Every January I mark my calendar with the deadlines of some big Canadian fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry writing contests.
Ideally, this reminds me to submit to them. But even if I don’t, the deadlines remind me that “oh, right, I’m supposed to be writing.”
I recommend marking the deadlines, as well as a reminder 30 days beforehand.
2022 Canadian Writing Contest Submission Deadlines/Important Dates
**Please confirm the deadlines and guidelines yourself before submitting.**
January
1st: CBC Nonfiction Prize contest opens. Max. 2,000 words.
22nd: NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge‘s 1st round begins. (Writers need to pre-register for this.)
February
1st: The Malahat Review‘s Novella Prize (or Long Poem Prize in 2023) contest closes.
12th: The Writers’ Union of Canada’s Short Prose Competition for Emerging Writers deadline. Max. 2,500 words.
22nd: RBC Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Poetry & Short Fiction Writers deadline. **NEW as of 2021: no age limit.
28th: CBC Nonfiction contest deadline. Max. 2,000 words.
28th: The New Quarterly‘s Nick Blatchford Occasional Verse Contest deadline.
March
1st: The Fiddlehead‘s poetry and/or fiction and/or creative nonfiction contest opens or closes on this day … the webpage is quite confusing!
1st: CANSCAIP & the Writers’ Union of Canada’s Writing for Children Competition opens. **Details TBC for 2021.**
28th: The New Quarterly‘s Edna Staebler Personal Essay Contest deadline. (No word limit.)
April
1st: CBC Poetry Prize contest opens. Max. 600 words.
May
1st: The Malahat Review‘s Far Horizons Award for Poetry (or Far Horizons Award for Short Fiction in 2023) contest closes.
28th: The New Quarterly‘s Peter Hinchcliffe Fiction Award deadline. (No word limit.)
31st: CBC Poetry Prize contest deadline.
31st: CANSCAIP & the Writers’ Union of Canada’s Writing for Children Competition deadline.
August
1st: The Malahat Review‘s annual Constance Rooke Creative Nonfiction Prize contest deadline. 2,000-3,000 words.
31st: deadline for the Federation of BC Writers’ literary contests. Categories include: Flash Fiction, Short Fiction, Creative Non-fiction & Poetry. Submissions are welcome from all genres & styles, not just literary.
September
1st: CBC Short Story Prize contest opens. Max. 2,500 words.
1st: The Fiddlehead‘s Fiction Contest deadline. Max. 6,000 words.
October
31st: CBC Short Story Prize contest deadline.
November
1st: The Malahat Review‘s Open Season Awards annual deadline. Short fiction & creative non-fiction: max. 2,500 words. Poetry: max. 3 poems @ 100 lines each.
4th: Writing Battle‘s Autumn Battle registration deadline. You’ll have 5 days to write up to 2,000 words.
2023 Canadian Writing Contest Submission Deadlines/Important Dates
February
3rd: Writing Battle‘s Winter Battle registration deadline. You’ll have 2 days to write up to 1,000 words.
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Thank you for providing the submission calendar! Super handy. I’m glad to have found your website and to learn about you, too. Best to your writing! Cheers!
Yay! I’m so glad you find it useful, Rachel. Thanks for taking the time to comment. Good luck with your own submissions 🙂
Hi! Just wondering, do you know if any of these contests have free entry?
Hi Maire! Thanks for your question. I think they all require some amount of entry/administration fee. Often the literary publications will give you a year’s subscription to their journals, which is roughly the same cost as the fee. Best of luck with your writing!
Dear Heather,
Thank you for providing the submission calendar.
I have written a short story I would like enter into some good contests. Can you spare half an hour to check whether it is good enough?
Thanks
Kenny
Hi Kenny,
That’s great that you’ve written a story! I don’t review or edit other people’s work, but there are many other writers who do offer that service. You might want to look into Scribophile, an online community where people read and comment on each others’ work: https://www.scribophile.com/
Good luck with the contests!
– Heather
Thank you for this submission calendar! I am trying to set some goals this year and this was very helpful. 🙂