ShelfEvidentBaillie Gifford Prize
2025 Winner
Complete History
2020s
- 2025How to End a Story: Collected Diaries — Helen Garner
- 2024Question 7 — Richard Flanagan
- 2023Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World — John Vaillant
- 2022Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne — Katherine Rundell
- 2021Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty — Patrick Radden Keefe
- 2020One Two Three Four: The Beatles in Time — Craig Brown
2010s
- 2019The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper — Hallie Rubenhold
- 2018Chernobyl: History of a Tragedy — Serhii Plokhy
- 2017How to Survive a Plague — David France
- 2016East West Street — Philippe Sands
- 2015NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism — Steve Silberman
- 2014H Is for Hawk — Helen Macdonald
- 2013The Pike: Gabriele D'Annunzio, Poet, Seducer and Preacher of War — Lucy Hughes-Hallett
- 2012Into the Silence — Wade Davis
- 2011Mao's Great Famine — Frank Dikötter
- 2010Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea — Barbara Demick
2000s
- 2009Leviathan, or The Whale — Philip Hoare
- 2008The Suspicions of Mr Whicher — Kate Summerscale
- 2007Imperial Life in the Emerald City — Rajiv Chandrasekaran
- 20061599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare — James Shapiro
- 2005Like a Fiery Elephant: The Story of B. S. Johnson — Jonathan Coe
- 2004Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall — Anna Funder
- 2003Pushkin: A Biography — T. J. Binyon
- 2002Peacemakers: The Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and Its Attempt to End War — Margaret MacMillan
- 2001The Third Reich: A New History — Michael Burleigh
- 2000Berlioz: Volume 2 — David Cairns
1990s
About the Baillie Gifford Prize
The Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction is the United Kingdom's most prestigious award for nonfiction writing. Founded in 1999 as the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction, replacing the NCR Book Award that had been discontinued following a 1997 scandal, it was renamed in 2015 when the Edinburgh-based investment management firm Baillie Gifford became its primary sponsor. With its motto 'All the best stories are true,' the prize recognizes outstanding works of nonfiction across a wide range of subjects including current affairs, history, politics, science, sport, travel, biography, autobiography, and the arts.
The prize is open to authors of any nationality whose work is published in the UK in English during the eligibility period, making it genuinely international in scope. A panel of independent judges changes each year and selects a longlist followed by a shortlist of six, from which the winner is chosen. Since 2019, the prize has been worth £50,000 to the winning author, with shortlisted authors each receiving £5,000, bringing the total annual prize value to £75,000. The winner is announced at an awards ceremony in London each November.
The Baillie Gifford Prize has a distinguished record of recognizing landmark works of nonfiction, including Helen Macdonald's H Is for Hawk, Kate Summerscale's The Suspicions of Mr Whicher, Patrick Radden Keefe's Empire of Pain, and Hallie Rubenhold's The Five. It is widely regarded as nonfiction's answer to the Booker Prize, providing a high-profile platform for the best in intelligent, accessible nonfiction writing and playing a significant role in bringing important books to the attention of general readers.
Frequently Asked Questions
- The prize was founded in 1999 as the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction. It was also known for periods as the BBC Four Samuel Johnson Prize (from 2002) and the BBC Samuel Johnson Prize (from 2009). It was renamed the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction in 2015 when the investment firm Baillie Gifford became its primary sponsor.
- Authors of any nationality are eligible, provided their book is published in the UK in English during the eligibility period (November 1 of the previous year through October 31 of the current year). This makes it a genuinely global prize, with past winners from the United States, Canada, Australia, and elsewhere.
- Since 2019, the winner receives £50,000 and each of the other five shortlisted authors receives £5,000, for a total prize fund of £75,000. This makes it one of the most valuable nonfiction prizes in the world.
- The longlist is announced in early September, the shortlist in early October (often at the Cheltenham Literature Festival), and the winner is announced at a ceremony in London in early November.
- The prize covers a broad range of nonfiction categories: current affairs, history, politics, science, sport, travel, biography, autobiography, and the arts. Literary fiction, poetry, and children's books are not eligible.