The screenwriting competitions directory.

25 Sept 2026Closes tomorrow

25 Sept 2026Closes tomorrow

30 Sept 20266 days left

30 Sept 20266 days left

30 Sept 20266 days left

30 Sept 20266 days left

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5 Oct 202611 days left

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15 Dec 2026

31 Mar 2027

Closed for this cycle

Channel 4's page currently says applications are closed and publishes no dates for the 2027 course. The last window ran 22 September to 6 October, closing at 5pm, and Channel 4 offers an email alert for when applications open.

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 competition is closed. Its final deadline was 16 September 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific, at 50 US dollars, after an early-bird deadline of 15 July at 40. The winner and nine finalists will be announced on 8 February 2027. American Zoetrope says the 2027 competition will open on 1 June.

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 2026 competition closed at 11.55pm BST on 16 September 2026, after an early bird rate of £58 to 5 September and a standard rate of £65. Rocliffe does not accept late entries. Every entrant receives a written assessment by November 2026, and the three finalists are showcased at BAFTA in London on 30 November 2026. The next call has not been announced.

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.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for Pilot 2027/28 closed at 12 noon on 4 August 2026. BBC Writers runs Pilot every two years, so the next round is not expected until 2028. The 2027/28 programme is focused exclusively on emerging deaf, disabled and neurodivergent writers. The annual BBC Writers Open Call is a separate opportunity.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for Berlinale Talents 2027 closed at 12 noon CEST on 2 September 2026 (early rate 10 euros to 19 August, then 15 euros). The application page now reads "once the application opens" and lists no dates for the next call; in recent years the call has opened in July, so expect the 2028 window from July 2027.

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

Applications for the 2027 fellowship open in autumn 2026, with no date published. The 2026 round closed on Monday 15 December 2025 at 11:59pm Pacific. This runs genuinely annually, with four consecutive named cohorts, but the deadline has slipped roughly three weeks later each year, from 13 November for the 2024 cycle to 25 November for 2025 and 15 December for 2026, so do not project a date from that trend. The fee is 65 dollars per submission, non-refundable, with no waivers or discounts available, and CAPE notes it is subject to change.

Closed for this cycle

No deadline is published and the next cycle is unannounced. CFC's own applications page lists the lab with an empty deadline field, and the programme page carries no application link. There is no pattern to extrapolate from: this has run exactly once. Applications for the inaugural cycle opened in June 2025, the cohort was announced on 19 January 2026, and the lab ran 19 January to 5 June 2026 with Jezabel Bamberg, Sandi Rankaduwa, Isabella Shibuta and Yemie Sonuga. Note that the announced schedule already moved once: launch materials said the lab would run October 2025 to March 2026, and it did not. Treat any forward-looking date here with suspicion.

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 last published cycle opened on 28 May 2025 and closed at 18:00 on 25 June 2025, and no window for the next cycle has been published anywhere. Be careful projecting from that: the window moved by roughly three and a half months between cycles, from 6 February to 1 March in 2024 to late May and June in 2025, and the programme year moved with it. Only two cycles are evidenced and they disagree, so there is no stable pattern. The careers page has been unchanged since at least January 2026 and still fronts the closed 2025/26 cycle, so watch Channel 4's talent schemes index rather than this page.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round opened on 15 May and closed at 12 noon on 26 June 2026, with all applicants hearing back by 30 September. New Writing North's index says the awards open again later in 2027 without giving a month. The pattern is consistent in shape but drifting later: opening has been stable at 15 or 16 May, while the deadline has walked from 4 June in 2024 to 16 June in 2025 to 26 June in 2026, always at midday. The production partners rotate annually, so treat the company list as year-specific. A caution if you go looking: the strand cards still display live Enter here buttons and present-tense deadline text after closing, and the dedicated 2026 page carries no closure indicator at all, though the underlying submission forms are genuinely shut.

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 December 2026, with no exact dates, times or timezone published. Applying costs 40 US dollars, and the 1,500 dollar attendance fee is due only on acceptance.

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 2027 programme window ran 4 May to 1 June 2026 and is closed. The next application window has not been announced.

Closed for this cycle

The call opened on 19 May 2026 and closed at 17:30 on 31 July 2026, extended from an original date of 21 July. IMPORTANT: this is a one-off anniversary award, not an annual competition. It was launched to mark ESB's centenary and the festival's 25th anniversary, there is no prior cycle of any kind, and an archive search returns no earlier captures of the page. Do not expect a next window: if it recurs at all, that will be new information. Two errors on their own pages are worth knowing: the website gives the premiere as February 2026 while the guidelines correctly say February 2027, and the award appears under three different official names across the page, the guidelines PDF and the required email subject line.

