Competition calendar 2025
Launching the 13th Edition of the International Chocolate Awards, we are proud to announce our calendar for the 2025 season. As dates and locations for some competitions are still being confirmed, please check our site regularly to make sure you don’t miss your regional competition. The judging will be partly in-person and partly remote, with samples sent to judges at home. Please refer to the individual competition announcements for more information.
Following our founding principle of transparency and focus on fine cacao, we relaunched all of our filled chocolate competitions as “Craft Chocolatier Competitions” in 2021-22. We want to celebrate and champion the chocolate makers and companies using cacao with an identifiable and traceable source. This change brings our chocolatier entries inline with our bean-to-bar competitions. You can read more about this move forward in our announcement here.
All winners of any of the regional competitions are eligible to enter our prestigious World Final and World Final Ceremony held later in 2025. We’re also proud to continue our Cacao Country Support competitions in Peru, Colombia, Mexico and Central America.
Origin Traceability
Following our founding principle of transparency and focus on fine cacao, we updated our traceability policy. We want to celebrate and champion the chocolate makers and companies using cacao with an identifiable and traceable source.
You can read more about this move forward here.
2025 Competition Calendar
- Craft Drinking Chocolate Competition
- Judging: 18-22 January
- In-person judging at SIGEP, Rimini, Italy
- Winners’ Announcement online (date to be confirmed)
- Italian/Mediterranean Craft Chocolatier Competition
- Open for registration: 1 February
- Closing date for samples: 27 February
- In-person judging: 1 – 4 March, Florence, Italy
- Winners’ announcement: 15 March, Florence, Italy
- WINNERS
- European, Middle Eastern and African Bean-to-Bar Competition
- open for registration: 1 March
- samples accepted: 10 March – 4 April
- remote judging: 10 – 30 April
- Winners’ announcement: 17 May, Bucharest, Romania
- WINNERS
- European Open Craft Chocolatier Competition (French, Benelux, Scandinavian, Eastern European)
- open for registration: 1 March
- samples accepted: 10 March – 4 April
- remote judging: 10 – 30 April
- Winners’ announcement: 17 May, Bucharest, Romania
- WINNERS
- DACH Craft Chocolatier Competition
- samples accepted: 7-30 Apr 2025
- remote judging: May 2025
- winners’ announcement online (June)
- Canadian Craft Chocolatier Competition
- samples accepted:
- winners’ announcement online
- WINNERS
- Asia-Pacific Bean-to-bar and Craft Chocolatier Competition
- Registration open: 8 February
- Samples accepted (all categories): 8 – 28 February
- Remote judging (all categories):
- Winners’ announcement in Bangkok, Thailand: 19 April
- WINNERS
- Americas /USA & Canada/- Bean-to-bar and Craft Chocolatier Competition
- Samples accepted: 11 March – 9 April
- remote judging
- Winners’ Announcement online (to be confirmed)
- Americas /Latin America & the Caribbean/ – Bean-to-bar and Craft Chocolatier Competition
- Samples accepted: 11 March – 9 April
- remote judging
- Winners’ Announcement online (to be confirmed)
- British Bean-to-Bar and Craft Chocolatier Competition
- samples accepted:
- winners’ announcement online
- WINNERS
- Perú – Cacao Country Support Competition
- June-July
- Winners’ announcement: Salon du Chocolat, Lima, Peru on 19th July
- Colombia – Cacao Country Support Competition
- to be confirmed
- to be confirmed
- WORLD FINAL
- October-November 2025 (tbc)
CLICK HERE to enter our professional site for Entrants and Judges
Last updated on: 05 June 2025
Which competition should you enter?
Which competition should you enter?
Because we are running our plain/origin and flavoured bean-to-bar chocolate competitions separately from our Craft Chocolatier Competitions, if you are a company that creates products relevant for both, you might not be sure which competitions you should enter your specific products to.
- Regional Craft Chocolatier Competitions accept and judge chocolate products made from couverture or the entrant’s own bean-to-bar chocolate, both having a clearly traceable source for the cacao used.
Product types accepted: filled chocolates, truffles, ganaches, pralines, caramels, fondants, enrobed fruits and nuts and spreads made from chocolate couverture or from the entrant’s own bean-to-bar chocolate, as well as flavoured chocolate bars made from chocolate couverture (but not bean-to-bar).
- Regional Craft Chocolatier Competitions accept and judge chocolate products made from couverture or the entrant’s own bean-to-bar chocolate, both having a clearly traceable source for the cacao used.
- Regional Bean-to-Bar Competitions accept and judge plain/origin chocolate bars and flavoured chocolate bars made from the entrant’s own bean-to-bar chocolate, all products having a clearly traceable source for the cacao used.
Product types accepted: (all bean-to-bar!) plain chocolate bars, single origin plain chocolate bars, flavoured chocolate bars, flavoured single origin chocolate bars.
- Regional Bean-to-Bar Competitions accept and judge plain/origin chocolate bars and flavoured chocolate bars made from the entrant’s own bean-to-bar chocolate, all products having a clearly traceable source for the cacao used.
As an example, a company creating bars and filled chocolates from their own bean-to-bar chocolate should therefore enter their plain/origin and flavoured bars to the relevant Regional Bean-to-Bar Competition (eg. Americas, European-Middle Eastern-African, Asia-Pacific) and their bonbons, dragées, spreads to the relevant Regional Craft Chocolatier Competition (eg. Americas, Canada, Eastern Europe, DACH, Asia-Pacific etc.).
Whereas, a company creating bars and filled chocolates from couverture, should enter all of their products to the relevant Regional Craft Chocolatier Competition.
We hope that this explanation makes it clearer where to enter your chocolate products. But if you are still unsure, feel free to contact us for further guidance.
We look forward to seeing many of our regular and also new entrants in their respective competitions and we wish all our entrants good luck!
CLICK HERE to enter our professional site for Entrants and Judges
