Well….we could not be MORE EXCITED than to annouce information on the 2026 National Homebrew Competition (NHC). Registration is open Feb. 3, 10 AM MT through Feb. 25, 8 AM MT.
AHA’s NHC is the world’s largest, longest running and most competitive beer, mead and cider competition. 2026 will be NHC’s 47th year and it is comprised of 11 different events. 9 First Round judging locations, Final Round judging and the Awards Ceremony during Homebrew Con in Asheville, NC.
Are you limited to entering a single first round site, or can you send entries to various sites. Might want to do this if you have an entry that needs more time and you need to delay to a later judging site or you have an entry that does better in a specific region of the country.
Hello Michael. This is from Charlie and Jen our mighty NHC Competition Chairs regarding multiple locations: Entrants may ship entries to multiple first-round sites. The phrase “select their First Round judging site” refers to the selection process during registration, not a limit on the number of sites an entrant can use. The “first-come, first-served” language addresses site capacity constraints - sites may fill up based on when entries are confirmed. However, entrants should not send identical beers to multiple sites (which would create potential issues if the same beer advanced from different locations) and that is also mentioned in the rules.
The rules state that you will be disqualified for:
“Any identifying marks on bottles, cans, or caps, including labels, tape, or markers”
But it is also stated to tape…. the label… on the bottle.
Other comps allow a black marker to black out anything on the cap. Is this allowed?
“All packages must have “Attn: 2026 NHC” clearly listed on the outside when delivered. All individual bottles or cans must be labeled “HOMEMADE PRODUCT FOR COMPETITION.” These labels are required by law on each entry container and may also be printed on the outside of the shipping box.”
Will the “HOMEMADE PRODUCT FOR COMPETITION.” be included in the BAP label, or do we need to make our own label to attach with this? And Should these be taped on or rubber band?
Can I get some clarification on rules around attaching labels and markings on caps?
The rules state multiple times that packing tape is preferred and rubber bands aren’t sufficient. This is one of the first times Ive seen this from a comp. I know that if labels come off that’s on us, but really no rubber bands?
Also a rule there says that marker on caps is disqualifying. Many of us write on our caps when bottling and black out writing with a marker. Is any marker disqualifying?
Follow up question to Dan’s question: Is the 10 entries the limit for the ENTIRE competition or is it just 10 entries per 1st round location?? In other words, if someone had 90 entries (oh, their poor spouse), they could theoretically drop a mortgage payment and enter 10 different entries to each of the 9 sites.
Dan, you can absolutely mark through identifying marks on your cap with a marker. Rubberbands are preferred this year as the BAP labels will be such that entries do not need to be relabeled. Tape secures the labels in ways that rubber bands cannot as sometimes they break or slip off. If you prefer rubber bands you can continue without risking disqualification.
Thanks for the responses, Charlie! Re: 10 entry limit - is there a chance that will be raised if you don’t hit your entry limit? And if so, do you know when that would be? FWIW - last year there was no limit and the competition didn’t fill up.
I know there are a number of us out here who have >10 entries we had been preparing for this year’s comp, so that limit came as a bit of a surprise.
Dan, I also sincerely hope they increase/remove the limit as I also have more than 10 to submit having spent the last several months brewing…mostly for CoA, but definitely with an eye towards NHC.
I pulled the numbers from last year. Total entries in 2025 was 2947 across six sites for an average of 491 entries per site. This year, AHA has added three more sites (super awesome, BTW!) with a limit of 750 entries per site. That’s a maximum throughput of 6750 entries…that is more than double what was entered last year when there was no limit. Projecting an overall reduction in entries (if the more proficient brewers remain capped), I’m guessing each of the nine sites will have about 300 entries each…and that’s going to create a lot of low-population tables. Especially for some of the lesser-brewed categories.
If they decide to keep the cap in place for a couple of weeks to make sure everyone gets a chance to enter at the location most convenient for them (and then lift the cap), I’m 100% in favor of that.
Nice job pulling the numbers and putting some context around what the 10 entry cap might mean.
Raising entry limit if you haven’t filled is common enough, for sure. However, I’ll just note that:
Comps usually publish that they’ll do that ahead of time and provide a timeline for when that will happen.
We are already opening this up very close to the shipping timeline for many sites, so raising limits too far down the road could create some issues for folks. E.g., there are still one or two things I (or others) might think to brew if we knew the limit was going to be higher.
Yes, blacking out identifying marks on the cap is fine (and standard).
Regarding labels, BAP competition software gives organizers the option of selecting anonymized labels for shipping, so there is no need to strip off the shipped label and replace it with another, anonymous label. Normally, competitions do not want labels taped, because the comp has to remove the label and tape makes that hard and tedious. But at the NHC, we want the labels taped as they are more secure than rubber bands and we won’t be needing to replace the label.
What about this secondary label? Should this be taped? Rubber banded? BAP labels are large to begin with and will require a couple passes with shipping tape to attach. And this is a new requirement. I have never had to include this on any other competition. The closet thing is for Bluebonnet in Texas that require the inclusion of a Bill of Lading.
There is also mention of adding the “HOMEMADE PRODUCT FOR COMPETITION.” to the outside of the shipping box, this seems like a very poor suggestion, making it more like to have your box destroyed by the shipper.
Michael, rubber banding is fine, the decision about adding taping language came from above my pay grade. From time immemorial, rubber banding has worked for affixing labels and I think it iwll work for this. If you want to tape though, it is fine and probably preferable, unlike most competitions which outright ban taping of labels.
As for the outside of the shipping box, I wouldn’t put anything about beer or yeast or anything like that, but I don’t thjink the suggestion of “homemade product for competition” will encourage someone to steal it. I also have never had any issue with UPS delivering my homebrewed beers with nothing on the outside other than the address.
Regarding the questions about entry limits: “A 10-entry limit, per location, was put into place to support maximum participation across the entire membership. Each First Round location will automatically limit entrants to no more than 10 per and attempts to enter more than 10 are rejected by the system. We are mindful of serving the membership and will explore this topic for future years as we look to continuously improve."
Hello Julia, I just renewed my membership on 1/31/26 and was trying to register some entries today along with volunteering as a judge. I was able to register to judge with no problem but cannot register my entries as it keeps saying “participant has an invalid value for the field AHA Member Number”. I spoke to Sandy and she mentioned it may be a delay in the AHA sending updated information to BAP. I’ll try again tomorrow but wanted you to know in case others have the same issue.