Closed for this cycle

IMPORTANT: the next edition is on hold. In July 2026 European Short Pitch announced that the call for its 2027 edition was suspended after Creative Europe MEDIA funding did not come through, saying it was facing a genuinely uncertain moment and exploring smaller, more focused activities for 2027 instead. The most recently completed cycle was the nineteenth edition: applications closed on 12 September 2025, extended to 19 September, with selection announced in mid-December, the development workshop in mid-January 2026 and the forum in early June 2026. Until 2027 the annual rhythm had been strikingly stable, with a September deadline, December selection, January workshop and June forum, which makes this pause a genuine break rather than drift.

Closed for this cycle

Both labs are closed. The Screenwriting Lab 2027 call opened on 29 June 2026 and closed on 31 August for non-members and 14 September for Film Independent members. The Episodic Lab 2026 call opened on 15 December 2025 and closed on 2 February 2026 for non-members and 16 February for members. Film Independent has not announced dates for either next call.

Closed for this cycle

Submissions for 2026 closed with the late deadline on 15 August 2026 (earlybird 15 June at 20 pounds, regular 15 July at 25, late 35, or 30 for students and FilmFreeway Gold members). Finalists were notified on 4 September; the Awards Evening is at Komedia in Bath on 19 October 2026, during the festival (16 to 25 October). Submissions opened on 19 May this year, so expect the 2027 call around May 2027.

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

This year's contest closed with the extended deadline on 20 August 2026 (early 20 May, regular 20 June at 45 US dollars, late 20 July at 50, extended 59). Filmmatic posts results on 15 October. The page gives no dates for the next season; the tiers have run from May to August, so expect the 2027 call around May 2027.

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 ran from 3 October and was scheduled to close on 27 October 2025 at 11:59pm Pacific, but hit its 1,000 application cap first and shut early. FOX says only to check back next autumn for the next cycle. The programme is genuinely annual across three evidenced cycles, but the window has moved earlier and shortened each time, from a roughly 40 day window opening in December, to 16 days in mid-October, to 25 days in early October. The 1,000 cap was introduced for the second of those and has closed the window early both times since, so the published closing date is a ceiling rather than a plan.

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 opened on 2 March and closed on 20 March 2026 at 5:00pm, with shortlist interviews in the week of 4 May and six writers informed by 12 May. No timezone is published, though the organisers are Irish. The 2027 window is unannounced, but the cadence is the most stable of any Irish scheme we carry: four consecutive years with a late February or early March open, a deadline in the first three weeks of March, a residential weekend in Galway in May, a second in Dublin in October, and six writers plus three shadow editors every single year. The only drift is the deadline itself sliding from the first days of March in 2023, 2024 and 2025 to the 20th in 2026, so a March 2027 deadline is a reasonable expectation.

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

Entries for the 2026 contest closed on 1 June (fees ran $40 to $75 by deadline). The last cycle opened in late August, so the 2027 window is likely to open around then.

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.

Closed for this cycle

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

The 2026 round closed at 10pm on Sunday 8 February 2026 and applications are now shut. Do not try to plan around a pattern here: the deadline has moved across January, February, April, May and September in six documented cycles, and the gap between the 2025 close in September 2024 and the 2026 close in February 2026 was roughly seventeen months. The only durable features are a 10pm cut-off and a Sunday close in the most recent rounds. The page limit has also drifted, from 8 to 15 pages in the 2024 and 2025 calls to a maximum of 12 in 2026.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round opened on 11 June 2026 and closed at 11:59pm on 2 July 2026, with no timezone published. IMPORTANT: this is not an annual scheme, despite being long-standing. Evidenced cycles ran in October 2021, August and September 2023, and June and July 2026, and ITV's own run-count confirms no cycle in 2022, 2024 or 2025. The window has moved from October to late August to mid June across those three rounds, with two and three year gaps between them. Do not diarise against it.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round opened at 9am on 5 May 2026 and closed at 11:59pm on 26 May 2026, with placements starting late July or early August. No timezone is published. IMPORTANT: this is not an annual scheme. Only two windows are evidenced, in August and September 2022 and in May 2026, and we found no evidence of any cycle in 2023, 2024 or 2025. ITV describes the 2026 round as a return. The scheme also changed materially between cycles, from one partner label to four, from one required credit to two, and from a 500,000 pound fund to one million. The cadence is too irregular to predict, so no next window should be assumed.

Opens soon

Applications for the spring and summer 2027 residencies closed on 10 September 2026. The next round, for the fall and winter 2027-28 residencies running 1 September 2027 to 29 February 2028, opens on 15 January 2027 and closes on 10 February 2027. MacDowell publishes no closing time. There are no residency fees, and need-based stipends and travel reimbursement grants are available; the application fee is not stated on the current page, so check it before applying.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round closed on 3 March 2026, with no time or timezone published, and this was the first edition of Essentials. No 2027 call has been announced; only the Accelerator strand is on record, with its first module starting in early 2027 and no call dates published. The programme is annual and reliable in cadence but has drifted materially in every other dimension: the deadline has swung about three months across recent cycles, the programme shortened from three residential modules to two, the fee fell from 2,100 euro to 1,400 as a result, a new 100 euro shortlist charge appeared, and eligibility opened to solo writers for the first time.

