Photos are magic.
They let us travel effortlessly through time and space.
They let us see through the eyes of others.
And we can all easily create and share them with one another.
Photography is thus perhaps the greatest of all the arts.
Yet, in this era when photos are everywhere, they are often not even really noticed, let alone appreciated, for how truly magical they can be.
America’s Favorite Photos is all about rekindling America’s appreciation of photography.
Our mission and entire purpose is to encourage, support, and promote photography as an art form we can all create, share, and celebrate together.
Join us on the journey!
When you take enough photos, eventually, even by accident, one will turn out to be pretty great.
You probably have at least one of those.
Select your favorite and enter it in the next upcoming America’s Favorite Photos competition.
The winner is selected by public voting.
Everyone can participate as a Voter, discover and vote for all of their new favorite photos, and help select America’s Favorite Photos.
And everyone is also invited to enter a photo.
Do I have to pay anything?
No
What kind of photo?
Any photo (as long as it's your photo!)
Will I still own my photo?
Yes
Will I be able to change my photo?
Yes, until the start of the competition
2023 was one big competition.
To help make things more fun and accessible, 2024 instead consists of nine different qualifying competitions.
Everyone is welcome to enter a photo (the same one or different ones) in one or more of these qualifying competitions.
Each qualifying competition has its own Featured Gallery of Finalists (linked to from the Home Page of this site) - and the Top Finalists from each qualifying competition automatically advance to the overall annual 2024 Competition held in December of 2024.
The Top 20 Finalists will be showcased and celebrated in the overall annual 2024 Featured Gallery - and the Top Photo will win the title of America's Favorite Photo of 2024 and the overall prize of $10,000.
The overall annual 2024 Competition will be one round of voting over four days (December 19th through December 22nd).
BONUS: the Top Favorite Photo of each qualifying competition now also wins $10,000!
Everyone is welcome to enter a photo in the February/March Competition.
Important Dates:
January 21: Entry approvals begin. Approvals (and other important competition information) will be sent by email - so please be sure to verify your email address (from your account Dashboard) so you don't miss out!
January 29: Competition Pages and Vote Links for approved photos become available (via your account Dashboard). You're then welcome to share your Vote Link with friends and family so they'll be able to easily find and vote for your photo once voting begins.
February 1: Voting begins! To help you get off to a great start, the first day of voting will be a Double Vote Day (all votes count as double!)
All of the photos that make it to the Final Round of voting will be showcased and celebrated in the February/March 2025 Featured Gallery.
PLUS: the Top Favorite Photo of February/March 2025 wins $10,000!
PLUS: the Top 20 Favorite Photos of February/March 2025 automatically advance to the overall annual 2025 Competition - and the Top Favorite Photo of 2025 wins $10,000!
(Dates are subject to change)
The overall goal of the competition is to give every entered photo an opportunity to be discovered and appreciated - and to make it easy for everyone to discover and appreciate those photos!
The winner is decided by public voting - and everyone is welcome to vote.
To start things off, photos are randomly assigned to Groups.
Voters can vote for free for their favorite photo in each and every Group each and every day.
A huge thank you to everyone who helps discover and select America’s Favorite Photos!
For the November/December 2024 qualifying competition, each photo is initially randomly assigned to a Group of around 20 photos when voting starts on November 1st, 2024.
The Top 10 Favorite Photos in each of these Groups will then advance to the next Round of voting in a new randomly assigned Group of other photos that have also advanced to the next Round.
A photo thus just needs to be slightly above average to continue to advance to its next Group in the next Round of voting.
A photo makes it to the Final Round after being slightly above average in nine Groups over nine Rounds of voting. This is one additional Round than the previous competition - but, since these are 4-day Rounds instead of 5-day Rounds, this ends up being a total of five fewer days than the previous competition.
All of the photos that make it to the Final Round will be showcased and celebrated in the November/December 2024 Featured Gallery.
PLUS: the Top Favorite Photo of November/December 2024 wins $10,000!
PLUS: the Top 20 Favorite Photos of November/December 2024 automatically advance to the overall annual 2024 Competition - and the Top Favorite Photo of 2024 wins $10,000!
Rounds of voting are each four days - and the first two days of every Round are Double Vote Days (all votes count as double!)
All Rounds start at 5am Eastern / 2am Pacific
All Rounds end at 10pm Eastern / 7pm Pacific
Round One: November 1 - November 4
Round Two: November 5 - November 8
Round Three: November 9 - November 12
Round Four: November 13 - November 16
Round Five: November 17 - November 20
Round Six: November 21 - November 24
Round Seven: November 25 - November 28
Quarterfinal Round: November 29 - December 2
Semifinal Round: December 3 - December 6
Final Round: December 7 - December 10
Since each advancing photo is competing against a different Group of advancing photos in each Round, vote totals are reset between Rounds to keep everything fair for all photos.
Also, while votes in a Round determine a photo's rank in its Group for that Round, it's only the rank in its Group that matters as to whether it advances to the next Round or not - so the rank of each photo in its Group is always shown - but vote totals themselves are never shown.
This helps improve the overall experience for both competitors and voters.
If a voter could see that a photo has significantly more or less votes than another photo, that might completely discourage them from voting (thinking that their vote wouldn't make any difference) - and voters should never be discouraged from voting for their favorite photos - as the whole point of all this is for them to do so - and sometimes just a single vote will significantly change the rankings!
Groups not only make it easier for voters (as they can wander through different Groups and vote for their favorite photo in each Group instead of having to only pick just their one overall favorite photo from among all the photos in the whole competition) - but it also makes things much easier for competitors (as they are effectively only competing with the other photos in their Group to be able to advance to the next Round).
Of course, each Round gets more competitive (as you are competing against other photos that have also advanced from the previous Round) - but you don't have to worry about beating everyone in the entire competition - rather just the other photos in your Group.
With that said, some Groups will be tougher than others, and if your photo does not advance to the next Round of voting, it could simply be that you were in a tough Group - and you are then welcome to try again in the next competition.
It's always 100% free to enter, compete, and win - and everyone is welcome to enter a photo in each and every competition.
Thank you for participating in America's Favorite Photos as a competitor and/or as a voter!
