We explain how the extreme 2015–2016 El Niño event lengthened the day by 0.8 ms. The 2015–2016 event was an El Niño event of a different type compared to previous extreme events; thus, we expected different mechanisms of coupling with the solid Earth. We showed that the atmospheric torque on the American topography, usually acting alone during classical El Niños, was, in 2015–2016, augmented by a friction torque over the Pacific Ocean and inherent to the different nature of this particular event.