: 0.54.
Player profile — Conner "Scrawny" Girvan (Canada): age 31, currently without a team, no Rating 1.0 recorded for the year, maps played: 0.
Player profile — Piotr "izak" Skowyrski (Poland): age 38, currently without a team, Rating 1.0: 0.93, maps played: 30, KPR: 0.63, DPR: 0.68.
Player profile — Ivan "StRoGo" Shurpatov (Russia): age 23, listed with WW, Rating 1.0: 0.80, maps played: 80, KPR: 0.54, DPR: 0.70.
Player profile — Ömer "imoRR" Karataş (Turkey): age 25, listed with Eternal Fire, Rating 1.0: 1.03, maps played: 1071, KPR: 0.72, DPR: 0.70.
Note on times displayed on the site: all voting times are presented adjusted to the viewer's selected timezone for convenience.