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, and as of 12 September 2026 the festival site carries no screenplay competition page at all while it runs this year's edition, so there is nothing to read even for the fee ladder. The last three cycles have been consistent: entries open in the first week of December of the preceding year, with the final deadline in May.

Closed for this cycle

The eleventh annual round closed on 16 February 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific at a fee of 70 dollars, with the lab running April through May 2026. The calendar is consistent: a mid-February final deadline in each of the last two cycles, both falling on a Monday, an April to May lab, and seven fellows selected each time. The pricing has drifted, though: the previous cycle offered a cheaper 60 dollar regular tier alongside the 70 dollar final deadline, and the most recent cycle published only the 70 dollar tier, so the cheaper route disappeared. Curriculum length has also changed from eight weeks to seven.

Closed for this cycle

The window for the January 2027 programme ran 1 to 21 June 2026 and is closed. No further window has been announced.

Closed for this cycle

Registration for the first India edition closed at 23:59 IST on 1 September 2026. Selected writers are announced on 15 December 2026, every applicant hears by email in December, and the workshop begins in February 2027. NextGen is a travelling programme that changes shape per territory (France, then the Netherlands, then India), so do not expect a second India cycle unless Netflix announces one.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 round closed on Monday 27 July 2026 at 11:59pm Pacific, with the programme running 22 September to 14 November 2026. The programme genuinely runs every year and claims more than twenty years and over 200 graduates, but the calendar slot has just moved sharply. The 2024 and 2025 rounds both closed on a Monday in mid-March, while 2026 jumped to late July, a drift of around four and a half months that left a sixteen-month gap between deadlines and moved the programme itself from mid-year to autumn. Do not predict a 2027 deadline from either the old March slot or the new July one.

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

The 2026 challenge (the 23rd annual) finished with final round results on 29 July 2026, and no 2027 dates have been published. It has run every calendar year without a gap, always in three rounds, with entries closing in February and final results landing late July or August. The early-bird entry deadline falls in the first week or two of January, which is the moment to watch. One caution: the start date has moved earlier every single year (24 March 2023, 15 March 2024, 21 February 2025, 13 February 2026), so treat February as the shape rather than assuming a repeating date.

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.

Closed for this cycle

Round 1 2026 opened on 31 July and closed on 4 September 2026 at 11:59am NZST, a morning deadline. Recipients are announced on 30 October. Seed offers four grants of NZ$12,500 and Seed Advanced two of NZ$15,500 per round, each plus GST if applicable. NZWG's page now lists Round 1 only and announces no Round 2 dates; indicative dates it gave in August (opening 18 December 2026, closing 12 February 2027) are no longer published, so treat the next round as unannounced.

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 2026 window ran 1 April to 1 May and is closed. The next window has not been announced.

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

The 2026 cycle closed on Friday 13 March 2026 at 12 noon, described as a strict deadline; no timezone is published, though RTÉ is Dublin-based. Finalists were named on 17 April, commissions on 15 May, with delivery in October 2026. The next cycle is unannounced, and this is one to watch rather than plan around: the cadence is reliably annual but the deadline month swings hard, running December for the 2022 edition, April for 2024, May for 2025 and March for 2026. The slate size moved too, from eight developed and three commissioned to ten and four in 2025 and back again in 2026, and 2026 switched from drama to comedy-only. Expect a call, but do not expect it in any particular month.

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.

Closed for this cycle

The 2027 programme round opened at 12 noon on 27 July 2026 and closed at 12 noon on Monday 7 September 2026. Applying is free. Interviews follow in November, successful writers are announced in early December, and the programme runs January to December 2027. Screen Scotland has not announced the next window.

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 19th annual) closed on 31 May 2026 and no 2027 dates have been published. It has shared its deadline ladder with the Script Pipeline Screenwriting Contest in every year we could evidence: a Special Entry tier the preceding September, pre-registration at the end of December, an early tier in early March, regular on 1 May and late on 15 May. Results run July into early August. On that pattern the 2027 contest would be expected to open around September 2026, but nothing is published yet. Note the contest was renamed from Competition to Contest between 2024 and 2025, so older links may fail. Original pilots only: specs of existing shows are not accepted.

Opens soon

Applications for SE#15, starting September 2027, open in December 2026. No closing date, time or timezone has been published yet. The previous round ran from December to early March, with decisions by the first week of May.

