Artificial intelligence could eventually have a role in deciding how freestyle skiing competitions are scored, but the International Ski and Snowboard Federation says it has no plans to take humans out of the loop.
FIS provided an update on its ongoing AI judging project during its 2026 Autumn Meetings in Geneva, where officials from across snowboard, freestyle and freeski met to discuss the upcoming World Cup season and the next Olympic cycle. The technology is currently being developed for freestyle moguls and aerials:
“Further progress was also reported on the ongoing AI judging project. The programme is being developed as a tool to support, rather than replace, the judging process, with potential applications extending beyond competition judging itself. These include support for judges’ education and training, as well as new possibilities for data and visualisation that could enhance digital content and television broadcasts.”
Exactly what that assistance will look like during a competition remains unclear. FIS has not publicly detailed the technology behind the system, how an AI-generated assessment would factor into a judge’s score or when it could appear at a World Cup event. The federation says the project could also be used outside competition to train and educate judges while generating additional data and visualizations for television broadcasts and digital content.
FIS Has Been Working On AI Judging For Some Time
The Geneva announcement is the latest step in a project FIS has been discussing publicly for more than a year. Following its technical meetings in May, the federation said it had made additional progress developing AI-supported judging technology for freestyle skiing and described potential applications for coaches, athletes, broadcasters and fans in addition to judges.
Artificial intelligence has also come up in discussions surrounding freeski and snowboard Park & Pipe events. FIS officials spent part of the May meetings examining both remote judging and the possibility of incorporating AI tools into judging for Slopestyle, Big Air and Halfpipe. Those discussions were framed as exploratory, with officials weighing the advantages and disadvantages rather than announcing a system ready for competition.
The idea is not entirely new to competitive skiing. Earlier this year, former Olympic freestyle skier Jeremy Bloom drew attention for developing Owl AI, a system intended to analyze judged sports without eliminating human officials. The technology was even used to reassess the women’s snowboard Slopestyle final from the 2026 Winter Olympics.
Human Judges Are Staying In The Equation
For now, the most important distinction is that FIS is not proposing an autonomous AI judge that independently hands athletes their scores.
Mogul competitions currently combine subjective judging with an objective speed component. Under FIS rules, turns account for 60% of a mogul skier’s score, aerial maneuvers account for 20% and speed accounts for the remaining 20%. Aerials competitions separately judge takeoff and air, form and landing before applying each jump’s degree of difficulty.
Those are precisely the types of movements and technical elements where additional video analysis or data could potentially give judges another reference point, though FIS has not yet explained which elements its system is being trained to evaluate.
With development still underway and no implementation date announced, AI is not about to take over freestyle skiing judging. But FIS is now openly developing the technology as another tool in the judging process, suggesting artificial intelligence could become part of how top-level ski competitions are evaluated in the years ahead.
