Writing Contests, Grants & Awards

The Writing Contests, Grants & Awards database includes details about the creative writing contests—including poetry contests, short story competitions, essay contests, awards for novels, and more—that we’ve published in Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it. Ours is the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.

The Moth

Cash Prize: $3,508
Entry Fee: $20
Application Deadline: 6/14/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of €3,000 (approximately $3,508) is given annually for a short story. A second-place prize of €1,000 (approximately $1,169) is also given. The winners will be published...

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PEN America

Cash Prize: $5,000
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 6/15/26

Two grants of $5,000 each are given annually for poetry, fiction, and nonfiction works-in-progress “by immigrant and refugee writers, recognizing that the literature of...

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PEN America

Cash Prize: $4,000
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 6/15/26

Ten grants of $4,000 each are given annually to support the translation of book-length works of poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction that have not previously appeared in...

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Tusculum Review

Cash Prize: $1,500
Entry Fee: $20
Application Deadline: 6/15/26

A prize of $1,500 and publication in Tusculum Review is given annually for a collection of poems, a short story, or an essay in alternating years. The winner’s work is...

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New American Press

Cash Prize: $1,500
Entry Fee: $25
Application Deadline: 6/15/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $1,500, publication by New American Press, and 25 author copies is given annually for a book of fiction. Keith Rosson will judge. Using only the online submission...

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PEN America

Cash Prize: $15,000
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 6/15/26

Two grants of $15,000 each are given annually for nonfiction works-in-progress that “use oral history to illuminate an event, individual, place, or movement.” Using only the...

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Artist Trust

Cash Prize: $2,500
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 6/22/26

Grants of $2,500 each are given annually to poets, fiction writers, and nonfiction writers who are residents of Washington State. Students enrolled in a degree-granting program...

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Lascaux Review

Cash Prize: $1,000
Entry Fee: $15
Application Deadline: 6/30/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $1,000 and online publication in Lascaux Review is given annually for a work of flash fiction. Previously published or unpublished stories are eligible....

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TRP

Cash Prize: $2,000
Entry Fee: $28
Application Deadline: 6/30/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $2,000, publication by TRP: The University Press of Sam Houston State University, and 10 author copies is given annually for a short story collection or novel. Using...

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Washington Writers’ Publishing House

Cash Prize: $1,500
Entry Fee: $28
Application Deadline: 6/30/26

Two prizes of $1,500 each, publication by Washington Writers’ Publishing House, and 25 author copies are given annually for a poetry collection and a short story collection or...

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University of North Texas Press

Cash Prize: $1,000
Entry Fee: $25
Application Deadline: 6/30/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $1,000 and publication by University of North Texas Press is given annually for a collection of short fiction. Using only the online submission system, submit a...

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The Story Prize

Cash Prize: $20,000
Entry Fee: $75
Application Deadline: 7/1/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $20,000 is given annually for a story or novella collection written in English and published in the United States in the current year. Two runners-up receive $5,000...

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Bellevue Literary Review

Cash Prize: $1,000
Entry Fee: $20
Application Deadline: 7/1/26

Three prizes of $1,000 each and publication in Bellevue Literary Review are given annually for a poem, a short story, and an essay about health, healing, illness, the...

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Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival

Cash Prize: $1,750
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 7/1/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $1,750, publication in Pree and New York Carib News, as well as on the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival (BCLF) website, and an...

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Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Cash Prize: $15,000
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 7/3/26

A prize of $15,000 is given annually to an emerging poet, fiction writer, or creative nonfiction writer from an underrepresented community who has not published and is not...

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Stony Brook Southampton

Cash Prize: $1,000
Entry Fee: $0
Application Deadline: 7/14/26
Genre: Fiction

A prize of $1,000 is given annually for a short story by a current undergraduate college student. The winner also receives a full scholarship to attend the Southampton Writers...

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