How to Format Poems for Contest Entry
Quick answer: How to format poems for contest entry: blind judging rules, anonymous files, fonts, spacing, line limits and the checks that stop a disqualification.
Contest administrators will tell you a quiet, painful truth: a measurable slice of entries in any poetry contest are disqualified or handicapped before a judge reads a single line, for reasons that have nothing to do with the poems. A name on a page that was supposed to be anonymous. Two poems in a file that asked for one. Forty-two lines against a forty-line limit. These are heartbreaking losses because they are entirely preventable, and preventing them is what this page is for. Formatting for contests is not decoration; it is eligibility.
Contest formatting also differs from magazine formatting in one structural way: most serious contests judge blind, so the rules exist to make every entry identical in dress and traceable only through the entry system. Once you understand that logic, every strange-sounding rule makes sense, and following the rules stops feeling like bureaucracy and starts feeling like what it is, a fairness machine you want working, because it is also what guarantees your poem gets judged on nothing but itself.
The straight answer: the rules outrank everything
Whatever this page says, the contest's own guidelines say it better for that contest, and they win every conflict. Read them twice: once when you decide to enter, once immediately before you submit. Contests vary on file type, line counting, font, and where your name may appear, and last year's rules are not this year's. The habits below cover what most contests share, so you arrive at any set of guidelines already ninety percent compliant.
The shared logic is blind judging. Judges receive poems stripped of identity so that a famous name earns nothing and an unknown one costs nothing. Contests that publish their criteria make the deal explicit; Writory's monthly contest, for one, scores each entry on creativity, emotion, structure, language and theme, and every entrant sees their score. Under a system like that, formatting has exactly one job: deliver the poem clean, anonymous and inside the rules, so the five criteria are all that operate.
Anonymity: the rule that catches the most poets
If the contest is blind, your name must not appear anywhere in or on the poem file: not under the title, not in a header or footer, not in a signature line, not in the file name. 'MyPoem_PriyaSharma.docx' fails the test before the document even opens. Name the file after the poem instead, and put your identity only where the entry form asks for it.
The trap almost everyone misses is metadata. Word processors quietly stamp documents with an author name drawn from your account settings, and a judge or administrator checking file properties can see it. Before exporting, use your word processor's inspector to remove personal information, or create the final file in a fresh document. Exporting to PDF usually carries the author field across too, so check the PDF's properties after export. Two minutes of checking removes the most common accidental identity leak in blind contests.
Files and formats: what to send and how to name it
Most contests accept PDF or .docx, and some paste-into-a-box entry forms accept neither. When you have the choice, PDF is the poet's friend, because it freezes your line breaks, stanza spacing and indentation exactly as you set them, on every device a judge might use. A .docx file can reflow if the judge's software substitutes fonts or the page size differs. When the contest specifies one format, that instruction ends the debate.
Keep the package minimal and literal: one poem per file unless told otherwise, the file named with the poem's title, nothing extra inside. No cover page unless requested, no decorative borders, no images or background textures, no copyright notice on the poem, which reads as amateur and implies distrust. If the entry is by paste-in form, paste, then visually verify every line break and stanza gap survived, because forms are the natural predator of white space.
Page setup: the invisible standard
The conventions are plain because plainness is the point. A standard readable font, Times New Roman, Garamond or similar, at 11 or 12 point. Single spacing within the poem, since poems are single-spaced by convention and a blank line means a stanza break, so double-spacing a poem falsifies its structure. Left alignment, with indentation only where the poem itself demands it. Title at the top in the same font, bold or slightly larger if you like, never in all capitals with asterisks around it. One poem starts per page in multi-poem documents.
Centring every line deserves its own paragraph, because it is the most common formatting habit that quietly hurts entries. Centre alignment is a design choice that means something; used by default it tells an experienced judge the poet has not yet read much contemporary poetry on the page. Unless your poem has a shape that needs centring, set it flush left and let the line breaks carry the architecture.
Line limits and how they are counted
A forty-line limit sounds unambiguous until you ask what counts. Practice varies: some contests count only lines of verse, others count blank stanza-break lines as well, and the title usually stands outside the count but not always. If the rules define the counting method, follow it; if they do not, count conservatively, assuming blank lines count, so that your poem is safe under either method. An entry that fits every counting scheme cannot be tripped by any of them.
If your best poem runs over, resist the temptations of squeezing: shrinking the font, merging stanzas, or joining two short lines into one long one to duck under the limit. Judges read poems for a living and see the seams instantly, and a poem distorted to fit a limit competes worse than a shorter poem built for it. Either revise the poem honestly down, which sometimes improves it, or enter a different poem and send the long one where length is welcome.
Traps and time-wasters around contests
Formatting is also where illegitimate contests reveal themselves. Warning signs worth knowing: contests with entry fees but no named judges, no published past winners, and no stated criteria; contests whose main product is an anthology you are pressured to buy after 'winning'; and contests that claim rights over all entries, not just winners, buried in the terms. Legitimate contests state fees, prizes, judges or judging method, rights, and dates in plain language, and free contests with transparent scoring do exist.
Time-wasters are gentler but real: entering without reading past winners, so your poem is aimed at the wrong target entirely, and entering the same contest with the same poem repeatedly while changing nothing. Read what won last cycle. It is the fastest available intelligence about what the judges reward.
A realistic first step and a final checklist
This week, build a contest-ready master file of your three strongest poems: flush left, standard serif at 12 point, single-spaced, one poem per page, no name anywhere, metadata scrubbed, each exported to a cleanly named PDF. Then find one contest closing in the next month, read its rules twice, and adapt your master file to them. Before you press submit, run the sixty-second check: right file, right format, right line count, no name in the document, no name in the file name, no name in the properties. That minute is the cheapest advantage in the whole competitive field.
What poets can take from this
- Read the contest rules twice, once when entering and once just before submitting.
- Never put your name in the poem file, the file name, or the document metadata for blind contests.
- Prefer PDF where allowed, and verify line breaks after any paste-into-form entry.
- Single-space poems, use blank lines only for stanza breaks, and set lines flush left by default.
- Count line limits conservatively, assuming blank lines count.
- Study the previous cycle's winners before choosing which poem to enter.
Try it yourself
Take a poem of yours that is exactly at a limit, forty lines, and revise it to thirty, cutting only what the poem can survive without. Notice which ten lines the poem never needed.
Questions
Should I put my name on the poem for a contest?
Not if the contest judges blind, which most serious contests do. Your name belongs only on the entry form, never in the document, the file name, or the file's metadata. Identifying information inside the poem file is one of the most common reasons entries are disqualified.
What font and spacing should I use for a contest poem?
A standard serif such as Times New Roman or Garamond at 11 or 12 point, single-spaced, with blank lines marking stanza breaks and text flush left. Plain formatting keeps the judges' attention on the poem. Follow the contest's own instructions where they specify anything different.
Do blank lines count towards a poetry contest's line limit?
It depends on the contest, and practice genuinely varies. If the rules define how lines are counted, follow that. If they do not, count conservatively by assuming stanza-break lines are included, so your poem fits under every counting method the organisers might use.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated September 2026.
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