The Innovative Storytelling Award recognizes digital journalism of the highest quality that re-invents the way stories are told. Judges take into consideration the originality of the nominated presentation, how re-imagined delivery vehicles enhanced the audience’s understanding of the underlying journalism, and creativity in applying tools or technologies.
The award is open to any U.S. journalist or U.S. news organization. A vendor or technology partner may apply if submitted jointly with a news organization. The award includes a cash prize of $5,000.
There is a maximum of 2 entries allowed per news organization.
The Associated Press has won the 2025 Innovative Storytelling Award from the National Press Foundation for its visual feature on the flurry of push alerts from the first 100 days in office of the second Trump administration.
Journalists Humera Lodhi, Maya Sweedler, Sara Burnett and Linda Gorman produced the project illustrated by Annie Ng.
The interactive presentation color codes the alerts by type of news, including direct action taken by the administration, lawsuits or other opposition actions, court reversals, and public reaction or fallout. Alerts are also visually grouped by topics such as federal cuts, foreign policy, tariffs, and immigration.
“This was a creative way to make sense of a time when the public was being bombarded with an overwhelming amount of information in the modern medium of push alerts,” said the NPF judges. “By pulling everything together and providing much-needed context to this tumultuous period, this project demonstrates innovative storytelling at its best.”
The New York Times has won the 2024 Innovative Storytelling Award from the National Press Foundation for its hour-by-hour reconstruction of the Lahaina fire on Maui.
The feature was created by Mike Baker, Malika Khurana, K.K. Rebecca Lai, Riley Mellen, Natalie Reneau, Bedel Saget, Elena Shao, Anjali Singhvi and Charlie Smart.
NPF judges said the story showcased the best of innovative journalism by applying a breadth of technology to create a multi-dimensional digital story that carefully explained in acute detail how the tragedy unfolded.
The Washington Post won the 2023 Innovative Storytelling Award for “The Blast Effect” – an immersive series showing how bullets from an AR-15 eviscerate human tissue and organs. The series was created by N. Kirkpatrick, Atthar Mirza, Manuel Canales, Ronald Paniagua, Aadit Tambe, Anna Lefkowitz, Rekha Tenjarla, Madison Walls, Ann Gerhart, Peter Wallsten, Chiqui Esteban and Wendy Galietta.
