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Fat Bear Week 2025 Starts This Week With Bracket Reveal Monday and Voting Sept. 23–30

Organizers report an unusually abundant salmon run expected to produce especially hefty contenders.

Brown bear fishing for salmon at Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park, Alaska.
Meet 435 Holly! She was the winner of Fat Bear Week back in 2019. Learn how to vote for the corpulent cutie of your choice below! Image via NPS/ L. Carter.
Grazer, a female bear who is the two-time defending champion in the popular online Fat Bear Week competition, is shown Sept. 27, 2024, in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska.

Overview

  • The 12-bear bracket will be unveiled on Sept. 22 at 6 p.m. CDT, with a single-elimination format that includes four first-round byes.
  • Online voting runs daily Sept. 23–30 at fatbearweek.org and Explore.org, limited to one vote per email between 11 a.m. and 8 p.m. CDT.
  • Viewers can watch the Brooks Falls livestream on Explore.org as dozens of bears feed on the Brooks River in Katmai National Park, home to about 2,200 brown bears.
  • Two-time champion 128 Grazer enters as the defending titleholder, and her cub 128 Jr. has already won Fat Bear Jr. to earn a spot in the main event.
  • Naturalists highlight a bumper sockeye run and note that the giant male Chunk is back despite a broken jaw, setting expectations for especially large competitors.