Acrobatic performer pulling splits in the sky among jaw-dropping snaps shortlisted for Sony World Photography prize
THE stunning finalists for the Sony World Photography Awards have been revealed, including a stunning photo of an acrobat hanging from her hair while she did the splits.
The competition has celebrated the world’s most captivating images every year for nearly two decades.
And the 30 finalists have just been announced, alongside more than 65 preselected photographers.
Categories include natural world and wildlife, street photography, lifestyle, portraiture, landscape, object, movement, creative and architecture.
This year, 430,000 images from 200 countries were submitted.
Only one winner will be selected in each category and their work will be presented at Somerset House in London on April 16.
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A wider selection of images from the competition will be on display to the public from April 17 to May 5.
Colombian shortlist Luis Henry Agudelo Cano shows Roxana suspended in the air by her hair.
Roxana learned this incredible trick after ten years of training in the street circus.
Three German Shepherds with their owner, Michael, at the beach.
German photographer Hans-Juergen Burkard asked Michael about their “love of dogs” and then photographed their humorous interactions with their canine companions.
Award-winning Swedish photographer Marcus Westberg was selected for his photo of elephants wading through swamps.
South Sudan is home to a 20 million hectare wilderness area and the world’s largest animal migration – the Great Nile Migration.
A service member from Fort Riley, Kansas, USA, purchases a cold drink from a vending machine next to a stack of mannequins used for combat first aid training.
Fort Riley was a major training center during the Cold War, providing basic training to recruits from across the United States.
The image, titled Strange Love, was captured by Irish snapper Seamus Murphy.
Murphy is also responsible for the featured photo of a bride taking a smoke break on Patriarshy Bridge, Moscow, Russia.
In Ireland, Shane Hynan photographed a family’s land in County Kildare.
Beofhód, translated as “life under the turf” in Irish, announces the importance of peat bogs in Celtic culture.
New Zealand finalist Todd Antony photographed a battle scene of a Buskashi rider in Tajikistan.
Buzkashi – literally meaning “shooting a goat” in Persian – is an ancient and fierce sport in which players compete to grab the headless carcass of a goat.
An eastern black rhino moves through a forested river at night in Kenya’s Masai Mara National Reserve.
British finalist Will Burrard-Lucas set up a remote camera trap with the help of rhino rangers to get this stunning photo.
Shortlisted photography by American Sunita Mandal captured two polar bear cubs with their mother on Baffin Island, Canada.
For almost a month, the photographer worked with Inuit guides, traveling by sled and using long lenses at a respectful distance while the family rested, played, learned to hunt.
Passers-by photographed by Anita Pouchard Serra in her native Argentina as they watch capybaras eating grass by the side of the road.
Chinese finalist Chen Liang shows off the Yuqing Watchtower.
Most of the watchtowers in Jiangmen, China’s Guangdong province, were built between 1912 and 1949, during the Republic of China era.
These were public shelters and defensive fortresses built by Chinese living overseas and returning to their hometowns.
Finger of God, by American David Baxter, shows a superb image of a tornado in northwest Oklahoma.
Tornado Alley, which stretches from North Texas to Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and South Dakota, can produce some of the wildest weather on the planet.
Another stunning image from Baxter shows a UFO-like thunderstorm developing over the high plains of southern New Mexico.
The image was taken in 2025, one of the most intense storm seasons on record.
Former swimmer Delfina Pignatiello from Argentina filmed a group of women in a swimming pool using a waterproof camera.
Lights were placed outside the water to capture images of the national synchronized swimmers.
Frozen World shows the Icelandic highlands, the last day they were open before heavy snow closed the area for the season.
The images, produced by the Swedish Julia Mustonen-Dahlkvist, reveal the black volcanic desert covered by the first frosts, transforming the landscape into surfaces from another planet.
At the terminus of the Leones Glacier, freshly exposed polished rock was exposed for the first time.
The image, titled Standing on New Ground, was taken by British photographer Liam Man.
The image of Cap de Formentor taken by Briton Michael Blann shows the place where the upper end of the Serra de Tramuntana mountain range meets the Mediterranean in Mallorca, Spain.
The image is part of Blann’s series of photographs documenting the greatest cycling routes across the Alps, Pyrenees, Dolomites, Picos and Spanish Islands.
The selected image by Spaniard Borja Abargues, The River on the Verge of Collapse, shows the Buriganga River.
Once the lifeblood of Dhaka, the Buriganga now flows like a toxic artery through Bangladesh’s capital.
A photograph by Colombian Santiago Mesa shows the inked hands of Katherine, a member of the Comandos de la Frontera armed group.
The Comandos de la Frontera are part of the armed groups that control the territory and its vast cocaine trade.
Blowing Away the Blues, by South African snapper Sandile Ndlovu, shows members of the Mthwalume Brass Band posing for a photo.
With over 35 active members, the Mthwalume Brass Band is a vibrant pillar of community spirit in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
The group encourages talented young people to help them address issues such as drug and alcohol abuse and bullying.
