Submissions for the 2026 anthology are now CLOSED.
Our next submission window will be open from
1 December 2026 – 15 February 2027
The 2027 theme and guest editor will be announced soon!
2026 Theme
The theme for this year’s anthology is BRIDGES. What does the theme mean to you? Burning bridges, crossing over from one place/time/event to another, a bridge in music, or a visit to the dentist? Or does it conjure up a person with that name, a feat of engineering, or part of a ship? There are so many possibilities with this theme, including lots we haven’t mentioned, so we hope you have fun with it and bring us something original and brilliant.
Feel free to interpret the theme however you wish, in 500 words or fewer. Selected flashes will be published in National Flash Fiction Day’s 15th Annual Anthology. Payment is one contributor’s copy of the anthology.
This year’s anthology will be edited by Karen Jones and Sharon Telfer. You can read more about them here.
All selected pieces will be considered for one of two Editor’s Choice Awards. The 2026 editors will each select one piece from the accepted stories to receive a £50 prize.
Submission Guidelines
Please submit work via Duosuma, our submission manager, between 1 December 2026 (00:01 GMT) and 15 February 2027 (23:59 GMT).
The Fine Print
We do accept simultaneous submissions for the National Flash Fiction Day anthology. If your story is published elsewhere, please withdraw your anthology submission immediately by informing us via email.
We only accept unpublished work. We do not class stories posted on private blogs, social media pages, or online groups (such as in workshopping forums, online courses etc.), as previously published. Stories published on public blogs or social media are ineligible.
Submissions are open internationally. Although we anonymise submissions, we actively encourage submissions by writers from underrepresented groups, such as BAME, LGBTQ+, and disabled writers.
All authors who have a story accepted for the anthology will receive a free print copy upon publication.
We cannot accept stories that include copyrighted song lyrics. Please do not send us work with lyrics unless those lyrics are clearly in the public domain.
Please do not send us AI-generated work; at present, we are only considering original work written by humans.
Rights
National Flash Fiction Day require non-exclusive first publication rights and incidental promotional rights. National Flash Fiction Day retains the unrestricted right to publish selected stories in its anthologies, in print and online, and in any relevant promotional material, and will retain copyright and economic rights for the anthology as a whole.
All rights for individual stories revert back to their respective author upon publication.
The author is free to republish their work, either in part, as a whole, or in an altered form, wherever they like after National Flash Fiction Day have published the anthology.
If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact us via email with “RIGHTS” in the subject line: nationalflashfictionday@gmail.com
Please note that submission of work by an author to the National Flash Fiction Day Anthology shall be considered acceptance of the full guidelines above.
Data Collection
We collect your name and email for the purpose of informing you about the status of your submission. If your story is accepted, we collect your name, email and address for the purpose of sending you your contributor’s copy of the anthology, and for nominating work to writing awards (such as Best Small Fictions and the Pushcart Prize). For some award nominations, we are required to pass your email address along to the publisher. If you would prefer us not to do this, please mention this when you submit your work so that we don’t consider your piece for an award that requires us to pass along your details.
Additional Support
With projects like this, breaking even is always a challenge.
We would like to keep submissions free, but to do so, we need your support. If you are in the position to do so, please consider buying a book from our back catalogue or donating a small amount via the PayPal link below or via Duosuma when you submit to help keep this project going.
If you would like to help in other ways, please email us: nationalflashfictionday@gmail.com.
Thank you for your support.