Creativity abounded in this year’s BYO Label Contest. With the popularity and ease that comes from using artificial intelligence, more labels than ever were submitted, and yet so many labels created the old-fashioned way still caught the judges’ eyes and took home many top honors.

From hop cops to finger-painted apes, to mosaic birds and surfer fanzine-inspired labels, we believe the judges nailed it this year. But there were so many other great labels to choose from so we then gave readers a chance to vote for their favorite on our social media pages after we awarded the top four. 

We just hope the homebrews inside the bottles taste as good as the labels that wrap around them look. Check out all of this year’s winning labels and honorable mentions on the following pages. 

As always, a huge thanks goes out to sponsors who generously donated prizes, as well as readers who make this contest so much fun each year!

Grand

Sheephound Brewing is a group of homebrewers in San Bernardino County, California, who are first responders, mainly in law enforcement. All of their labels are original artwork and follow a similar theme, but our favorite was their Top Hop entry. “In the label, our hop cop is sitting on his police car while blocking off the freeway. The bridge in the back is an homage to the San Bernardino bridge, which is almost identical to the one in our label. The California road signs are used for the beer information,” Jason says. 

Gold

Good things take time. It’s true when brewing beer, and when making labels. Inspiration for the Hail, Caesar! label struck as a rerun of Planet of the Apes came on TV. “I grabbed my iPad and finger painted the ape, already with a vision of how I would lay out the label along with the red strip accent. The artwork took me about three days to complete,” Allan says.

Silver

Gary is not new to bringing home the hardware in our label contest, as the reigning Grand Champion winner from 2024. And his submission this time around didn’t disappoint either! He describes the hoppy, crisp Chirpy Lager as “easy drinking on a summer’s day, as the birds are busy, I’m taking it easy.” The primary hop, Mosaic®, dictated the art style with a mosaic look that has us looking forward to spring.

Bronze

Inspired by surfing the beaches on the East Coast and indie music fanzines, Bill Gibbons combined these passions to create the label of “a blonde surfer riding killer waves to come up with the inspiration for the Suicide Blonde label,” Bill says. He says this refreshing New Zealand Pilsner bursts with tropical aroma and fruity flavors, making it a great post-surf beer to reach for.

Reader’s Choice

This label was just narrowly beat out for a spot in our top four, but when it came to a vote among Facebook followers it was the clear Reader’s Choice winner. Cosmin started homebrewing this year and says he enjoys the creativity not just in brewing the beer but also designing the labels. This particular label was created for the baptism party of his son, “which is the Romanian name of the bird Robin (his name).” 

Honorable Mention