Now in its 12th year, the annual Nikon Comedy Wildlife Awards has announced the finalists for its 2026 competition, with the shortlist spanning 40 individual finalists, three under 16 finalists, four portfolio finalists and nine video finalists. Alongside the awards, a free exhibition showing the work of the finalists will take place at Gallery@Oxo in London from December 9–13. A related exhibition of past Comedy Wildlife award winners is also currently on in London at Frameless running until January 2027. The overall winner, category winners and Highly Commended entries will be announced at an awards ceremony in London on December 8, 2026.

The competition attracted more than 10,000 entries from 112 countries, its highest number of submissions to date. The prizes are generous and exciting. The overall winner will receive a safari with Alex Walker’s Serian in Kenya’s Masai Mara, while other prizes include Nikon’s Z6III and Z50II cameras, the new Nikon ZR and photography equipment from Nikon and ThinkTANK.

The shortlisted photographs range from a caiman sporting what appears to be a wig and a leopard seemingly performing a handstand to a white-tailed eagle caught mid-strut and a polar bear appearing to converse with a seagull. The shortlist also includes nine video entries, four portfolios and three under 16 submissions from young photographers.

Founded in 2015 by professional wildlife photographers Paul Joynson-Hicks MBE and Tom Sullam, the awards combine wildlife photography with humor as a way of encouraging greater engagement with conservation. The competition supports a different conservation organization each year and, in 2026, is working with the Born Free Foundation , which focuses on protecting wild animals and threatened species and their habitats.

“The Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards started very gently, somewhere out on the vast plains of the Serengeti,” says co-founder Tom Sullam. He says the competition has grown from a small conservation-focused project into a global awards program, using humor to encourage empathy toward wildlife and, ultimately, behavioral change.

The 2026 judging panel includes new members Roma Wells, Will Fortescue, Jamie Smart and Stuart Goldsmith. They join returning judges including Kate Humble, Hugh Dennis, Cameron Whitnall, Hannah Stitfall, Roxy Hemadani, Will Burrard-Lucas, Daisy Gilardini and Will Travers OBE. Nikon Europe Senior General Manager Marketing Stefan Maier says the record number of entries demonstrates the competition’s growing reach, while also highlighting the importance of wildlife conservation.

Among the 40 individual finalists, Andy Parkinson (UK) has been shortlisted for “Hercules the Baboon” a portrait of an infant olive baboon who seems to be incredibly strong by holding an adult above his head in Mara North Conservancy, Kenya. “ Sexy Mantis” by Diego Perez (Peru) was photographed during a night walk in Camanti, Cusco, Peru. A tiny green mantis peeks over a leaf in the proposed Bosques del Araza Regional Conservation Area, creating a humorous illusion as its hidden hind legs make its oversized forelegs appear almost human. Jan Wittmer’s (Germany) “Angry Bird” was captured on a photo trip to Germany’s Helgoland island where the photographer captured Europe’s smallest bird, a goldcrest, at ground level just as it stopped searching for food and looked directly into the camera.

The three finalists in the under sixteen category included Phiané Oosthuizen, (South Africa) who captured a photograph of a Southern Double-Collared Sunbird (Cinnyris chalybeus) at Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in Cape Town, South Africa. Matei Maracineanu (Romania) “Walking to school at 7 AM in winter” featured a crow stepping onto thin ice suddenly flaring its wings and tail as it struggled to keep its balance, striking a pose familiar to anyone who has ever slipped on black ice. On a sweltering day near Rayleigh, Essex, the third finalistJack Brackley photographed a red fox sitting in tall grass and appearing to laugh as Brackley and his father waited nearby in a hide.

Among the four portfolio finalists, on Maligne Lake in Alberta, Canada, Alexander Hormann photographed a female moose emerging from the water, capturing a sequence that appears to show her developing a runny nose, sneezing and ending with a broad grin. In Zambia’s South Luangwa National Park, Jeremy Richards captured an African bullfrog being pummeled from a rain-filled mating pool by a larger rival after heavy rains brought the frogs out of their burrows. In Crowdy Bay National Park, Australia, Heather Smith photographed a kangaroo joey with an expression resembling a child caught with its hand in the cookie jar during a playful interaction with its mother. During the March ice thaw in La Crosse, Wisconsin, Curt Lundeen captured a bald eagle attempting to steal another’s catch, with four frames showing the victim’s rapid transformation from shock and panic to outrage and defeat.

Frameless gallery in London is presenting 91 photographs from past winners of the Nikon Comedy Wildlife Awards as a fully immersive experience. Rather than viewing the images as conventional prints, visitors encounter the photographs at large scale across FRAMELESS’s projection spaces, with the wildlife scenes surrounding them and spatial sound adding to the sense of being inside each environment.

The exhibition brings together highlights from the awards since their launch in 2015, placing humorous wildlife moments within the landscapes where they were originally photographed. Designed for all ages, the presentation transforms the competition’s photography into an audiovisual experience.

And at the Oxo Tower on London’s southbank a free exhibition showing the work of the 2026 finalists will take place at Gallery@Oxo in London from December 9–13.