For feature screenplays.

9 Sept 2026Closes tomorrow

10 Sept 20262 days left

11 Sept 20263 days left

13 Sept 20265 days left

14 Sept 20266 days left

15 Sept 20267 days left

17 Sept 20269 days left

20 Sept 202612 days left

22 Sept 202614 days left

30 Sept 2026

30 Sept 2026

30 Sept 2026

2 Oct 2026

2 Oct 2026

5 Oct 2026

30 Oct 2026

7 Nov 2026

1 Dec 2026

4 Dec 2026

7 Dec 2026

31 Mar 2027

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 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.

Closed for this cycle

The last round closed at 11am on 18 November 2025 and no new window has been published. The evidenced pattern is an autumn opening with a deadline at 11am on a Tuesday in mid-to-late November: 18 November 2025 and 19 November 2024, with the 2024 round being promoted from October. Rounds before 2024 could not be evidenced from a primary source, so treat this as a two-year observation rather than a rule. Expect a November deadline, with no date announced yet.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 opt-in closed at midnight Pacific on 1 September 2026. A longlist of up to forty follows, then a shortlist of up to ten with interviews, and four recipients are chosen by 30 October 2026, with the fellowship starting in November. No 2027 cycle has been announced; check the Black List's programmes page before planning around one.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle opened in January and closed on 26 February 2026 at 3:00pm EST, with a 100 Canadian dollar application fee plus HST payable via Stripe; the HST-inclusive total is not published. The residency itself runs from 13 July to early December 2026. The 2027 window is unannounced, but this is the most reliably annual programme of its kind in Canada: three consecutive cycles are evidenced with 19 participants each, running 15 July to 13 December 2024, 14 July to 12 December 2025, and from 13 July 2026, with five writers in the Writers' Lab every year. On that record a call opening in January with a late-February deadline is a reasonable expectation, though CFC has not published one.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 call is closed; the lab itself runs 5 to 19 August 2026 in Mexico with an online module in October. The next call opens in January 2027, though no exact dates, times or timezone have been published.

Opens soon

The 2026 edition is complete. The next call opens in October 2026, though no exact dates, times or timezone have been published.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle closed on 11 June 2026 and is still resolving: quarter-finalists were published on 16 July and semi-finalists on 30 July, both on schedule, with finalists due 27 August and the grand prize on 10 September 2026. No times of day or timezones are published for any deadline, so we have stored dates alone. The 2026 entry ladder ran Early 19 February at 35 US dollars, Regular 26 March at 45, Final 21 May at 65 and Extended 11 June at 75. Entry fees are non-refundable for any reason. No 2027 animation cycle has opened, and the recurrence record here is thinner than for the operator's other contests: only two cycles are evidenced, and the prior one carries no year label at all on its results page, so we cannot date it from the primary source. The operator does forward-date its cycles, having already opened a 2027 form for a sibling contest, so a 2027 animation window is plausible rather than assured.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 season closed on 30 June 2026 with accolades announced by 15 August, and no 2027 dates have been published. One caution if you go looking: filmmatic.com's own page currently shows a deadline ladder headed 2025 which is actually the 2023 season's dates, so use the FilmFreeway listing, which is the reliable source. We could only evidence two seasons, and every 2026 milestone fell exactly one month earlier than its 2023 counterpart, so treat the shape loosely rather than as a fixed calendar: entries open around March, the final deadline falls around the end of June, and results land in mid-August.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 contest closed on 29 June 2026 and is in judging, with quarter-finalists announced on 28 August and grand prize winners on 18 December. No 2027 dates have been published, though the 2026 prize list includes a free 2027 entry, so a further cycle is expected. Across four evidenced cycles the final deadline has landed between 28 and 30 June every year, with the first tier in mid-to-late April, quarter-finalists in late August and grand prize winners in early-to-mid December. The opening date is only evidenced for two cycles, 10 March 2025 and 23 March 2026, so treat March as an observation rather than a rule. Note the tier names changed for 2026, from Early Bird, Regular, Extended and Last Chance to Early Bird, Regular, Final and Extended.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round closed on 27 May 2026, with the pitch event on Sunday 12 July. The pattern is one of the most consistent we have found: across 2024, 2025 and 2026 the regular deadline has always fallen between 13 and 17 May, the late deadline exactly fourteen days later, fees frozen at 40 and 50 euro, ten finalists, a 3,000 euro prize, and the pitch always on the closing Sunday of the Fleadh in mid-July. The only drift is the weekday and the cut-off time, which moved from 5pm in 2024 to 23:59 from 2025. Two cautions if you check their pages: the submissions page carries a year typo giving the late deadline as May 2025, and it states GMT when Ireland is on Irish Summer Time in May, which would move the cut-off an hour earlier than most entrants expect.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is complete and no dates have been published for the next round. That cycle ran an earlybird deadline on 13 November 2025, regular on 4 December, late in late December and extended on 15 January 2026, with notification on 12 March and the lab running 10 to 12 April 2026. On the application fee: one is required and the festival calls it a non-refundable application fee, but no amount is published on any live page. For reference only, the 2025 cycle ran 60, 65, 75 and 90 dollars across the four tiers and the 2024 cycle ran 55, 60, 70 and 85, rising five dollars per tier year on year. We have not projected a current figure from that. The calendar itself is the most predictable of its peers, opening at the end of October or start of November, four tiers to mid-January, notification mid-March and the lab in the first or second weekend of April, drifting only by days across three evidenced cycles.

