The Scripps National Spelling Bee celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2025 — and at this year's event, one speller was out for the title after finishing in second place in 2024.
Seventh-grader Faizan Zaki became the 2025 champion on Thursday night, making it through 20 full rounds of the historic competition of wits, then winning it all by spelling "éclaircissement."
Just one year prior, Zaki fell just short in National Harbor, Maryland, when he went into a historic spell-off with Bruhat Soma. In the 2024 event, Soma spelled 29 words correctly in 90 seconds, while Zaki spelled 20 words correctly.
However, the 13-year-old Zaki, who's from Dallas, Texas, took his spelling talents a step further this year by finishing on top. From "adytum" to "radicicolous," Zaki had plenty of tough words to work through at this year's national event — but in the end, he was the champion, securing the $50,000 prize.
The Sporting News tracked the results of the 2025 Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Scripps National Spelling Bee results
Thursday May 29
Faizan Zaki's winning word: éclaircissement
Spellers eliminated in Round 20 (incorrect word)
- Sarvadnya Kadam (Uaupés)
Spellers eliminated in Round 19 (incorrect word)
- Sarv Dharavane (eserine)
Spellers eliminated in Round 18 (incorrect word)
- No spellers eliminated. Because all three spellers misspelled in Round 18, they all remained alive for Round 19.
Spellers eliminated in Round 17 (incorrect word)
- Harini Murali (tekke)
- Brian Liu (kyah)
- Aishwarya Kallakuri (Keighley)
Spellers eliminated in Round 16 (incorrect word)
- No spellers eliminated
Spellers eliminated in Round 15 (incorrect word)
- No spellers eliminated
Spellers eliminated in Round 14 (incorrect word)
- No spellers eliminated
Spellers eliminated in Round 13 (incorrect word)
- Esha Marupudi (aromorphosis)
- Oliver Halkett (aurore)
Spellers eliminated in Round 12 (vocabulary question)
Akshaj Somisetty (What is an imbroglio?)
Spellers eliminated in Round 11 (incorrect word)
- No spellers eliminated
Wednesday May 28
Spellers eliminated in Round 10 (incorrect word)
- Lawrence Ye (tourill)
- Hannah Kuo (bromyrite)
- Ved Raju (ellestadite)
- Nathan Settevendemie (conessine)
- Zwe Spacetime (cocillana)
- Sree Vidya Siliveri (collochore)
- Adarsh Venkannagari (tibione)
- Brihasa Veduru (cardueline)
- Nargiza Muzhapaer (persis)
- Ethan Robert (Allobroges)
Spellers eliminated in Round 9 (incorrect word)
- Nikhil Sha (sodoku)
- Zachary Rara (ketupa)
- Lauren Merillana (rendzina)
- Ishaan Gupta (omoideum)
- Jay Nayak (rhigolene)
- Holden Good (Delsartian)
- Chilaka Ugobi (quindecim)
- Rujva Patel (Riemannian)
- Avinav Prem Anand (morillon)
- Vittal Krishnamurthy (guimbard)
- John Donato (cheyney)
- Vidula Kalathur (Coulommiers)
- Arnie Parat (tatpurusha)
- Isaac Cancio (choristate)
- Siyona Kandala (soukous)
- Declan Mallady (usucapio)
Spellers eliminated in Round 8 (vocabulary question)
- Aren Lee (What is a lacuna?)
- Nicasio David (Another word for blithesome is:)
- Yahya Mohammed (What is a basilisk?)
- Zach Yeager (What does it mean to inveigle someone?)
- Roshan Kaushik (Something described as frangible is capable of:)
Spellers eliminated in Round 7 (incorrect word)
- Sumukh Tirumalasetty (cathepsin)
- Ryan Sekera (cribellum)
- Charlie Huang (chapiter)
- Sara Daoud (spirketing)
- Beatriz Whitford-Rodriguez (euhemerism)
- Megan Barrientos (myelination)
- Sanvi Mandvekar (tubifacient)
- Emmaline Bushman (oxter)
- Sharon Hwang (insinuendo)
- Sach Akella (allophenic)
- Kushi Gottimukkala (spinnerular)
- Jayden Jiang (cassowary)
- Jane Ross (pensile)
- Swetank Bangaru (gyrencephalate)
- Avishka Dudala (voltinism)
- Shreyansh Zadoo (neoteny)
- Rory Grant (enduement)
Spellers eliminated in Round 6 (incorrect word)
- Aiden Meng (horopter)
- Victoria Li (ablegate)
- Blanche Li (taqueria)
- Hadi Abbasi (feracious)
- Cyleane Quansah (indirubin)
- Kavin Suriya Prakash (funis)
- Luke Noblezada (oriency)
- Gemma Kim (levigation)
- Izzy Canada (lumichrome)
- Leah Rini (fabella)
- Simran Sanders (arnica)
- Sariah Titus (paraclete)
- Tarini Nandakumar (culmen)
- Noah White (categorem)
- Caleb Giuoco (petiole)
- Nirav Nimbarte (genethliac)
Spellers eliminated in Round 5 (vocabulary question)
- Aarav Balani (Another word for decorum is:)
- Enzo Paylaga (Someone described as plucky is:)
- Shruthi Srinivasan (What does dross refer to?)