Closed for this cycle

The 2026 edition is complete and no 2027 call has been announced. The 2026 round opened 16 September 2025 and closed 27 October 2025, with results on 17 December. Note that a September 2026 deadline circulating for the Séries Mania Institute belongs to its separate Eureka Series programme, not to Writers Campus.

Closed for this cycle

DORMANT: the last evidenced cycle is 2025 and no 2026 or 2027 window has been announced. The live page says applications are currently closed and this year's application period has ended, while every date on it remains a 2025 date, the governing terms are still headed 2025, and the fellows roster runs 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025 then stops. On the established pattern of a March open, an April close and August-to-November sessions, a 2026 cohort would be starting sessions about now; neither a window nor a cohort has appeared. There is no hiatus or discontinuation notice anywhere, and the operator actively invites people to subscribe for an update on when the next application opens, so this is a programme in limbo rather than a dead one. Worth re-checking each March. FOR THE RECORD, THE 2025 DEADLINE WAS PUBLISHED TWO DIFFERENT WAYS: the programme page and FAQ said 28 April 2025 at 12PM EST, while the governing terms and conditions said the entry period ended at 12:00pm EST on 14 April 2025. Two weeks apart in the operator's own documents, with the legally governing one being the earlier. We have therefore stored no deadline at all rather than pick one. Context, not causation: Sesame Workshop announced major layoffs in March 2025, reported at around 20 per cent of staff; no source connects those cuts to this fellowship, and the 2025 cycle ran to completion afterwards.

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 at noon Eastern on 1 July; the winner is announced in October. Entries typically reopen in late April.

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

The 2026 cycle is complete and no 2027 round has been announced anywhere. That cycle opened on 7 September 2025 and ran through six tiers to an extended deadline of 8 April 2026, with fees from 30 pounds at the lightning tier to 45 at extended for the main fund, and 25 to 35 for the First Time Filmmaker fund. Note the rules and the dates panel disagree on the final date, giving 5 April and 8 April respectively, with the only published time, 23:59 GMT, attached to the 5 April date. Nominees were notified on 6 July and the winner announced at the pitch event on 2 October 2026. The fund has run three years, so a further round is plausible but entirely unconfirmed.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for the 2027 Episodic Lab and Intensive closed on 25 August 2026 (window 13 July to 25 August, 50 US dollar fee). Decisions go out by email around mid February 2027; the in-person Lab runs 15 to 20 April 2027 and the virtual Intensive 27 to 28 July 2027. One exception: an original series eligible for the Sloan Science Grant can still be submitted with a waiver code until 14 December 2026. Sundance says the next season opens in summer 2027.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for the January 2027 lab closed on 12 May 2026 (US$40 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 round closed at 11:59pm on Sunday 3 May 2026 and the competition returns in early 2027, with no date yet published. The recent pattern is consistent: across 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026 the deadline has fallen on the last Sunday of April or the first Sunday of May at 11:59pm, with finalists in June and showcases in June and July. The fee rose from 20 to the current level between 2024 and 2025 and has held since. One caveat on calling it annual: the organisers' own previous-years list skips 2019, 2021 and 2022, and the 2020 finalists were never staged in a theatre because of the pandemic, so it has run annually since 2023 but has missed years before.

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 application window ran from 11:00am Eastern on 19 May 2026 to 11:59pm Eastern on 21 June 2026, with judging through to the end of August and notification in autumn 2026. Tribeca now says the finalists' three-day workshop takes place in September 2026, though exact days are not given. This is the only entry in its group that publishes exact times and a timezone. The workshop shape is stable, at three days in New York in mid-to-late September with five finalists, but two things make the calendar unreliable: no cycle ran at all in 2023, and application windows for the 2024 and 2025 editions were never published, only their workshop dates.

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.

Opens soon

The 2026 edition is complete. TorinoFilmLab has confirmed that its new calls open on 1 October 2026, but no deadline has been published yet. The 2026 round closed on 3 November 2025 at 4pm CET. The fees shown are from that edition, so check them against the new call.

Opens soon

The 2026 edition is complete. TorinoFilmLab has confirmed that its new calls open on 1 October 2026, but no deadline has been published yet. The 2026 round closed on 17 December 2025 at 4pm CET. The fees shown are from that edition, so check them against the new call.

Closed for this cycle

TrackingB's contests page now lists its contests as on hiatus, with no reason or return date given. The most recent contest, the 2026 TV contest, closed on 9 March 2026 and its results have been announced. The page lists no 2026 feature contest; feature contests previously 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

Applications for the 2027 cohort closed on 12 July 2026. Windows are announced on WBD Access's official social channels rather than the website. The programme page still shows an Apply button, but the Submittable form it links to says there are presently no open calls, so the button is not a sign the window has opened.

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.

Closed for this cycle

Applications for the 2027 course closed on 13 September 2026 at 11.59pm Pacific. The course runs on Thursday evenings over Zoom in the first half of the year. The next window has not been announced.