Closed for this cycle

The most recent round accepted applications from 9 September to 31 October 2025, with an early-bird discount for applications on or before 5 October, notification by mid-December and the forum held 17 to 19 March 2026. No times or timezone are published. Fees ran 650 Hong Kong dollars early and 800 at the official deadline, with a New Director concession at 500 and 650 respectively, and a 300 dollar bank charge added for telegraphic transfer. No call for the next edition has been published. The annual pattern is stable across three evidenced cycles: the call opens in early September, closes on 31 October, and the forum runs in mid-March.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round closed on 2 April 2026 at 5pm Central European time and 20 projects were announced in August. IFFR states that the 2027 deadline will be announced towards the end of 2026. The fund runs a single annual round; deadline dates for rounds before 2026 are not published.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 window ran 18 February to 6 April and has closed, with fellows announced in August 2026. The next cycle has not been announced.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for the 2026 cohort ran 28 May to 17 June and are now closed. The next window has not been announced.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 season closed on 19 March 2026, with no time of day or timezone published, and selected writers announced on 19 June. The pattern is consistent: a mid-March deadline every year, falling between the 14th and 19th, free every year, and three selections every year, with announcements in mid-to-late June. The 2025 season is confirmed to have run but its deadline could not be evidenced from any archived source.

Opens soon

Both 2026 seasons have closed. The fall season's final deadline was 30 July, extended to 13 August; second-round selections follow on 17 September, the top 50 on 1 October, fellows on 22 October, and Fast Track Week runs from 16 November 2026. ISA's spring page still shows the Spring 2026 season, which closed on 5 February. That season opened with a mega-early tier on 23 October 2025, so expect Spring 2027 to open around late October 2026, at 39 US dollars mega-early rising to 79 by the February final deadline, 10 dollars less for ISAConnect members.

Closed for this cycle

Entries closed on 10 May 2026 and winners are announced live at the festival, running 24 to 30 September 2026. No 2027 dates have been published. The last three cycles have been consistent: entries open in the first week of December of the preceding year, early-bird falls in the second week of January, regular in mid-March, late in late April and the final deadline in the first half of May. The 2023 cycle opened on 2 January and ran roughly a month later throughout, so treat the December opening as a three-year pattern rather than four. Results run quarter-finals in late June or July, finalists in early August, and winners at the festival in September. One practical caution: the competition no longer has its own page and now sits on a year-stamped festival entries page, with the rules delegated to FilmFreeway, so the official link is likely to move again around December 2026.

Closed for this cycle

The last round closed on 5 January 2026 at 11pm Berlin time, for residencies scheduled between 1 June and 30 November 2026, and no new window has been published. The cycle before closed on 17 February 2025 for the equivalent 2025 window. Note the deadline moved by around six weeks between those two cycles, so expect a single annual round closing in the northern winter rather than a repeating date. Also be aware the live page still carries stale 2025 text alongside the 2026 conditions.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026/27 round opened on 30 April 2026 and closed on 19 June 2026, with decisions by the end of August and development running from September. One caution on that deadline: the guidelines PDF gives noon on its cover page and midnight on page four, and the news announcement says noon while the FAQ page says midnight. Noon is the likelier intent and matches the previous cycle. The annual pattern is otherwise consistent: announced in late April or mid May, closing in the second half of June, with development starting every September, running since 2015. No dates for the next round have been published, and note that the development funding page still describes the scheme as open seven weeks after it closed.

Closed for this cycle

Playwriting and Screenwriting is part of the 2028 award cycle, with applications opening in autumn 2027, roughly fourteen months away. Exact dates are not yet published. For scale, the last time this discipline ran, applications opened at 10am Eastern on 8 October 2024 and closed at 5pm Eastern on 17 December 2024, with notifications the following summer. The cycle typically runs from autumn into early winter with decisions by mid-summer.

