If your business delivered strong results, smart decisions, or real progress over the past year, this is your opportunity to put that work on the global stage because Symbol Awards 2026 has launched.

The new edition is now accepting entries across key business areas, giving large organizations, growing teams, and independent professionals the opportunity to become a symbol of excellence.

What’s new in Symbol Awards 2026

The 2026 edition introduces structural updates designed to make recognition flexible and more relevant for businesses that outperform across different areas.

New awards across key business areas

Symbol Awards 2026 includes a broader family of awards designed to reflect how businesses perform, grow, and compete:

• Creative Awards — Showcase strong work in marketing, advertising, branding, communication, and design, with a focus on ideas and execution that support brand visibility and positioning.
  
  
• Impact Awards — Recognize sustainability, ESG, CSR, and purpose-driven initiatives that demonstrate responsibility, long-term thinking, and real-world impact.
  
  
• Customer Excellence Awards — Focus on performance in sales, customer service, and customer experience, recognizing organizations that build strong relationships and consistent customer value.
  
  
• Innovation Awards — Celebrate business strategies, products, services, and ideas that improve how organizations operate, scale, or adapt in changing markets.
  
  
• Leadership Awards — Recognize leaders and teams whose vision, decision-making, and execution contribute to sustainable business performance.
  
  
• Employer Awards — Highlight workplace culture, employee experience, HR practices, and wellbeing initiatives that support engagement, retention, and long-term team success.

The category catalog has been expanded to reflect a wider range of business areas. This provides companies with more accurate ways to enter work that reflects their actual strengths.

The goal is simple — fewer compromises when choosing a category and better alignment between the work submitted and how it’s evaluated by the Symbol Awards jury.

Entry fees and registration timing

Symbol Awards 2026 uses a clear pricing structure based on the type of work you enter. More importantly, registration opens early to give you enough time to prepare and adjust your entries if needed.

• Core categories
• Standard categories
• Premium categories
• Grand Prix categories 

A 40% discount is available when registering a set of five entries in any category or categories.

Grand Prix categories

New Grand Prix categories are available in limited numbers for work that sets a clear standard in its field. These categories are designed for ideas and execution that go beyond strong delivery and establish a point of reference for others to follow.

Priority submission benefits

Entries submitted before March 26 come with added value for participants who plan ahead.  

• Personalized feedback to help you improve your entries 
• A €200 voucher for a trophy order for this edition of Symbol Awards
• The opportunity to carefully go through all the requirements, as compared to last-minute submissions

Full details on entry fees, registration periods, and category structure are available in the Symbol Awards Entry Kit.

Why enter Symbol Awards 2026?

Being part of the Symbol Awards winners is more than a title. It gives your business global recognition and proof you can use to stand out in competitive markets, and show what you’ve achieved.

As a winner, you receive tools that support visibility and growth. 

This includes:

• The option to order a custom trophy 
• Certificate of Excellence
• Digital seal for your website, email signature, ads, etc.
• PR materials provided for your use
• Promotional campaign of your work via our social media and other channels
• Points for any upcoming Symbol indexes 
• Universal recognition of your work

When it comes down to it, winning at Symbol Awards gives you proof you can point to. Proof that builds trust, opens doors, and strengthens how your business is perceived.

Ready to turn recognition into business growth?

If your business is driven by innovation and future-focused thinking, this is the moment to put your best work forward. Register now for Symbol Awards 2026 and strengthen your next move with third-party recognition.

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