Photography Competitions 2026–2027: Free-Entry and Juried Calls
Photography has more competitions than any other medium, and a wider spread in what they are worth. Some are institutions with decades of history and juries drawn from museums and newsrooms. Many exist mainly to collect entry fees. The difference is rarely in the prize and almost always in the selection.
This guide covers what photography juries score differently from other media, the major competitions and where each cycle stood in September 2026, and what entry fees tell you. Cycles move every year, so check with each organiser before planning around a date.
What photography juries score differently
- The technical floor is visible. Unlike a photograph of a painting, the file is the work. Missed focus, noise in the shadows and clipped highlights all show at full size, and jurors do look at full size.
- Editing is judged against the category. Documentary, press and wildlife competitions restrict manipulation strictly and routinely ask shortlisted entrants for original or RAW files. Fine-art categories allow far more. Read the rules for the category, not just the competition.
- Series are judged as sequences. A series is scored on how the images work together: the weakest frame lowers the whole set, and the order matters.
- Captions carry weight in documentary work. Who, where, when and why is part of the photograph’s claim to be true.
Major photography competitions, and where each cycle stands
Status as of September 2026.
Sony World Photography Awards 2027
Status: open. The twentieth edition, organised by the World Photography Organisation, is free to enter. The Single Image competition, previously called Open, closes on 5 January 2027; the Series competition closes on 12 January 2027, and the Student competition on 27 November 2026. It is one of the largest photography competitions in the world, and one of very few at that scale with no entry fee.
Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Status: dates for the next competition not yet announced. Run by the Natural History Museum in London, it is the reference point for nature photography. The 2026 competition took entries from 20 October to 4 December 2025. Adults could enter up to 25 images for £35, entry was free for photographers aged 26 and under, and the fee was waived for photographers from 114 countries across Africa, Southeast Asia and Central and South America.
World Press Photo Contest
Status: 2027 entry period not yet announced. Open to professional photojournalists and documentary photographers, it judges the past year’s work under strict rules on editing and captions. The 2026 contest took entries from 1 December 2025 to 17 January 2026.
Head On Photo Awards
Status: 2026 entries closed; exhibition in November. Presented by the non-profit Head On Foundation in Sydney and open to photographers of every level, including those working on phones. The 2026 edition closed on 16 August 2026 across three categories, Portrait, Landscape and Exposure, with a prize pool of more than AUD$80,000. Its 110 finalists are exhibited at the Head On Photo Festival from 6 to 29 November 2026 and published in a hardcover catalogue.
The National Portrait Gallery’s photographic portrait prize
Status: 2026 entries closed; exhibition from November. Long known as the Taylor Wessing Prize, the London gallery’s photographic portrait competition took entries from 10 March to 21 April 2026, with the exhibition running from 5 November 2026 to 17 January 2027. We covered it alongside the painting prizes in Portrait Art Competitions in 2026.
Entry fees, free entry and finalist fees
Photography competitions use the same three models as every other medium, and the model tells you something about the incentives.
- Per-image fees. Common at institutional prizes, where they fund the exhibition. Legitimate, but the organiser earns the same whether or not your work is any good.
- Free throughout. Usually funded by a sponsor, as at the Sony World Photography Awards. Excellent when genuine.
- Free submission, with a fee only if selected. You pay nothing unless the jury chooses your work, so the organiser earns nothing from accepting weak entries.
The number that matters more than any fee is the selection rate, and whether the organiser publishes it at all. We wrote about telling the difference in Are Art Competitions Worth It?
Calls that accept photography now
Every Curatone.art open call accepts photography alongside painting, drawing and other media. Submission is free, the finalist fee applies only if the jury selects your work, and every entry is scored independently by each member of the jury on a ten-point scale. Finalists are published in an exhibition catalogue with an ISBN and archived with a permanent DOI.
Preparing a photograph for a juried submission
- Read the category’s rules on editing before choosing the image, not after.
- Export in sRGB at the size the competition asks for. Other colour spaces look wrong in a browser.
- Check at 100% for dust, halos from sharpening and banding in skies.
- Keep your original files. Serious competitions may ask for them.
- Write the caption as information and the statement as the reason the image exists. See How to Write an Artist Statement.