Who attends AWS re:Invent and how sponsors take part
AWS pitches re:Invent at technical practitioners, security professionals, and business decision-makers, with more than 2,200 sessions over five days, and says 47 percent of its 2025 attendees were there for the first time. Attendees must be at least 18 by the day they pick up a badge, and there are no day or Expo-only passes: a full conference pass is required.
Companies get onto the floor through sponsorship. The AWS Partner sponsorship page describes six levels for 2026, from a 5-by-5 kiosk to a 40-by-40 custom booth with dedicated speaking sessions, across a 500,000-square-foot Expo. Add-ons listed on AWS's sponsorship page include hospitality suites, meeting rooms, lightning talks or 60-minute breakout sessions, and designated networking receptions.
AWS re:Invent 2026 dates, venues, and Expo hours
AWS re:Invent 2026 runs Monday, November 30 to Friday, December 4, with badge pickup and a Sunday kickoff on November 29. AWS lists six conference venues: Caesars Forum, Caesars Palace, Encore, MGM Grand, The Venetian, and Wynn. Keynotes are at The Venetian, and the re:Play party fills Allegiant Stadium on Thursday night, December 3.
The Expo is at The Venetian. It opens with a welcome reception from 4 to 7 p.m. on Monday, runs 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday, with a Wednesday happy hour from 4:30, and closes at 4 p.m. on Thursday. Friday is a half day of sessions at The Venetian and Wynn | Encore. AWS notes that all times are subject to change, and teardown times come with the sponsor materials.
Inside the re:Invent Expo: zones and demo-first booths
AWS organizes the floor around hands-on time. Its Expo page lists the AWS Village, where new launches appear first; Lightning Theaters with 20-minute talks from practitioners; an AWS for Industries Zone; a Builder Community Zone with challenges and guided labs; a Global Impact Zone; and a Partner Advantage Zone for AWS Partners in AI, migration, security, and industry solutions. AWS counts more than 450 companies bringing demos to the floor.
A sponsor booth competes with all of that, so build it around demo stations: a screen at standing eye level, a ledge for a laptop, power and network at every station, and enough depth that a second visitor can watch over a shoulder without blocking the aisle. Give solutions engineers a quieter corner or a closed meeting room for conversations that turn technical, and keep the headline short enough to read from 20 feet away.
Sponsor presence beyond the re:Invent Expo floor
Re:Invent spreads across the Strip, and so can a sponsor. AWS's agenda places its own activations and community spaces at Caesars Forum, Caesars Palace, MGM Grand, The Venetian, and Wynn | Encore. Shuttles run continuously between properties during conference hours, and badge holders ride the Las Vegas Monorail free, which makes a suite or meeting room in another resort reachable for the right guest.
That rewards pieces that travel. A lounge set, a demo counter, or a branded entry can be designed to work in the Expo booth and again in a suite or meeting room, and packed to move between buildings in one load. Our guide to planning a brand activation in Las Vegas covers timing, permits, and venue rules for builds outside an exhibit hall. Each resort sets its own rules for deliveries, rigging, and catering, so get them in writing for every space you book.
Venetian building rules that shape re:Invent builds
AWS gives booth rules to sponsors rather than posting them, but the building's own rules apply to every event at The Venetian. From the Venetian Expo's exhibitor guide:
- Encore labor exclusively installs anything attached to rated truss or the building, all ground-supported rated truss, all lighting, and floor-supported items more than 16 feet tall
- Rated truss and motors come only from Encore; truss used as booth structure or decoration can get an exception after Encore's rigging review with engineering stamps, and video walls on truss need an engineering stamp
- No rigging is permitted in Hall G, the lower-level hall, so confirm which hall your space is in before planning anything overhead
- Electrical, internet, and booth cleaning are exclusive to the venue and its partners, and all food and drink comes from the venue's catering, with samples only by advance approval
- The venue doesn't accept or store exhibit shipments; freight goes through the event's general contractor
- Haze needs approval from the fire department and the venue, with a test scheduled at least 24 hours ahead, and drones, robots, and remote-controlled devices are demonstrated only in a safely controlled area, such as a netted demonstration area on the floor plan the fire marshal approves
What AWS hasn't published, and how to plan around it
AWS doesn't post a public exhibitor manual for re:Invent. Its sponsorship page asks partners to fill out a form to see the prospectus, and booth heights, sign rules, move-in times, the service contractor, and order deadlines go to contracted sponsors. This guide doesn't guess at them; the sponsor materials are the final word.
Plenty can be settled before they arrive: the footprint your sponsorship level buys, the demo plan and screens, the meeting and hospitality pieces, and the graphics. With those locked, fabrication can start the day the rules land. The calendar adds pressure, too. The Expo opens on the Monday after Thanksgiving, so fabrication, crews, and trucks work through the holiday week, which favors a builder already in Las Vegas.
An AWS re:Invent planning timeline around Thanksgiving
As general guidance, counting back from a Monday-after-Thanksgiving opening. The guide to what a custom booth costs helps size the budget, the Las Vegas trade show calendar shows what else is in town that week, and the RFP template helps when comparing builders:
- Spring and summer: choose a sponsorship level and footprint, and request AWS's prospectus
- Late summer: concept and 3D design around the demo plan, with screens, power, and network drawn in
- September: engineering for anything tall, rigged, or carrying an LED wall, plus graphics and demo content
- October: fabrication, a shop walk-through with the demo team, and service orders as the sponsor kit sets them
- November: final graphics checks, with trucks booked around Thanksgiving and the event's move-in schedule