The World's Fair is the end-game monument building in Anno 1800, available for construction upon reaching the Investors tier of Population. Unlike other buildings, the World's Fair is built over several stages, with each stage taking time to complete and requiring a significant investment in resources and labor from your workforce for the periods of construction.
Upon completion, the building itself grants 150 attractiveness for as long as it maintains access to electricity. While you are limited to one World's Fair per island, you can build as many as you want across multiple islands.
Afterwards, the player can use the building to host exhibitions that showcase the latest advances in 19th century technology, discovery and design to an Investor audience looking to spend money.
Exhibitions grant an additional, temporary attractiveness bonus for as long as they last. The successful conclusion of an exhibition gives the player access to a long list of possible rewards, depending on investments and choices made.
Contents
Construction
The construction of a World's Fair is divided into five stages. The first stage requires placing the foundation, which is unlocked after advancing to the Investors population tier. The next four stages, unlike regular buildings, are built over time and require huge amounts of building materials and workforce. Each phase also requires a certain number of investors to be available.
The building will need to receive a steady stream of supplies and electricity, in periods both during and after its construction. This means an in-range warehouse and power plant are permanent features within its placement design.
If a player lacks sufficient free workforce, they can still continue construction on the monument, but progress is delayed. Workforce priorities could always be shifted towards the monument on a temporary basis.
Phase 1/5: Foundations

World's Fair: Foundations
- 300000
coins
- 100
timber
- 200
bricks
- 160
steel beams
- 150
windows
- 150
reinforced concrete
- 1
Investors
Phase 2/5: Superstructure

World's Fair: Superstructure
- 150
timber
- 300
cement
- 500
farmer workforce
- 1
Investors
Phase 3/5: Glazing

World's Fair: Glazing
- 300
bricks
- 150
steel beams
- 150
reinforced concrete
- 1000
worker workforce
- 1750
Investors
Phase 4/5: Infrastructure

World's Fair: Infrastructure
- 300
windows
- 150
steam motors
- 150
wood veneers
- 1500
artisan workforce
- 3000
Investors
Phase 5/5: World's Fair

