ESB – Eurasian Spelling Bee (Lexical Skill Competitions)
About the Eurasian Spelling Bee
The Eurasian Spelling Bee (ESB) was founded by ELPC Global LLC in 2020. The main sponsor of this prestigious competition is Gatehouse Awards, a UK-based awarding organisation specialising in English language qualifications and examinations.
The Gatehouse Awards team prepares the official exam materials and provides international certificates for ESB participants.
ESB is a prestigious Vocabulary and Spelling Competition that challenges students from Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East to strengthen their lexical skills. The competition is aligned with CEFR and is open to students aged 6 to 19 years.
The Eurasian Spelling Bee (ESB) test comprises four components: Writing, Listening, Brainstorm, and Oral assessments.
More than 20 countries are set to participate in Eurasian Spelling Bee (ESB), making it a truly global event.
Regional/international academic competition for English spelling
Structured in multiple levels:
Preliminary round → Semi-final round→ World Finals
Already held in several Eurasian countries with proven success
What is Eurasian Spelling Bee (ESB)?
A Fun and Inspiring English Spelling Competition for Students Aged 6–19.
The Eurasian Spelling Bee (ESB) is an international competition designed to promote lexical skills in the English language. It challenges students who are learning English as a foreign language from countries around the world, with a particular focus on spelling proficiency.
In line with the theme “Read to Succeed,” ESB encourages students to:
- Read more to understand the patterns and principles of English
- Expand their vocabulary and improve pronunciation
- Develop poise and communication skills under pressure
- Gain recognition on a national and international stage
The competition also :
- Highlights pressing literacy needs in schools.
- Equips teachers with effective English teaching strategies.
- Fosters friendship and intercultural understanding among students from both public and private schools worldwide.
Objective of Eurasian Spelling Bee
- Enhance students’ English vocabulary, spelling accuracy & confidence.
- Develop cognitive agility, memory, and presentation skills.
- Create global exposure and intercultural learning experiences.
Competition Gallery
Competition Rules and Guidelines
The competition is open to students studying in Grades 2 to 11 from countries around the world.
Exception:
- Students in Grade 1 are eligible to participate at the Grade 2 level.
- Students in Grade 12 are eligible to participate at the Grade 11 level.
The competition consists of two categories (Regular and Special) and six levels (Bee 1 to Bee 6) aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR).
Regular Category
Only students who attend public/state or private national schools and study English as a second or foreign language are eligible for the Regular Category.
Bilingual students are not eligible for the Regular Category. A student is considered bilingual if he or she:
Was born in, or has lived and attended school for at least three (3) years in an English-speaking country; or Lives in a non-English-speaking country but attends an English/American International school, Presidential school, or a school specialised in English language instruction.
If a student who meets the above definition of bilingual applies for the Regular Category through another school, ELPC Global reserves the right to disqualify the student from the competition.
Special Category
Bilingual students are only eligible to participate in the Special Category, which consists of five (5) levels. For further details regarding the Regular and Special Categories, please refer to Rule & Guideline 8.
The registration for the Competition opens on 5 January 2026 at 10:00 hours (local GMT) and closes no later than ten (10) days before the Preliminary Round examination in all participating countries.
The exact registration deadline for each participating country will be announced by the respective national coordinator. Any registration submitted before the opening date or after the closing date will not be accepted or included in the Competition.
The ELPC organisation accepts no responsibility or liability for any technical failure, malfunction, system error, server issue, service provider disruption, or any other problem that may result in a registration being lost, delayed, incomplete, or improperly submitted.
The competition will be run in three rounds: preliminary round, semi-final round and final round.
| Preliminary Round | Semi – Final Round | Final Round |
| Date * Exact exam date will be selected by national coordinator. * Online / Paper-based | Date * Exact exam date will be selected by national coordinator. * Online / Paper-based | Date * Paper-based |
| Country *Respective country | Country *Respective country | Country *To be confirmed |
| Task *Written, Listening, Brainstorm | Task *Written, Listening, Oral Spelling | Task *Written, Listening, Oral Spelling |
| Results *10 working days later | Results *10 working days later | Results *The day after the exam if paper-based |
No online competition will be conducted for the ESB 2026 World Finals. Participation in the World Finals requires physical attendance..
The dates stated above are tentative and may be subject to change due to exceptional or extreme circumstances in the respective participating countries. The Preliminary and Semi-Final rounds may be conducted in either online or paper-based formats, depending on the circumstances in each country. The country coordinators are responsible for determining the appropriate exam mode for the Preliminary and Semi-Final rounds.
