The annual Best of the Net Anthology is a project of Sundress Publications.
***Nominations for the 2026 edition of the anthology are now closed. We will begin accepting nominations for the 2027 anthology on July 1st, 2026. Guidelines below are for the 2027 anthology.***
The works nominated for inclusion in the Best of the Net Anthology should be 100% created by human artists. We do not consider AI-generated or AI-assisted writing or art. If a nominated piece is deemed by Best of the Net to be at all using AI that piece will be immediately removed from consideration.
Participant Qualifications:
- Nominations must come from the editor of the publication (journal, chapbook, online press, etc), or, if the work is self-published, it may be sent by the author.
- Nominations must have originally appeared online, though later print versions are acceptable.
- The poem, story, or essay must have been first published or appeared on the web between July 1, 2025 and June 30, 2026.
- For journals and presses, each entry may include up to:
- six poems
- two stories
- two works of creative nonfiction
- and three works of art.
- For individuals nominating self-published work, please nominate no more than two pieces regardless of genre.
- Nominations should include the URL of the poem, story, art, or essay AND a full-text version in a Word (.DOCX) or PDF document. If the website or journal requires payment for viewing, please email the editors with a code or way to allow access. Pieces that require payment for access and for which we have no way to view them in the journal itself will be disqualified.
- All nominations must include the author’s name and email address as well as the name, contact info of the nominating editor, and URL of the journal.
- Art nominations may be the cover art or pieces that were featured in an online journal that primarily features writing.
- We will make every attempt to contact journals that submit incomplete information. However, entries that remain incomplete three days after the close of nominations will be disqualified.
- Book reviews are not eligible.
- Comics may be nominated under any appropriate genre, but may only be nominated once. If the editor would like to have it considered as fiction, nonfiction, or poetry, that’s just fine. The editor may alternatively submit the piece under the art category.
- Thank you for thinking of us, but Best of the Net staff are not eligible for nomination.
- Sundress staff members and interns (that are not also BotN staff) are eligible for nomination and they may be named finalists by the judges but they are not eligible to win.
- As with Sundress staff, Sundress-sponsored journals are eligible to nominate works from their journals, and the works may be named as finalists by the judges but they are not eligible to win.
- Former staff and all Sundress authors are eligible for nomination and can win if selected by the judges.
- The submission window closes (firmly) on September 30th, 2026.
All participating journals, presses, or individuals will receive a link within the anthology site when the issue is released regardless of whether their nominations were chosen. A complete list of finalists will also be published, though finalists will not be notified until the release of the anthology.
By nominating work to the Best of the Net anthology you are acknowledging the right for the work to be republished on our website as part of our annual anthology.
For more information or any questions you may have, please email our team at bestofthenet@sundresspublications.com.