What Does Honorable Mention Mean in a Contest?
Quick answer: Honorable mention means your story impressed the judges but placed just below the winners. Here is what it signals, what you get, and how to use it.
An honorable mention means the judges rated your story highly enough to single it out by name, but not highly enough to award it a prize. It sits below the placed winners (first, second, third) and usually below any runners-up, yet above the hundreds of entries that received nothing. You typically get a public listing, sometimes a certificate, and rarely money. It is a commendation, not a placing.
That sounds like a consolation, and emotionally it can feel like one. Practically, it is useful intelligence. A contest that read hundreds or thousands of stories chose to name yours. That tells you the story works, that it survived several rounds of reading, and that with revision or a different judge it could place. Writers who treat honorable mentions as data rather than near-misses tend to convert them into wins.
Where it sits in the results hierarchy
Most contests announce results in tiers. At the top are the placed winners, who take the prize money. Below them some contests name runners-up or a shortlist. Honorable mentions come next: stories the judges wanted on the record without attaching a rank or a cheque. The number varies wildly. One contest might name three honorable mentions from five thousand entries, another might name forty from four hundred, and those two commendations mean very different things.
The terminology is not standardised either. Some contests say commended or highly commended, British competitions often prefer those terms, and others fold everything into a longlist. When you compare credits across contests, look at the maths: how many entries, how many named. An honorable mention that puts you in the top one percent of a large field is a genuinely strong result, whatever the label says.
What you actually receive
Read the rules page, because the package differs by contest. The common baseline is your name and story title on the results announcement. Many contests add a certificate. Some publish honorable mentions alongside the winners in their anthology or on their site, which counts as publication and matters for where you can send the story next. Prize money is rare at this tier, though a few large contests attach a small award.
One thing you almost never receive is an explanation. Most contests will not tell you why the story stopped where it did, which is why feedback-forward competitions are worth seeking out. Writory's monthly Short Story Contest, for instance, returns a five-part score out of 100 to every entrant against a published rubric, so a commendation arrives with numbers you can actually act on.
Can you call yourself an award-winning writer?
Strictly, no. An honorable mention is a recognition, not an award, and editors and agents know the difference. Writers who inflate a mention into a win in a query letter risk looking naive to the exact people they are trying to impress. The honest phrasing works better anyway: received an honorable mention in, was commended in, or placed among the honorable mentions of.
Used accurately, the credit still earns its place in a cover letter or bio, especially from a respected contest. Editors read those lines as a signal that someone else with judgement has already vetted your work. Three honest commendations from real competitions say more than one vague claim, and they suggest a writer who submits steadily, which editors also like.
How to use the mention
First, decide what it tells you about the story. A mention usually means the piece is close: strong enough to survive the slush rounds, not quite strong enough to beat the final handful. Reread it after a month away and look for the soft patch, often a slow opening page or an ending that resolves too neatly. Then send it out again. Stories that earn mentions in one contest regularly win or get published somewhere else.
Second, put the credit to work. Add it to your bio line for future submissions, note the contest and year, and keep a running list so query letters are easy to assemble later. If the contest published the story, record that too, because most magazines and competitions only take unpublished work and you will need to know its status at a glance.
Common misreadings
The gloomy misreading is that a mention is a polite rejection. It is not. Contests have no obligation to name anyone beyond the winners, and naming you costs them a small amount of their credibility, which they spend deliberately. The sunny misreading is that a mention guarantees the story is finished. Also no. It means one panel, on one reading, rated it near the top. A different judge might have placed it first or left it unlisted.
Judging at the top of any contest is closer than entrants imagine. Final decisions often turn on taste, theme fit, or the strength of a single scene. Take the encouragement, take the data point, and keep the story moving.
What poets can take from this
- Record every honorable mention with the contest name, year, and field size so your bio and query letters stay accurate.
- Check whether the mention came with publication before submitting the story anywhere that requires unpublished work.
- Reread a commended story after a month and revise the opening page and the ending first, the two places close calls are usually lost.
- Never upgrade a mention to a win in a cover letter; editors check and the honest credit is already persuasive.
- Compare mentions by the maths of the field, not the label: top one percent of five thousand entries is a serious result.
Try it yourself
Take a story of yours that came close somewhere, a mention, a shortlist, a kind rejection, and rewrite only its first 150 words and its final 150 words without touching the middle. Send the new version to a different contest and note what changes in the response.
Questions
Is an honorable mention the same as a shortlist?
Not quite. A shortlist is usually announced before winners are chosen and marks the final pool under consideration. Honorable mentions are announced with the results and mark stories the judges commended after the winners were settled. Some contests use the terms loosely, so read how each one defines its tiers.
Should I mention honorable mentions in a query letter?
Yes, if the contest is reputable and the credit is recent. One line is enough, phrased accurately. Two or three strong commendations signal that your work already survives competitive reading, which is exactly what an agent wants to know.
Do honorable mentions ever come with money?
Occasionally. A few large contests attach a small cash award or a subscription at this tier, but most offer a listing and sometimes a certificate. The rules page for each contest states exactly what each tier receives, so check before you assume either way.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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