If a paper-based exam is conducted, the venues for the Preliminary and Semi-Final rounds will be selected by the country coordinators in each participating country. For both the Preliminary and Semi-Final rounds: Task 1 (Written), Task 2 (Listening), and Task 3 (Brainstorm) will be administered by the school coordinators. Task 4 (Oral Spelling) in the Semi-Final round will be conducted under the responsibility of the local and national coordinators.
Selection Criteria for Semi-Finals and World Finals: The top twenty percent (20%) of participating students from each participating country will be invited to compete in the Semi-Final Round.
A minimum of ten (10) students per level from Bee 1 to Bee 6, from each participating country, will be invited to the World Finals, provided that the country meets the minimum participation requirement. If a country does not meet the required minimum number of participants, the number of students selected for the World Finals may be fewer than ten (10).
If a selected student declines participation in the World Finals, the next highest-scoring student(s) will be offered eligibility to participate in the World Finals in Tokyo, Japan. The number of semi-finalists and finalists may increase or decrease slightly depending on the total number of participants or cases of equal scores. Finalists will be selected based on their Semi-Final Round scores.
World Finals:
Accommodation will not be provided for World Finals participants. Students are required to arrange and book their own accommodation. The event organisers may assist with hotel bookings only if participants choose to stay at the official hotel where the examinations and events will be held.
Arrival date: To be informed (check-in the hotel and registration day)
Departure date: To be informed. Participants may choose to extend their stay beyond the Awards Ceremony, subject to personal travel plans and hotel availability.
- The Welcoming Ceremony will take place at 20:00 on To be informed at the official venue.
- The name of the hotel/venue will be announced after the Semi-Final results.
- Examinations: To be informed : Full-day examination from 09:00 to 18:00
- To be informed: Half-day examination from 09:00 to 15:00. All examinations will be conducted at the official exam venue, to be announced after the
Semi-Final results. - The Awards Ceremony and Gala Dinner will be held on To be informed at 20:00 in the ballroom of the official venue. The final results for all participants will be announced during this event.
- Exam Entry Fee: Students who qualify for the World Finals are required to pay a World Finals registration (exam entry) fee. The fee per enrolled student will be announced by the respective country coordinator.
- Gala Dinner & Awards Ceremony Entry Fee: Students and their accompanying persons are required to purchase entry tickets for the Gala Dinner and Awards Ceremony. Ticket fees for students and accompanying persons may differ. All ticket fees will be announced by the country coordinator. VIP guests will be invited to the Gala Dinner free of charge.
Force Majeure
In the event of force majeure, including but not limited to severe acts of nature or weather conditions such as floods, fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, or explosions, as well as war, acts of terrorism, epidemics, or other circumstances beyond reasonable control, the event and/or travel related to the Competition may be postponed until conditions improve. The final decision regarding postponement, rescheduling, or any other necessary measures shall be made solely by the ESB Organising Committee, based on a careful assessment of the prevailing circumstances.
Students may register individually or as part of a group through the national coordinator of their respective country. All student details must be entered accurately using Latin (English) letters only.
NB: Students are advised to contact their country coordinator for information regarding the registration fee. Cancellations are permitted only in cases of medical reasons. No refund of the registration fee will be issued unless a valid medical certificate is provided.
Students in the preliminary round will be given 4 (four) tasks (written text, written vocabulary, listening and brainstorm), and in the semi-final and final round 4 (four) tasks (written text, written vocabulary, listening and oral):
1) Task 1 Written – participants read the text and identify and correct 10 misspelled words (time allowed 10 minutes);
2) Task 2 Written – Bee Levels 1-2 – participants need to identify and correctly spell 10 words based on a picture and scrambled up letters. (time allowed 10 minutes); Bee Levels 3-6 – participants need to identify and correctly spell 10 words based on a definition and scrambled up
letters. (time allowed 10 minutes);
3) Task 3 Listening – participants listen to a short recording, read the text and complete 10 gaps with correct spelling of the words (approximate time 10 minutes);
4) Task 4 Brainstorm – this task is given only in the preliminary round. This task will be taken together with written and listening task at the same time. Participants need to think carefully and guess missing letters in 5 (five) words that are aligned to a certain topic, start with the first letter given, according to the definition, and number of words required will be given in the tasks. Only closed compound nouns (joined to form a single word, e.g., football, blackboard) are acceptable as a single word in this task while open compounds (spelled as two words, e.g., ice cream) and hyphenated compounds (two words joined by a hyphen, e.g., long-term) are not allowed. (time allowed 10 minutes)
5) Task 4 Oral – students will not take oral spelling exam in the preliminary round, and in the semi-final and final round each participant will be given five words to spell. However, there is an exception rule for the oral spelling exam in the final round, please read Rule 6 for further details. (time allowed: the spellers have total 1 minute to think and spell each word after the clear pronunciation and all information are given. The judges and pronouncer will not communicate with the speller during the final 30 seconds. The judges will disqualify any speller who does not provide a complete spelling before the expiration of time (0 seconds). If the judges and pronouncer need to discuss a competition-related matter while the speller is contemplating a word, they may pause the time clock, and they will inform the speller when they pause and resume the time clock. )
NB: For paper-based exam mode all the answers for written and listening tasks need to be transferred on to the answer sheet by the students. The scores for oral spelling task will be recorded by the invigilators. The answer sheets will be provided for each student during the exam.
