Announcing the 5th Annual Personal Essay Awards Winners

Congratulations to all the winners of the 5^th Annual Writer's Digest Personal Essay Awards! Read an interview with the first-place winner, F.A. Battle, in the May/June 2025 issue of Writer's Digest or here on the blog.

Want an opportunity to win a WD award? Keep checking our competitions page for upcoming competitions.

1. "Ground Zero" by F.A. Battle

2. "They Say if You Name the Thing, it Helps" by Allie Dixon

3. "A Stroke, a Recovery, and a Marriage Revised" by Charlotte Troyanowski

4. "How to (not) get into an Ivy League School" by jlee

5. "Letters from Far Away" by Jean Palmer Heck

6. "The Verizon Guy" by J. Shepherd

7. "A Baker's Dozen: Thirteen Perspectives on Anorexia" by Deborah Svec-Carstens

8. "Ode to an Ugly Urn" by Katrina Gallegos

9. "Delivery Notes" by J. Mackenzie

10. "Didu" by M. Talu

11. "The Hunt" by Elinor Horner

12. "Cardinal Virtues" by Robin Clifford Wood

13. "Treasures from the Sea" by Renee Srch

14. "A Clash of Cultures Around the Dinner Table" by Genine Babakian

15. "AFTERTHOUGHT ON AN EPITAPH" by Melanie Verbout

16. "Because the Night belongs to Mothers" by Hope Loraine Cotter

17. "My Name Isn't Michelle" by Nicholle Harrison 

18. "Historian of Silences" by Jonathan Odell

19. "In the End" by Mark V Sroufe

20. "Man Enough" by Christian Escalona

21. "Across the Gulf" by Annie Barker

22. "On Fathering (What You Didn't Know)" by John Cheesebrow

23. "My Name is Not Sally" by Celia Ruiz

24. "An Abortion, a hysterectomy, and Black Sweatpants" by Lynne Schmidt

25. "Aging, Angst, & Anxiety" by Stephanie Baker

Check out the latest Writer's Digest Competitions!