26 Remarkable Winning Photos from the 2025 BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition

The 2025 BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition has once again delivered an awe-inspiring collection of images that celebrate the beauty, diversity, and fragility of our planet. Announced on June 15 in honor of Nature Photography Day, this year’s winners were selected from over 8,000 submissions spanning nearly 60 countries. Organized by the California Academy of Sciences, the competition is now in its 12th year and continues its mission to “inspire awe and conservation through powerful imagery.”

Photo by: Talia Nicole Greis

The competition features seven categories—Photo Story; Aquatic Life; Art of Nature; Winged Life; Terrestrial Wildlife; Human/Nature; and Landscapes, Waterscapes, and Flora. Each category honors a winner and six finalists, while the overall Grand Prize recognizes an image that captures the essence of our natural world in a truly unforgettable way. A People’s Choice Award will also be announced after public voting from July 1 to July 31.

This year’s jury was composed of leading voices in wildlife and conservation photography, including Suzi Eszterhas, Sophie Stafford, Fernando Faciole, Britta Jaschinski, Anthony Ochieng Onyango, Peter Mather, and Aishwarya Sridhar. Their careful selection showcases not only technical brilliance but also emotional depth and ecological importance.

From haunting underwater shots and surreal landscapes to intimate wildlife moments, the winning photos serve as a powerful reminder of what’s at stake in the fight to protect Earth’s biodiversity. They reflect both the grandeur and the vulnerability of the natural world, urging us to see it with new eyes—and act with greater care.

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#1. Grand Prize Winner: "Lemur’s Tough Life" by Donglin Zhou, China

"Tsingy de Bemaraha Strict Nature Reserve, Madagascar – A Common brown lemur (Eulemur fulvus) carries her baby on her back while making a harrowing leap from one towering cliffside to another. This remarkable image was captured after a day of persistence on the photographer’s part—hiking an hour through rugged limestone terrain to her position. Only after waiting until the early evening did her patience pay off when this plucky primate emerged onto the scene, likely leading the troop in search of food. Ordinarily Brown lemurs have no set dominance hierarchy, with groups composed of males and females, old and young alike, but it appeared clear to this photographer that the focal lemur was the leader of the pack. This daring lemur navigated her group deftly through the sharp peaks and crevices of the stone forest, resulting in the immortalization of this once-in-a-lifetime leap."