Free Creative Writing Competitions: What Free Means Here
Quick answer: Free creative writing competitions at Writory are earned, not open: win a poetry or story round and the next entry is free, or enter three rounds running for the Seasoned Quill badge. Otherwise story entry is $8, deadline 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, and every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100.
Writory's poetry and story contests are not free at the door: story entry is $8, closing 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, and every entrant in both receives a certificate and a score out of 100; free entry is earned.
Two ways entry becomes free, in both contests
Writory runs two monthly creative writing contests, one for poems and one for short stories of 100 to 3,000 words, both in any language and both open to anyone aged 13 or over anywhere. Neither is free to walk into. Both become free the same two ways: win a round and your next entry costs nothing, or enter three rounds running and the Seasoned Quill badge arrives with a free entry attached. An earned entry gets exactly the same blind reading, certificate and score as a paid one.
This is a different page from the one on writing contests with no entry fee, which is about fee-free contests generally and what to check before entering them. This page is about what is free here, in both forms, today, and how a regular entrant stops paying. The honest summary: a poet or story writer who enters three months in a row has earned a free fourth, and a winner never pays for the round after a win.
What is free for everyone, right now
The six-lesson Story Craft course at /academy/story-craft is free to read in full. The monthly story prompts at /short-story-prompts are free. The full story rubric with judges' notes at /short-story-judging-criteria is free, and it is the same document the judges hold. Every poetry winner for the past year is free to read on /winning-poems and /past-winners, with scores. None of that is a trial or a sample; it is the contest's teaching, open to anyone, entrant or not.
What is not free is the reading of your own work, because reading is the one thing that costs. Story entry is $8 for one story, $14 for two, $25 for five. Every entry is read blind and scored against the published rubric, Storytelling & Structure 25, Character & Emotional Impact 25, Language & Craft 20, Originality & Voice 20, Impact & Resonance 10, and every entrant receives all five marks and a certificate on 30 November 2026. The story winner takes $100.
Genuinely free competitions elsewhere, and what they cannot give
Free competitions with real funders exist and are worth entering: the Commonwealth Short Story Prize, annual and open to Commonwealth citizens; Furious Fiction, a 500-word challenge from the Australian Writers' Centre; On The Premises, themed rounds a few times a year; and for poets, a number of magazine and foundation prizes with no fee. Check each on its own site, since windows move, and read the rights clause before entering anything.
What none of them can give is an answer to everyone. A free contest with thousands of entries replies to its shortlist and nobody else, so a writer who enters four free contests in a year and places in none has learned nothing about the work. A scored monthly contest fixes that for a small fee, and then, if you keep entering, for no fee at all. The sensible year uses both.
When the rounds close
Story entries close on 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, with results and certificates on 30 November 2026; the poetry contest closes on the 25th of every month. Both clocks are Indian Standard Time because Writory is run from India: UTC plus five and a half hours, no daylight saving, so 11:59 PM IST is early evening in London. The first contest runs from 1 September to 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, with results and certificates on 30 November 2026. From December the contest is monthly: entries close on the 25th, results on the 30th, and the next round opens the moment they land.
This is not a free contest and this page has not called it one. It is two monthly contests where free entry is earned by winning or by turning up three months running, where everything that teaches is free, and where the fee, when you pay it, returns a certificate and a five-part score rather than silence. Writers keep all rights in both, and nothing is published without consent.
The published rubric, 100 points
- Storytelling & Structure (25 points): Does every scene cause the next, and does the ending pay off the opening?
- Character & Emotional Impact (25 points): Do we want something with your character, and does the story make us feel it?
- Language & Craft (20 points): Clean, deliberate prose: rhythm, precision, and nothing wasted.
- Originality & Voice (20 points): The angle only you could write, told in a voice that sounds like nobody else.
- Impact & Resonance (10 points): What the story leaves behind after the last line.
How it works
Submit an original story of 100 to 3,000 words by 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST. Every story is judged blind against the rubric above, and results arrive on 30 November 2026: every entrant receives a certificate with their name and a score out of 100. Writers keep all rights. Monthly winners earn free entry to the next round. Enter at https://writoryofficial.com/submit-story.
Common questions
Is Writory ever completely free to enter?
Only when earned, in either contest. Win a round and the next entry is free; enter three rounds running and the Seasoned Quill badge brings a free entry with it. There is no open free entry and no free trial round, and earned entries receive the same blind judging, certificate and score as paid ones.
Who can enter the two contests?
Anyone aged 13 or over, in any country, in any language. The story contest takes original fiction of 100 to 3,000 words in any genre; the poetry contest takes original poems. There is no residency rule and no separate category by nationality, and both are entered online.
What does a story entry cost?
$8 for one story, $14 for two, $25 for five, in US dollars for writers outside India. The poetry contest has its own lower fee on its own page. The fee includes the blind reading, the certificate and the five-part score; the only optional extra is a written feedback report.
What does every entrant receive?
A certificate with their name and the contest round, and a score out of 100 broken into the rubric's separate marks, on results day, whatever the placing. Scores are private to the writer; only winners are published, with consent. The story winner also takes $100 and free entry to the next round.
How is this page different from the one on contests with no entry fee?
That page is about fee-free contests generally: why they are rare, what to check, and where Writory's fee fits. This one is about what is free at Writory itself, across both poetry and story: the earned free entries, the free course, prompts, rubric and winners' pages, and what the fee buys when you do pay.
Are the free resources really free, or a sample?
Really free. The Story Craft course, the monthly prompts, the full rubric with notes and every past poetry winner can be read in full without entering or paying anything, and they do not expire. They exist so that a first entry is not also a first attempt.
More story contest pages
- Writing Competitions to Win Money, With the Odds Stated
- Short Story Competitions Open Now
- How to Submit a Short Story to the Writory Contest
- The Short Story Prize, and How It Reaches You
- A Writing Contest Filipinos Can Enter Online, in English or Filipino
- A Writing Competition Open to Singapore, in Any of Its Four Languages
- A Writing Competition Open to Pakistan, in Urdu, English or Any Language
- A Writing Competition Open to Everyone in the UAE, in Any Language
- A Historical Fiction Short Story Contest That Scores the Story, Not the Research
- A Fairy Tale Writing Contest for New Tales and Honest Retellings
- Short Story Competition Rules, in Full and in Plain Words
- Short Story Competition Word Limit: 100 to 3,000 Words, and How to Use Them
- All short story contest pages
- Winning Stories
About Writory
Writory (writoryofficial.com) is an international monthly poetry contest founded in 2025 by Shivay Mehra. Poets from 31 countries have entered, readers come from over 150 countries, and every submitted poem is judged and scored out of 100 across five criteria: creativity, emotion, structure, language and impact and resonance. Every entrant receives a certificate; winners receive cash prizes and are published by name. Entries close on the 25th of each month and results are announced on the 30th. Writory is listed by Duotrope, Poetry Kit, Christopher Fielden's competition list and Creative Writing NZ, among other organisations. Past results are public at past winners and the leaderboard.