4Screenwriting

Closed for this cycle

The 2025-26 cycle has closed and a new window has not been announced; windows usually open in late spring, and the site still shows the previous cycle.

1 Dec 2026

Closed for this cycle

The 2026-27 cycle is under way and both public entry windows have already closed, each filling on capacity ahead of its published deadline. The Black List portal opened 8 June 2026 and shut around 19 June on its 2,500 cap, well before the 6 July date the Academy had published; the Writers Guild Foundation portal opened 22 June and filled its 2,000 places before its 20 July deadline. Fellows are awarded in spring 2027. There is no stable annual pattern to plan around: under the old open-entry model the contest opened in January or February with a March to May ladder, while the two cycles under the partner model opened in mid-May 2025 and early June 2026. The practical advice is to watch for the Academy's partner announcement press release, which came on 8 June for this cycle, and enter the same week. Waiting for the published deadline is how people miss it.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 competitions closed early: Austin states that submission volume reached capacity in all categories ahead of the published late deadline of 27 May, so the effective close fell somewhere between 1 and 27 May and no exact date was published. Winners are announced on 31 October 2026, with reader comments sent by mid-November. The 2027 competitions open in December 2026, which Austin has published. The annual shape is reliable across four evidenced cycles: entries open in the first half of December (7 December 2022, early December 2023, 9 December 2024 and 8 December 2025), early bird lands in late March, regular in mid-to-late April, and the late deadline in the last days of May. All deadlines close at 11:59pm Central. Winners are announced at the Awards Luncheon during the festival in late October or early November. Two changes make the late deadline less dependable than it looks. The capacity cap is new for 2026, pre-announced and then triggered for the first time, and the Extended tier that existed in 2023, 2024 and 2025 was abolished. Deadlines have also tightened year on year, from a late deadline extended to 31 May in both 2023 and 2024, to a firm 28 May in 2025 and 27 May in 2026. Enter early: the published date is now a ceiling rather than a promise.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round opened on 8 April 2026 and closed at 11.59pm on 6 May 2026, with no timezone published. The BBC states the scheme is open annually, but the pattern has just broken: the 2023, 2024 and 2025 rounds all opened in the second week of January and closed on 30 or 31 January, while 2026 moved roughly three months later and ran a week longer. The closing time has also drifted, from 5pm to midnight to 11.59pm. Do not model a 2027 window on the January pattern. One caution if you check the page yourself: it still displays an Open for applications banner for the 8 April to 6 May window three months after closing, with no closed or expired label.

9 Sept 2026Closes tomorrow