- Duaa Oznali (Something described as temporal:)
- Giovanni Adjei (If someone denounces something, they:)
- Leo Furlong (Something described as heterogeneous:)
- Yuva Peddireddy (If someone is described as fickle, they are:)
- Ananya Aggarwal (Something described as vapid is:)
- Rian Camty (Something described as taboo is:)
- Isaac Geremew (What is a cameo?)
- Anjali Agarwal (What is a tome?)
- Thevaan Butani (If something is flagrant, it is:)
- Zachary Teoh (Something described as manifold is marked by:)
- Shreeya Sivakumar (What would be the most likely setting for a dirge?)
- Viky Tanamala (Something described as sordid is:)
Spellers eliminated in Round 4 (incorrect word)
- Rithvi Balajee (gibbon)
- Arshan Shahriar (offal)
- Louis Avetis (marigolds)
- Navtaj Singh (subgum)
- Shruthi Ayyagari (coolth)
- Arya Bhavansikar (surtax)
- Margt Fieni (biorhythm)
- William Fuller (agnatic)
- Connor Norton (animalcule)
- Alejandro Martinez (keelblock)
- Nikita Ramakrishnan (illfare)
Tuesday, May 27
Spellers eliminated in Round 2 (vocabulary question)
- David Wang (What does reciprocity refer to?)
- Sonu Morali Mohan (Something described as vicarious is experienced:)
- Brighid Reid (What is an encomium?)
- Vishava Bharath (To blandish is:)
- Samuel Riley (What is a vanguard?)
- Naqeeb Hossain (Ebullience is:)
- James Granger (Someone described as quixotic tends to be:)
- Esme Filippo (What is jocularity?)
- Bindi Ray (An abstemious person is likely to:)
- Juliet Merrill (A schism is:)
- Minna Danzinger (What is a veneer?)
- Josslyn Hansen (A talisman is supposed to:)
- Will Henley (Someone described as sophomoric is:)
- Johannes Roxburgh (If something is described as kindred, it is:)
- Brett Kuprowicz (Something declamatory is:)
- Harper Cox (Which of the following would be called an iris?)
- Jacob Martonito (Someone described as ingenuous is:)
Spellers eliminated in Round 1 (incorrect word)
- Christopher Werito (huerta)
- Bria Curry (en arrière)
- Madison Gray (Hippolyta)
- Ike Sperling (koh-i-noor)
- Carolina Van Garsse (fracas)
- Abigail Adegbite (genet)
- Sophia Schoenrock (zortzico)
- Aiden Westover (loggia)
- Cecily Dean (espadrille)
- Gabriel Aguirre (ape-ape)
- Julia Kurien (uraeus)
- Parker Zimmerly (gelilah)
- Adele Gibbens (calabash)
- Josephine Frimpong (witch of Agnesi)
- Malek Youssri (Ardhamagadhi)
- Caroline Andrus (oud)
- Leya Ismail (korrigan)
- Aruuke Reyeva (cavalletti)
- Ainsley Gastmeier (kangri)
- Divya Choudhary (sannyasi)
- Zander Myers (sciatica)
- Eliza Schwass (Bartókian)
- Carter Peterson (ryas)
- Eli Schlosser (Terre Haute)
- Anya Stoll (alouatte)
- Natalie Linthicum (kiva)
- Reed Laursen (coulibiac)
- Olivia Lipiec (tichodrome)
- Antonella Guzman-Vazquez (Aramic)
- Blaze Blacketer (sprechstimme)
How to watch Spelling Bee 2025
- Dates: Wednesday, May 28-Thursday, May 29
- Times: 8-10 p.m. ET
- Channel: Ion TV
- Stream: Ion Plus, Fubo
The 2025 Scripps National Spelling Bee will be broadcast on ION TV on Wednesday, May 28, and Thursday, May 29 from 8-10 p.m. ET. The semifinals are on Wednesday, and the finals are on Thursday. The event can be streamed on Ion Plus or Fubo.
Fans can also watch the preliminaries on Tuesday, May 28 from 8 a.m. to 7:40 p.m. ET and the quarterfinals on Wednesday, May 29 from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET. Both of these rounds will be on Bounce XL, not national television.
Spelling Bee schedule 2025
The 2025 Spelling Bee extends across three days, beginning with preliminaries on Tuesday, May 28. Quarterfinals and semifinals will take place on Wednesday, May 29 and the finals will be on Thursday, May 30.
| Round | Date | Time (ET) | Channel | Stream |
| Preliminaries | Tuesday, May 28 | 8 a.m.-7:34 p.m. | N/A | ION Plus |
| Quarterfinals | Wednesday, May 29 | 8 a.m.-1 p.m. | N/A | ION Plus |
| Semifinals | Wednesday, May 29 | 8-10 p.m. | Ion TV | ION Plus, Fubo |
| Finals | Thursday, May 30 | 8-10 p.m. | Ion TV | ION Plus, Fubo |