| No | Round | Tasks | Remarks | ||
| 1 | Preliminary | Written | Listening | Oral/Brainstorm | The exam level for the semi-final round will be one Bee level higher than the one in the preliminary round, and will remain the same at the final round. Total: 80 points in the Preliminary round |
| Task 1 (3 points for each word correctly spelled – 10 questions, a total of 30 points) | Task 3 (2 points for each word correctly spelled – 10 questions, a total of 20 points) | Task 4 (Brainstorm) (2 points for each word correctly spelled – 5 questions, a total of 10 points) | |||
| Task 2 (2 points for each word correctly spelled – 10 questions, a total of 20 points) | |||||
| 2 | Semi-final | Task 1 / Task 2 as above | Task 3 as above | Task 4 (Oral) 1 correct word (6 points each) | Total: 100 points in the Semi-final round |
| 3 | Final | Task 1 / Task 2 as above | Task 3 as above | Task 4 (Oral) 1 correct word (6 points each) | Total: 100 points in the final round |
- The Judges and Pronouncers will be in complete charge of the contest. Their decision will be final in all questions. Any problem relating to the spelling of a word must be referred to the Judges immediately during the competition at the relevant stage. No complaints or appeals will be considered after the contest has ended.
- The judges listen carefully, determine whether or not words are spelled correctly, and uphold the rules. The decisions of the judges are final.
- Misunderstandings: The judges will not respond to the speller’s question(s) about the word and its pronunciation but, if the judges sense that the speller has misunderstood the word, the judges will direct the speller and pronouncer to interact until they are satisfied that reasonable attempts have been made to assist the speller in understanding the word within the time constraints outlined in Rule 4. It is sometimes impossible to detect a misunderstanding until a spelling error has been made, and the judges are not responsible for the speller’s misunderstanding.
- Pronouncer Errors: The judges compare the pronouncer’s pronunciation with the diacritical markings in the word list. If the judges feel that the pronouncer’s pronunciation does not match the pronunciation specified in the diacritical markings, the judges will direct the pronouncer to correct the error as soon as it is detected.
- Spellers are allowed to bring a note pad and pen or pencil to practise the words before the competition (for their use only), but the speller must then spell the word orally during the competition. Extra paper and pencil are not allowed.
- In competition, spellers may pronounce words before spelling, after spelling, or not at all. However, you are encouraged to pronounce the word BEFORE spelling to ensure that you heard the word correctly. For example, if you are given the word baseball and you spell baseballs, your spelling will be considered incorrect. Or, if you are given absence and you spell absent, your spelling will be considered incorrect. The speller may ask the pronouncer to say the word again, define it, use it in a sentence, provide the part of speech, provide the language(s) of origin and/or provide an alternate pronunciation or pronunciations.
- The pronouncer strives to pronounce words according to the diacritical markings in ESB word lists.
- The pronouncer responds to the speller’s requests for a definition, sentence, part of speech, language(s) of origin and alternate pronunciation(s) as listed in the competition word list produced by ESB. The pronouncer does not entertain root word questions, requests for alternate definitions or requests for slower pronunciation.
- Homonyms: If a word has one or more homonyms, the pronouncer indicates which word is to be spelled by defining the word.
- At any time, the speller may request that a word be re-pronounced, defined or used in a sentence, or they may ask for the part of speech or the language of origin. But the pronouncer shall grant the request(s) until the judges agree that the word has been made reasonably clear to the speller. The pronouncer will not syllabify (divide into syllables) the word.