World's Fair
- 300
filaments
- 150
light bulbs
- 300
caoutchouc
- access to
electricity
- 2000
engineer workforce
- 5000
Investors
Exhibitions
A player can host exhibitions at a fully built World's Fair. This will allow an eclectic gathering of the world's innovators to descend upon the monument and showcase their latest findings to the player's Investor audience - to charm them into funding their future work. Depending on the type, size and amount of supplies granted to the exhibition to ensure its successful conclusion, the grateful innovators will leave behind donations, which serve as the player's Rewards for hosting the World's Fair.
The donations received, depend on all the steps taken towards a successful exhibition.
The information below will describe all the steps necessary for running an exhibition and how to steer towards a certain reward, along with a running example of one theoretical player trying to obtain dinosaur bones.
Exhibition types; Fields of Discovery and Subjects
The first step the player must decide on is the type of exhibition: The specific field of 19th century discovery that the exhibition focuses on. Each of these fields rewards its own set of possible rewards.
- Architectural Marvels - unique ornaments
- Science and Innovation - machines and inventions
- Archaeology and Ethnography - relics and antiquities
- Botany - flora, garden design and musical composition
Each of these fields of discovery is then further subdivided into 9 different subjects. These subjects act like tiers. Higher tiered subjects are more prestigious and difficult to organize for. They also award more temporary attractiveness, which lasts only for the duration of the exhibition.
Type of Exhibition | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Tier | Attractiveness (Temporary) | Architectural Marvels | Science and Innovation | Archeology and Ethnography | Botany |
1 | 0 | City Signage | Basic Tools | Curiosities | Invasive and Wild Plants |
2 | +100 | City Furniture | Basic Equipment | Everyday Materials | Various Trees |
3 | +200 | Plaza Design | Common Seeds | Buried Handicrafts | Aquaculture |
4 | +300 | Esplanade Design | Advanced Tools | Ancient Writings | Flowering Brushes |
5 | +400 | Fountain Architecture | Chemical Research | Rich Furnitures | Colorful Flowers |
6 | +500 | Antique Landscaping | High-End Equipment | Noble Funerary Materials | Lotuses |
7 | +600 | Refined Architecture | Powered Machines | Natural History | Exotic Plants |
8 | +700 | Marine Promenade | Agricultural Revolution | Mythical Artifacts | Huge and Strange-Shaped Plants |
9 | +800 | World's Fair Annexe | Unique Inventions | Ancient Architecture | Mythical Plants |
Each of the subjects listed above, has its own unique and/or specific set of rewards.
To begin the running example: Let's say a player wishes to collect Dinosaur Bones to complete their Jurassic Museum Set. The only subject that has a chance of awarding these items, is Natural History. This is a Tier 7 subject in the field of Archeology and Ethnography. In this example, the player should select "Archeology and Ethnography" as the type of their Exhibition.
Exhibition sizes
The player can decide to organize their exhibition in different sizes. Bigger exhibitions are more costly, require a larger investor audience to be worth putting on, and more luxurious catering and a longer preparation time during the next step. Bigger exhibitions also make a higher range of subject tiers within a chosen field of discovery, possible for being put on exhibit.
Modest | Large | Sumptuous | |
---|---|---|---|
Unlock precondition | 5000 ![]() |
7500 ![]() |
10000 ![]() |
Running cost | 25000 ![]() |
50000 ![]() |
100000 ![]() |
Preparation time | 20 minutes | 30 minutes | 40 minutes |
Depending on the size of the exhibition chosen, the following subject tiers are made possible:
- Modest exhibitions: subject tiers 1-5
- Large exhibitions: subject tiers 3-7
- Sumptuous exhibitions: subject tiers 5-9
To continue the running example: The player who wanted the Dinosaur Bones and therefore needed their Archeology and Ethnography exhibition to be about Natural History (a tier 7 subject), needs the Exhibition to be capable of hosting a tier 7 exhibition. This Player can therefore choose their Archeology and Ethnography exhibition to be either Large (tiers range 3-7), or Sumptuous (tiers range 5-9), as both have Tier 7 within their range.
At the end of the exhibition, the player will be able to pick one among the rewards unlocked through the choice of the size and the amount of goods provided during the catering.
Preparation Phase and Catering
After choosing the type and size of an exhibition, the preparation phase starts and the event will need to be catered to with luxury goods in order to make the investor audience comfortable enough to spend money. Should more Investors be available than the minimum requirements prescribe, fewer supplies are necessary. (With more money walking around, less of it needs to be charmed out of each individual for the exhibition to be a success.) The amount of goods can be reduced by up to 50%, when more than twice the minimum required amount of investors participate.
Depending on the size of the event, several goods are randomly required to cater the exhibition. The successful delivery of these goods to the World's Fair will increase the Exhibit's temporary attractiveness bonus to match that of the associated tier.
Most important of all: supplying the World's Fair with goods - or not - can raise or lower the tier of subject chosen to be exhibited, from within the range of tiers previously granted by picking the size of the exhibition. The World's Fair interface will allow a player block the Exhibition's access to one or more types of goods, so that the player can save goods which may be in short supply (as most of goods required by the world's fair are also basic needs/luxuries). It is not necessary to block the supply of any good in order to be able to select a lower tier reward at the end of the exhibition: the player will be able to pick one of the rewards unlocked.
To finish the running example: The player who wanted Dinosaur Bones and needed their Archeology and Ethnography Exhibition to be about Natural History - which is a Tier 7 subject that can be hosted by both a Large size (subject tiers range 3-7) and a Sumptuous size (subject tiers range 5-9) exhibition - needs to take care to either;
- Fully supply their Large size Archeology and Ethnography exhibition with all the requested goods, so that the highest outcome of the 3-7 range is reached, resulting in a tier 7 exhibit, which adds +600 temporary attractiveness and has Natural History as its subject.
- Supply their Sumptuous size Archeology and Ethnography exhibition with at least half the required goods, so that the middle outcome of the 5-9 range is reached, resulting in a tier 7 exhibit, which adds +600 temporary attractiveness and has Natural History as its subject.
Below is a table of all the possible goods that can be requested to cater an exhibition. For the lavish evening that will be planned during the exhibition, one type of good will be picked out for each of its aspects (Food, Alcohol, Desserts, Decorations and Leisure), depending on the exhibition's size. Electricity is always required.
Goods requirements | |||
---|---|---|---|
Exhibition Size | Modest | Large | Sumptuous |
Food | 25-50 tons of:
or or or |
50-100 tons of:
or |
100-200 tons of:
or |
Alcohol | 50-100 tons of:
or |
100-200 tons of:
or |
100-200 tons of:
or |
Desserts | 25-50 tons of:
or |
50-100 tons of:
or |
50-100 tons of:
or or |
Decorations | none | 25-50 tons of:
or |
50-100 tons of:
or |
Leisure | none | none | 25-50 tons of:
or or |
Access to electricity | required | required | required |
Without delivering all the goods requested, players will need to wait until preparation time runs out before the exhibition starts. If all are delivered, the exhibition starts immediately. All exhibits last 10 minutes, regardless on their type and tier.
The goods demanded will be delivered to the World's Fair from the closest warehouses. Because of this, the World's Fair will require a nearby warehouse, even after its construction is concluded. The exhibition always requires access to electricity: if electricity is suspended during the preparation the goods won't be delivered, while if it stops being provided during the exhibition the temporary attractiveness slowly decreases, and can't be re-gained within the same exhibition.
Rewards
Every World's Fair Exhibition grants three donated items as their reward. If DLC Seat of Power is enabled, players can take advantage of Cultural Outreach Act, the lowest of the Culture Department's Palace policies, granting one more reward from all World's Fair events. Depending on the player's selection of the exhibition's type, size and supplies, at the end of the exhibition it will be possible to pick one of the unlocked rewards, each one having its own separate pool.
To learn more about how this randomization works, or to see a complete list of all the possible rewards from a subject's successful exhibition at a World's Fair, see the page on the World's Fair Rewards.
Trivia
- The World's Fair was teased a long time before the release of the game, the first post on Anno Union appeared on the 28th of September, 2017. In total, three blogposts and one voting were tied to the World's Fair:
- DevBlog: Welcome to the world fair! (28. September 2017)
- DevBlog: Union Exhibition Vote! (19. October 2017)
- Union Update: A postcard from the world fair (12. March 2018)
- The monument is based on The Crystal Palace in London, where in 1851 The Great Exhibition was held.