The best thing about ArcGIS StoryMaps is that it provides an easy-to-use tool for telling stories about the world we live in — and the world we want to see. With three million stories published and counting, the impact that storytellers can have on a virtually infinite range of topics never fails to inspire us on Esri’s StoryMaps team.

Each year, the ArcGIS StoryMaps Competition encourages storytellers to submit their work and ultimately showcases some truly remarkable examples of how ArcGIS StoryMaps can be used to inform readers, achieve goals, and ultimately make the world a better place. We’re expecting the 2026 competition — now accepting submissions through December 11 — to be no exception.

If you’re even slightly considering tossing your hat into the ring, 1) do it! And 2) keep reading this blog post to get the lowdown on all you need to know before entering: The competition format resources available to help you along the way, and, perhaps most importantly, who will be determining the winners and what they’ll be looking for in a winning story.

How does the competition work?

Esri invites anyone who is at least 18 years old to submit one original story or collection (that has not been submitted to a prior ArcGIS StoryMaps Competition) that uses place-based storytelling and geospatial data to answer the question: “How are you bold in pursuit of better?”

Better, after all, is what we all want, according to Esri President Jack Dangermond — for ourselves, our organizations, and our communities. And boldness is often how we get there, through curiosity, innovation, creativity, and willingness to try different approaches.

Entrants (as individuals or groups of people) will be asked to submit their story under one of four categories:

• Seeing what others missed — where maps and geospatial analysis have revealed an unexpected pattern or insight
• Refusing the status quo — where mapping has helped challenge “the way it’s always been done”
• Designing a better future — using geography to anticipate, test, or prepare for what’s next
• Acting with clarity in complexity — where maps helped leaders make deliberate, informed decisions amid uncertainty

For more information on each of these categories, plus resources to inspire you and help get you started, visit the 2026 ArcGIS StoryMaps Competition home page.

Entrants who are enrolled in a two-year or four-year institution of higher education also have the option to have their story placed in a student track under each category so that their story will be judged against other student submissions.

Rules for submission (IMPORTANT!)

Although you’re probably excited to get your story or collection submitted, it is critical to not overlook the basic submission requirements, including (but not limited to):

• Make sure you are using ArcGIS StoryMaps and that you are not using a free public ArcGIS account to create your submission.
• Make sure that your story or collection — and all the content within it (web maps and the layers they contain, other ArcGIS apps, etc.) — are published publicly. Suddenly getting a login prompt while reading a story is a big no-no. It’s highly recommended to test your story on in multiple browsers and even mobile devices to confirm.
• If you’ve already submitted an entry to the 2026 ArcGIS StoryMaps competition, you may not submit another one (this applies to organizations that are submitting, as well as individuals/groups).
• If you’re submitting to the student track and worked on your submission with a group, all story authors must also be students.

For all the fine print, you can read the rules in full here. Not following any of the submission requirements can be grounds for an entry not being accepted, so it cannot be stressed enough how important it is to get these little things right the first time.

How do winners get selected and what do they get?

Esri’s StoryMaps team will review eligible submissions  and select up to five finalists and three student finalists in each of the four categories. From those finalists, our guest judges will then choose one winner and one student winner in each category. (Check out this story to learn more about who the guest judges are.)

On top of that, there will be two special awards:

• The Community Choice Award will be determined via public vote of the finalists (this vote will be held from February 9 through March 9, 2027);
• The Storytelling With Maps Innovation Award will be selected by the ArcGIS Storytelling team from among the finalists based on who we feel most demonstrates excellence and creativity in using ArcGIS StoryMaps effectively, as well as integrating other Esri GIS products and applications into their story.

All winners will receive an official Esri certificate, get featured on the Esri website, social media platforms, and in an interview, and receive an award at Esri’s 2027 User Conference. Each winner may accept a voucher for an Esri Technical Certification Exam: one (1) per individual or two (2) per team. Each winner will also receive a printed copy of the Esri Press book The Power of Where by Jack Dangermond: one (1) per individual or two (2) per team.

What are the judges looking for?

And there it is, the million dollar question: What makes a story stand out amongst the hundreds of entries the ArcGIS StoryMaps competition typically receives? We’ve provided the judges with three deliberately broad criteria with which to examine each story:

• Overall design, impact, and originality
• Innovative use of GIS and the ArcGIS StoryMaps product
• Support of the competition and category theme

While we can’t speak for our judges and how they’ll ultimately approach their task, we can provide some advice and rules of thumb based on how we see the competition judging unfold year in and year out.

Overall design, impact, and originality

Stories should be well-written and well-organized, at a minimum, but here are a couple of ways to go above and beyond in creating a story that really stands out.

Be creative and thoughtful in your approach.

Whatever you’re covering in your story, we know you’re passionate about it, so let that passion shine through in a creative and memorable way. Remember that your audience likely doesn’t know nearly as much about the topic as you do, so take that into account as you’re constructing your narrative.