- Once you begin to spell a word, you will not have a chance to change letters. A Once you begin to spell a word, you will not have a chance to change letters. A speller may repeat the word orally, provided letters and their sequence are not changed. The speller must indicate words with apostrophes, capitals and other punctuation marks, and any accent marks either over the letter or at the end of the word.
- Judges may disqualify any speller who ignores a request to start spelling the word within a reasonable time outline in Rule 5.
- Misunderstandings: The speller is responsible for any misunderstanding of the word unless (1) the pronouncer never provided a correct pronunciation; (2) the pronouncer provided incorrect information regarding the definition, part of speech, or language of origin; or (3) the speller correctly spelled a homonym of the word and the pronouncer failed to either offer a definition or distinguish the homonyms. When a speller is given the definition of a homonym, he or she must spell the word which is defined.When a speller fails to spell a word correctly after all additional assistance as permitted by the rules of the competition has been provided, and / or the maximum time has expired, they must drop out of the competition.
- The pronouncer will announce the correct spelling of the word and a greeter will assist the participant to take their seat. Another word shall be given to the next speller in line. The winner(s) will be announced during the Awards Ceremony accordingly.
- There is an element of chance in this contest. When only two spellers remain with equal points, the elimination procedure changes. At that point, when a speller misspells a word, the other speller will be given the opportunity to spell the other word. If the second speller spells the word correctly, the second speller will be declared the winner of Gold/Silver or Bronze medal. If both spellers misspell the same word, both will continue in the contest with a new word until the judges make final decision.
- In the event of a protest or dispute, decisions shall be based on “Oxford Dictionary of English” the official contest dictionary. No other source shall be allowed.
- To minimize disruptions during this competition we ask audience members to turn off cell phones and pagers.
- All participants will receive a Certificate of Participation for the Preliminary and Semi-Final rounds of the competition. The World finalists who achieve the highest points in each category will be awarded as follows:
World Champion
– 1st runner up
– 2nd runner up
– Merit award
ESB World Champions Trophy will be awarded to the students who hit the highest record.
All of the students who take the exam of world finals will be awarded with an internationally recognized certificate in English by Gatehouse Awards United Kingdom. Additional folders which contain memorable gifts, certificates of
participation & appreciation for all of the world finalists, teachers and coordinators will be awarded upon their arrival to the exam. The medals of being a finalist will be awarded on the stage to the students who do not win the top awards.
The number of medallists in certain levels may be increased if there is a high level of competition in the respective ESB categories.
In levels with a large number of participants at the World Finals, students may be divided into mini-groups to facilitate smooth administration.
Example: If there are more than 30 students in Bee 3, they may be split into Bee 3-A and Bee 3-B. This approach may also apply to other levels as needed.
The method of releasing results for students in mini-groups will be determined by the judges. Options include:
- splitting based on age groups within the same level, or keeping students in mini-groups if they are of approximately the same age, with grouping decided by the organizers.
- The organizers will select the most appropriate method for each situation to ensure fairness and clarity in awarding results.
Participants in both categories should be prepared to spell any random word from Bee 1 up to their current level.
Example: A speller in Bee 5 should be ready to spell words from Bee 1 to Bee 5. The Special Category is not available for Grade 11 and Grade 12 students. Participants in the Special Category are considered bilingual and will compete at one level higher than the Regular Category. Example: A Special Category student in Bee 2 will compete against Regular Category students in Bee 3. Results from both categories will be considered together for awarding purposes.
| Regular Category | Special category | ||
| Grade | Bee Level | Grade | Bee Level |
| 1-2 | Bee 1 | N/A | N/A |
| 3-4 | Bee 2 | 1-2 | Bee 2 |
| 5-6 | Bee 3 | 3-4 | Bee 3 |
| 7-8 | Bee 4 | 5-6 | Bee 4 |
| 9-10 | Bee 5 | 7-8 | Bee 5 |
| 11-12 | Bee 6 | 9-10 | Bee 6 |
Sample papers to practise are available to download on www.eurasianspellingbee.org For further info please contact us via email [email protected] .Exam papers including instructions for the preliminary and semi-final round will be delivered to the country coordinators 3-4 days before the competition date and need to stay closed until the exam start time. The exam papers including answer sheets need to be sent back to ELPC organisation within 4 working days. The materials delivered after this date will not be marked.