A Short Story Competition Australians Can Enter Online, Judged Blind
Quick answer: Short story competition for Australian writers: Writory's contest takes original stories of 100 to 3,000 words in any genre and any language, entered online for $8. Judging is blind against a published five-part rubric. Every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100 on 30 November 2026, the top story wins $100, and writers keep all rights.
Entry is $8 a story, the deadline is 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, and every entrant, placed or not, receives a certificate and a five-part score out of 100.
What this competition is, next to the ones you already know
Australia has a serious short story calendar. The ABR Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize runs annually out of Melbourne, Overland and Meanjin still take unsolicited fiction, and Furious Fiction from the Australian Writers' Centre gives you 500 words and a 55-hour window for nothing. Those are the peaks, and a monthly contest run from India is not one of them. Writory is the flat ground where you train between them.
The difference is the return. Enter the Jolley and miss the shortlist and you learn nothing. Enter here and on 30 November 2026 you receive a certificate and five marks out of 100: Storytelling & Structure out of 25, Character & Emotional Impact out of 25, Language & Craft out of 20, Originality & Voice out of 20, Impact & Resonance out of 10. Judging is blind, so a first-timer in Hobart is read exactly as a Sydney novelist is.
The deadline in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth time
Entries close on 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST. India does not observe daylight saving, so the shift depends on your state. In Sydney and Melbourne that is 5:29 AM the following morning while daylight saving runs, from the first Sunday of October to the first Sunday of April, and 4:29 AM the rest of the year. Brisbane is 4:29 AM all year, Adelaide 4:59 AM in summer, Perth 2:29 AM.
The safe rule is to submit by your own midnight on deadline day; you will always be inside the window. 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. Stories must be original and unpublished, 100 to 3,000 words, in any genre, and the entrant must be 13 or older. Submission is online at /submit-story.
Paying in dollars from an Australian card
Writory prices international entry in US dollars: $8 for one story, $14 for two, $25 for five. At current rates one story is roughly AU$12; your card converts at the day's rate and may add a small foreign-transaction fee, depending on your bank. Payment goes through PayPal, which accepts a PayPal balance or a Visa or Mastercard as a guest without an account.
The top prize, $100, is paid to the winner by PayPal, and winners also enter the next round free. PayPal operates fully in Australia and pays out to a local bank account. Free entry is earned, not open: there is no free tier for first entries, and we say so plainly rather than hide it in the terms. Neither the fee nor the prize moves with the exchange rate on results day, since both are fixed in dollars.
Any language, and all rights stay with you
Stories in any language are read in their own language and judged in the one pool, so a story in Vietnamese from Cabramatta or Greek from Oakleigh competes on equal footing with English. Australian spelling is never marked down. Language & Craft rewards precision and rhythm, not conformity to one dictionary. Close to a quarter of Australians speak a language other than English at home, by the 2021 Census, and most competitions in the country still read English only.
You keep every right. Entering does not publish your story, so a piece scored here can still go to Griffith Review or a Text Publishing anthology afterwards. If you want the rubric explained lesson by lesson before you write, Writory Academy Story Craft is a free six-lesson course at /academy/story-craft. The sister poetry contest has published dated winners from India, the United States, Ireland, Kenya and Slovenia; the story contest's first results land on 30 November 2026.
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
Can I enter from Australia?
Yes. The competition is open worldwide to anyone aged 13 or over, with no residency or citizenship condition. Australians enter online at /submit-story on the same terms as everyone else, and judging is blind.
How much is the entry fee in Australian dollars?
The fee is set in US dollars: $8 for one story, $14 for two, $25 for five. One story is roughly AU$12 at current rates; your card or PayPal converts on the day.
What do I actually get back if I do not place?
The same as a winner receives, minus the prize: a certificate in your name and a score out of 100 with all five rubric marks shown, delivered on 30 November 2026.
What time does the competition close in Australia?
The deadline is 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, which is 5:29 AM the next morning in Sydney and Melbourne during daylight saving, 4:29 AM in Brisbane, and 2:29 AM in Perth. Submit by your local midnight and you are safe.
Does the story have to be in English?
No. Any language is accepted, and each story is read in its own language by a reader of that language. All entries compete in one pool against the same five-part rubric.
Is Writory a legitimate competition or a vanity contest?
Check before you pay. The rubric is published in full, the poetry contest's winners pages are dated month by month and name winners in five countries, and entering never publishes your story or takes any rights. There is no anthology to buy.
More story contest pages
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.