Every year, elegant shots of gliding whales and prowling tigers wow the world. But one competition is brave enough to take a stand against the tyranny of animals looking impressive. The Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards platforms animals making stupid expressions, sitting in weird ways, and having bad hair days.
Entry into the 2025 competition is free, and open until June 30. But select entries were shared with Popular Science — and with over 1,000 more already submitted, it’s clear 2025 will be a great year for animals being silly.
You don’t look as suave as you think
One subset of these photos features animals engaged in normal behavior, such as running and diving. But the timing of the photographs highlights the dorky positions in which we all find ourselves during routine moments. Especially when we’re penguins.
Penguins rarely manage to look noble, but even so, they don’t often look like they’re queuing up to do head cannonballs into the water. Photo: Martin Schmid/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
Fix your ears, young lady. Photo: Jeremy Duvekot/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
What’s that on your head?
Another staple of the Wildlife Comedy Awards is animals with things on their heads that definitely shouldn’t be on their heads. From other animals hitching a ride to make-shift hats and hairdos, the new photos have got you covered.
Social media sets impossible beauty standards for women. How can anyone compete with this rhino and her glorious up-do? Photo: Yann Chauvette/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
Somehow, I feel the little lava lizard holds the real power in this relationship. Photo: Rachelle Mackintosh/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
Hey, leave that to humans…
Douglas Adams, author of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, posited that there were at least two species on Earth more intelligent than humans (dolphins and — well, the other is a spoiler). But some of the 2025 Wildlife Comedy photos suggest other species are working their way up the ladder as well…
Next thing you know, these two will have figured out how to belay. Photo: Bhargava Srivari/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
How many children are these two planning to have? Photo: Brian Hempstead/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
That was my bad angle, can you retake it?
No collection of funny animal photos would be complete without this old classic. Sometimes animals look majestic right until you see the expression they were making when you snapped the photo.
Admittedly, mudskippers were probably never majestic in the first place.
I suspect the existence of mudskippers to be a CIA psy-op, but I haven’t figured out what the point would be. Photo: Emma Parker/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
You, I expected better from. Photo: Annette Kirby/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2025
For words from the competition’s founder and the original photo captions, head on over to Popular Science.