Sometimes, all it takes is an unorthodox approach to really pull readers in. Dear Diary, Adulting Just Got Too Expensive, one of the 2025 competition winners, uses comic book-like illustrations, colorful maps that look like they were drawn in crayon, and plenty of food metaphors to explain the demographic and economic concept of a “sandwich generation.” (Bonus content: The author talks about her approach to storytelling in this blog post.)

Don’t sleep on the visual language.

You could have an award-worthy story, full of impressive maps and GIS applications, with a captivating narrative to go along with them, but it may not make as much of an initial impression if the way the story looks is falling flat. We can tell when deliberate thought has been put into tying the story’s visual elements together in a cohesive way that adds to the overall storytelling experience, and it goes a long way toward elevating already-good stories.

It’s not coincidental that nearly every finalist in 2025 used a custom theme to complement their story content. Especially memorable was the Cobourg Heritage Atlas, where every visual element was carefully crafted and chosen to tie the whole story together into one coherent experience. The story’s color scheme, fonts, maps, and even separators all combine to evoke the feeling of actually paging through an old, printed atlas.

Innovative use of GIS and the ArcGIS StoryMaps product

This criteria focuses on how well the submission incorporates the geospatial element — not just through technical use of GIS applications and ArcGIS StoryMaps itself, but also in terms of how those technologies are actively used as narrative-building tools.

Show that you really know the story builder.

ArcGIS StoryMaps has not stopped growing as a product since it was released in 2019, with updates at least once a month to add more features and enhancements for storytellers to take advantage of. With so many options to choose from when building a story, however, it’s normal for some analysis paralysis to creep in. In our experience, the most exemplary stories all demonstrate that the storyteller has really gotten to know the ArcGIS StoryMaps builder.

And while it’s great to see all the different blocks put to good use, it’s clear when the use of those blocks has more of a “button-mashing” feel to it — throwing everything you can into a story just to prove that you can. It’s important to technically know how to use all the blocks, but it’s just as important to know when it makes the most sense to use each block in the context of your story. One of the 2025 student winners, The Migration of Humpback Whales, employs a wide variety of StoryMaps features, but it’s apparent that each serves a clear purpose, from a sidecar deployed in the slideshow layout to clever uses of the timeline block.

Integrate your GIS work — but be careful not to overwhelm.

We love when storytellers are excited to show off their GIS work in ArcGIS StoryMaps. But it’s important not to lose sight of your audience — unloading too much information, all at once can cause readers to lose interest in a story, no matter how important the subject matter. Too many maps crammed full of every atom of data can become more distracting than enlightening.

The 2025 competition’s Storytelling With Maps Innovation Award winner, Mapping Chattanooga’s Urban Forests, is a masterclass in relating cutting-edge GIS techniques and the data they uncovered in what feels like a breezy, easy-to-read story. Elements of the project are brought in only as needed, through basic swipe comparisons and simple charts. Only the final outcome of the effort, a map depicting heat risk index for different parts of Chattnooga, gives readers the opportunity to really sink their teeth into an interactive, data-rich map at the end of the story, without risking derailing their overall progress through the story. (And, it’s worth noting, the pop-ups in that map are conscientiously formatted so that readers aren’t left trying to parse a raw table of data fields.)

Support of the competition and category theme

Simply put, the judges need to see a clear approach in terms of what the submission is attempting to accomplish (besides just winning the competition), including a major takeaway or call to action. Then, there needs to be strong substance in support of that approach: evidence of thoughtful research, data analysis, and data visualization.

Cross your T’s and dot your I’s.

For the most part, this should be the easiest category to get right. We believe that everyone — and every place — has a story to tell, and those stories together all make up the immense tapestry that is our world. Whichever thread in that tapestry is the one you want to pull, there’s more than enough room for it in the ArcGIS StoryMaps competition.

First and foremost, make sure you’re following the competition rules when you submit your story (outlined earlier in this post). But beyond that, also make sure that you have permission to use all of the content in your story if that content doesn’t belong to you — and when you are using content that isn’t yours legally, it’s always good idea to provide accurate citations. Use of copyrighted material without permission can be disqualifying, so leave those movie GIFs at the door.

And remember, a lot of what separates a good story from a great story happens in the margins. Putting effort into giving your story a layer of polish can make a significant difference in the eyes of the judges, and it’s not hard to do! This blog post lists a number of things any storyteller can easily do to make their stories look and feel first-rate.

Above all else…

…have fun!

If you’re looking for more inspiration and guidance on building an exemplary story, once again, the competition home page is a good place to start. There, you’ll find galleries of previous winners so you can see the kinds of stories that have caught the judges’ attention in the past. Be creative and enthusiastic, and we can’t wait to see your stories in the submission inbox soon!