The Wildlife Photographer of the Year for 2025 has been revealed, along with the winners in the competition’s other categories.
South African photographer Wim van den Heever takes the main prize for his shot (see above).
Ghost Town Visitor shows showing a brown hyena visiting the skeletal remains of a long-abandoned diamond mining town in Kolmanskop, Namibia. It took Mr van den Heever a decade to get the single shot of the world’s rarest hyena, which are nocturnal and mainly solitary.
He used camera trap technology for the image, according to the Natural History Museum, London, which develops and produces Wildlife Photographer of the Year.
“How fitting that this photograph was made in a ghost town,” said Kathy Moran, Chair of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Jury. “You get a prickly feeling just looking at this image, and you know that you’re in this hyena’s realm.”
The winning photo was whittled down from a record-breaking 60,636 entries from 113 countries and territories.
The competition’s Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year goes to Italian photographer Andrea Dominizi, for his image After The Destruction, which captures habitat loss.
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Pic: Andrea Dominizi/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Framed against abandoned machinery, the image spotlights a longhorn beetle in the Lepini Mountains of central Italy, an area once logged for old beech trees.
The competition’s Impact Award, which recognises “a conservation success, a story of hope or positive change,” has gone to Brazilian photographer Fernando Faciole, for his image Orphan Of The Road – spotlighting an orphaned giant anteater pup following its caregiver after an evening feed at a rehabilitation centre.
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Pic: Fernando Faciole/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
All the winning photographs will be showcased in an exhibition at the Natural History Museum from Friday. Find out more here.
Here are the other winners in all categories:
Animals in their Environment
Shane Gross took this photo, called Like an Eel Out Of Water, in D’Arros Island, Amirante, Seychelles. It shows a peppered moray eel very much in its element hunting for carrion at low tide.
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Pic: Shane Gross/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Animal Portraits
Shadow Hunter by Italian Philipp Egger shows the orange glint of an eagle owl’s eyes and the evening light falling on its feathers.
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Pic: Philipp Egger/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Behaviour: Amphibians and Reptiles
Frolicking Frogs by Frenchman Quentin Martinez shows a gathering of lesser tree frogs in a breeding event in Kaw Mountain, French Guiana.
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Pic: Quentin Martine/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Behaviour: Birds
Synchronised Fishing by Qingrong Yang is a perfectly timed shot of a ladyfish snatching its prey from right under this little egret’s beak in Yundang Lake, Fujian Province, China.
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Pic: Qingrong Yang/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Behaviour: Invertebrates
This shot in Western Australia by Georgina Steytler, called Mad Hatterpillar, showcases the strange headgear of a gum-leaf skeletoniser caterpillar.
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Pic: Georgina Steytler/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Behaviour: Mammals
Cat Amongst The Flamingos by Dennis Stogsdill shows a caracal hunting a lesser flamingo in the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania.
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Pic: Dennis Stogsdill/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Oceans: The Bigger Picture
Audun Rikardsen witnesses feeding time around an Atlantic fishing vessel during a polar night in northern Norway in his photo, The Feast.
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Pic: Audun Rikardsen/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Natural Artistry
Simone Baumeister shows an orb weaver spider on its web on a pedestrian bridge, silhouetted by lights from the cars below in Ibbenbüren in Germany.
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Pic: Simone Baumeister/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Underwater
Survival Purse by Ralph Pace illuminates the egg case of a swell shark, tethered to the base of a giant kelp, in Monterey Bay, California.
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Pic: Ralph Pace/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Plants and Fungi
In this photo, called Deadly Allure, Chien Lee uses a UV torch to reveal the fluorescent world of an insect-attracting pitcher plant in the city of Kuching in Malaysia.
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Pic: Chien Lee/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Portfolio Award
Alexey Kharitonov, a self-taught photographer, won the Portfolio Award for a number of photos taken during his artistic exploration of remote regions in the Russian North, Siberia, and Asia.
The image below, called Eye Of The Tundra, shows a 30-metre-wide thermokarst lake.
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Pic: Alexey Kharitono/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Photojournalist Story Award
In a series of photos, Spanish photographer Javier Aznar González de Rueda explored the complex relationship between humans and rattlesnakes across the US.
This photo, labelled From Venom To Medicine, shows drops of deadly venom dripping into a glass as an eastern diamondback rattlesnake is milked, before the drops are used to produce antivenom that has the potential to treat medical conditions.
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Pic: Javier Aznar Gonzalez de Rueda/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Photojournalism
Jon A Juárez won this for documenting ground-breaking science used in Kenya to save the northern white rhino from extinction through in vitro fertilisation (IVF).
This southern white rhino foetus, which did not survive due to an infection, was the result of the first successful rhino embryo transfer into a surrogate mother through IVF. The photo is aptly called How To Save A Species.
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Pic: Jon A Juarez/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Wetlands: The Bigger Picture
German photographer Sebastian Frölich finds a springtail among a galaxy of neon green gas bubbles in Austrian moorlands for this photo, named Vanishing Pond.
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Pic: Sebastian Frolic/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Rising Star Award
Luca Lorenz won the award with some of his dark, atmospheric explorations of wildlife in his native Germany.
This one, called Sole Survivor, shows a Eurasian pygmy owl looking out for its chicks after its mate disappeared.
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Pic: Luca Lorenz/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
10 Years and Under
Jamie Smart took this photo of an orb weaver spider inside its silken retreat on a cold September morning in mid-Wales, keeping the spider perfectly lit and symmetrically framed as she manually focused her camera. It’s called Caught In The Headlights.
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Pic: Jamie Smart//Wildlife Photographer of the Year
11-14 Years
French youngster Lubin Godin finds himself in mist-shrouded mountains with silhouetted ibex in this photo, called Alpine Dawn.
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Pic: Lubin Godin//Wildlife Photographer of the Year