Opens soon

Round 1 2026 closed on 4 September 2026 at 11:59am NZST (a morning deadline), with recipients announced on 30 October. NZWG's page currently lists only Round 1; in August it gave Round 2 as opening on 18 December 2026 and closing on 12 February 2027, so treat those dates as indicative until they are relisted. Seed offers four grants of NZ$12,500 and Seed Advanced two of NZ$15,500 per round.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round closed on 14 January 2026 at 11:59pm Eastern European Time, with the retreat running 1 to 9 July 2026. The 2027 cycle is unannounced. The cadence is consistent across the two cycles we could evidence directly: an annual mid-to-late January deadline always at 11:59pm EET, an eight-day retreat at Costa Navarino in late June or early July, always free and fully funded. The deadline crept eight days earlier between 2025 and 2026, and the published cohort number was dropped for 2026 having previously been ten.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 contest closed on 8 May 2026 and winners are announced on 15 October. PAGE publishes its opening date in advance and states that entries for the 2027 competition open on 1 December 2026. This is the most reliable calendar of any major contest we carry: it has opened on 1 December in every one of the last four cycles, run a ladder on the 15th of January, February, March and April, and announced quarter-finalists on 15 July, semi-finalists on 15 August, finalists on 15 September and winners on 15 October, unchanged year after year. The only moving part is the final tier, which has fallen between 8 and 20 May. Fees have risen once in four years. If you enter one contest on a diary reminder, this is the one to set it for.

Closed for this cycle

The most recent cycle opened on 21 November 2025 and closed on 19 December 2025 at 11:59pm ET, with sessions running from February 2026 and the table reads and Face2Face events in August 2026. The 2027 window is unannounced, but the annual cycle is well evidenced across 2024, 2025 and 2026 cohorts, all reported in the trade press. Announcement timing drifts between February and April; the cycle itself does not. Note that the programme is headed as five months with an end date of August 2026 while the FAQ says sessions run February to May with the table reads and Face2Face in August, so taught delivery is roughly four months with a gap before the August showcase events.

Closed for this cycle

Screenplay entries for the 2026 festival closed on 15 June (fees ran $42 to $77 by deadline). The 2027 window has not been announced.

Rolling applications

Always open. Applications can be made at any time through Screen Australia's portal, with assessment taking approximately eight weeks from the point eligibility is confirmed. There are no rounds and no deadlines to plan around. The guidelines were issued on 1 July 2025 and updated on 2 July 2026, so the stable pattern here is annual guideline revision rather than an annual application window.

Rolling applications

Open all year with no deadlines. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis and decisions take up to six weeks from receipt of a completed form.

Open for applications

Applications opened at 12 noon on 27 July 2026 and close at 12 noon on Monday 7 September 2026. Interviews follow in November, with successful writers announced in early December and the programme running January to December 2027.

Closed for this cycle

The spring and summer 2026 cycle ran from 3 February to 15 July 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific, across five tiers: special entry on 25 February at 35 dollars, early on 20 April at 40, regular on 15 June at 45, late on 30 June at 50 and extended on 15 July at 55. Results are due on or after 20 August 2026. Joining the Script Pipeline mailing list takes 5 dollars off an entry. Bi-annual here means twice a year rather than every two years, and the pattern is stable: both cycles have run in each of 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. No dates for the autumn and winter 2026 cycle have been published.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 contest (the 24th annual) closed on 31 May 2026 and no 2027 dates have been published. Across every cycle we could evidence, 2021, 2023, 2025 and 2026, the ladder has been strikingly stable: a Special Entry tier opens the preceding September, pre-registration closes at the end of December, an early tier lands in early March, and the regular deadline has fallen on 1 May with a late tier on 15 May in all four years. Results run through July into early August. On that pattern the 2027 contest would be expected to open around September 2026, but nothing is published yet, so confirm on the official site. Note the contest was renamed from Competition to Contest between 2024 and 2025, so older links may fail.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is closed and no 2027 dates have been published. That cycle opened on 10 February 2026 with a regular deadline of 8 May at a 30 dollar fee and a final deadline of 22 May at 50 dollars. The fee is waived for SFFILM members, though the cheapest membership is 100 dollars a year. Submitting early confers no competitive advantage, and one fee covers a single application across several SFFILM narrative grants.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is closed and no 2027 dates have been published. That cycle opened on 10 February 2026 with a regular deadline of 8 May at a 30 dollar fee and a final deadline of 22 May at 50 dollars, finalists notified in late September and recipients announced in late October. The fee is waived for SFFILM members, though the cheapest membership is 100 dollars a year, so the waiver only saves money if you are already a member. One fee covers a single application across several SFFILM narrative grants.

