Welcome to the Type Directors Club’s 73rd Competition. Founded in 1946, TDC has been a beacon of typographic achievement for eight decades, recognizing outstanding work across communication design, type design, and lettering.

The TDC Competition celebrates the vitality of typography—not as a static discipline but as a living conversation between form, function, and cultural moment.

Whether you’re an audacious street stylist or an old-world maestro, we want to see your work! Brand practitioners, letterers, logo designers, graffiti artists, sign painters … if you have a passion for letterforms, be bold and show us what you’ve got!

Social media likes are easy to come by, but real acclaim comes from meaningful expertise. TDC recognition is fueled by a deep community of highly qualified type-brainiacs. This expertise is bolstered by our dazzling TDC Advisory Board and the Jury Presidents who oversee each discipline.

Entering TDC offers the chance of meaningful recognition that can elevate your career, bolster your business, and win you professional credibility. Enter now to claim your chance at being part of The Best Typography in the World.

Clearer Categories

This year, we clarified the categories within each discipline, including simpler category names and examples of what kinds of work can fit each category.

More Specific Writing Systems

TDC entrants can now specify all the writing systems used in their entries, allowing them to more accurately represent the languages/writing systems that they used, and allowing TDC to provide a jury better targeted to support those systems.

Every winning entrant stands tall among the world’s best typographic practitioners. But even within this lofty cohort, some works stand above the rest. So last year, TDC introduced the Type-High award in Gold, Silver, and Bronze. This special award recognizes the best of the best in each discipline.

Entering TDC offers the chance of meaningful recognition that can elevate your career, bolster your business, and win you professional credibility. Enter now to claim your chance at being part of The Best Typography in the World.

Read more about our awards

Communication Design

The Communication Design discipline is for any creation that uses type, lettering, or written language—be it print design, digital design, immersive experiences, architecture, fashion, film titles, social media campaigns, or otherwise.

Entries can contain any kind of design element, but the dominant element of the design should be typographic. We have included examples in the entry Categories to help you determine where your work fits best.

Expanded Physical Entry List

We’ve greatly expanded the options for physical entries (Communication Design only!). Just about any physical object that incorporates type in a meaningful way can be entered. See Categories for more information, but here’s a short list:

Analog Typesetting, Apparel, Jewelry / Accessories, Board Games / Cards, Booklets / Brochures / Catalogs / Menus, Calendars / Diaries / Journals, Fabricated Products: Fabric, Housewares + Homegoods, Album Packaging (LP, CD, Cassette), Product Packaging, Posters, Books, Graphic Novels / Comics, Magazines, Newspapers, Zines and other Self-Published items, Sports Team Apparel / Equipment / Hardware, Stationery / Invitations / Announcements

Lettering

Lettering is for work where the letters are either modified or created—this could entail traditional or abstract calligraphy, graffiti, tattoos, wordmarks and custom logotypes, or typefaces that are just a little too out there to be classic typeface design.

Type Design

The Type Design discipline is for entries showcasing the design of workable font software; this could mean single typefaces, type families, emoji or symbol fonts, or software for generating and creating type.