Closed for this cycle

Submissions for the 2026 forum closed on 20 August 2026 at 11:59pm Singapore time; the forum itself runs on 30 October 2026 during the festival. SGIFF's page shows the call as closed with no dates for 2027. The 2026 call opened on 20 July, so expect the next one around July 2027.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 contest closed with the final deadline on 28 August (early 29 May at 59 US dollars, regular 14 July at 69, final 79). Quarter-finalists are announced on 6 October, semi-finalists on 13 November, and the finalists and winners on 9 December 2026. Shore's page lists 1 April as the opening date, so expect the 2027 contest to open around then.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 competition closed on 3 August 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific, and winners are announced on 31 October. No 2027 dates have been published. Across four evidenced cycles the shape is very consistent: entries open between mid-February and mid-March, the final deadline lands in the last week of July or the first days of August, and winners are announced in the last week of October, preceded by a four-stage announcement cascade through late September. One drift worth noting: both the opening and the final deadline have moved a little later every year, from 14 February and 25 July in 2023 to 18 March and 3 August in 2026. Fees have been identical across 2024, 2025 and 2026.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for the January 2027 lab closed on 12 May 2026 (US$45 fee). The next Development Track window is expected to open in April 2027.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle opened on 14 October 2025 and closed on 1 June 2026; no time of day or timezone is published for any date in the ladder, so we have stored the date alone. The cycle is still running: longlist 6 July, personal statements 13 July, shortlist 27 July, additional materials 3 August, interview candidates 1 September, interviews 9 to 11 September, final participants notified 16 September 2026. The Writers Lab meets 12 to 16 October 2026 in Ojai. TWO DATES CONFLICT FOR THE PROJECTS LAB: the ladder reads 9 to 13 November 2025 while the body of the same page says mid-November 2026, and both carry a footnote that lab dates are to be confirmed. This operator has previous here, since the 2025 page carried 2024 dates inside an otherwise-2025 ladder. No 2027 edition is posted yet, though the index already lists 2027 entries for other Black List programmes. The 1 June close and the Ojai October-November rhythm held across both 2025 and 2026, so a June 2027 deadline is a reasonable expectation.

Closed for this cycle

Applications closed on 18 August 2026 (Netflix gave 11.59pm; most state agency portals cut off at the end of 17 August). Selected writers are notified on 28 September, the Sydney pitch day is 6 October, resubmissions are due 6 November and final feedback arrives by 1 December 2026. Netflix has announced no second round.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026-27 cycle closed on 3 February 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific, with an early-bird tier on 13 January, and applicants updated by 20 April ahead of the weekend retreat in June. No dates have been published for the next cycle. The programme is structurally stable, running annually on a two-year cycle naming with a June start and a ten-month duration, but the application front end has drifted: the deadline moved almost four weeks earlier between 2022 and 2026, and a two-tier early-bird structure was introduced that did not exist before. The 2023-24 and 2025-26 cycle dates could not be evidenced from any archived source.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 window closed on 30 April and final selections are notified by 17 August. The next cycle has not been dated.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is closed and no 2027 dates have been published. That cycle opened on 19 February 2026 with an early-bird deadline of 23 March at CAD 46.75 and a regular deadline of 13 April at CAD 55, notification at the end of July and the Writers' Lab in September. No deadline times or timezones are published.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is closed and no dates have been published for a next round. That cycle opened on 19 February 2026 with an early-bird deadline of 23 March at 46.75 Canadian dollars and a regular deadline of 13 April at 55, with the lab running in September. No deadline times or timezones are published. Worth knowing: 2026 appears to be the first edition of the Writers' Lab, which succeeds TIFF's long-running Writers' Studio, so there are no prior cycles to establish a pattern from and no future date should be inferred.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is complete and no dates have been published for the next round; the festival says to check back in autumn 2026. That cycle opened on 18 September 2025 and ran four tiers, early on 6 November at 45 dollars for a feature, regular on 15 January at 60, final on 19 February at 80 and extended on 5 March 2026 at 95, with notification on 22 May. Episodic and short categories run cheaper. The pattern across the two evidenced cycles is consistent: opening in mid-September, four tiers from November through early March, notification in May and the festival in the third week of June, with fees held flat between cycles. No deadline times or timezones are published anywhere.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 edition is complete and no 2027 call has been announced. Applications for the 2026 edition closed on 3 November 2025. TorinoFilmLab typically opens its calls in the autumn.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 TV contest closed on 9 March with results due by 30 August (fees ran $99 to $119). A 2026 feature cycle has not been announced; previous feature contests opened between April and June.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round opened on 6 April and closed on 25 May 2026 at 11:59pm Eastern, with winners announced at the Virginia Film Festival in October. This has one of the most predictable calendars we have found: across four consecutive cycles the closing date has fallen on US Memorial Day, the last Monday in May, every single year, with entries opening in early April in three of those four. No extensions are ever granted. One small note for verification: only the 2026 cycle published a timezone; earlier years stated 11:59pm with no zone.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 cycle is complete and its six participants announced. Applications closed on 25 May 2026. No 2027 window has been announced.