The global non-profit D&AD Awards have revealed the Pencil Winners for 2026 at an event at the Southbank Center in London with jury presidents revealing the winning work. Only 573 Pencils were awarded across 46 categories out of more than 50,000 entries, received from 89 countries.
The MENA took home a total of 15 pencils in total including a White and a Gold Pencil, which are on par with a Gold in other awards. Impact BBDO and TBWA\RAAD walked away with the highest honours in the region. While in terms of numbers, Impact BBDO joins FP7 McCann Dubai as the agencies with the most number of pencils, both winning three each (irrespective of the type of pencil). Furthermore, six other campaigns were also shortlisted at the awards, adding to the total tally of the regional campaigns recognised.
D&AD CEO, David Patton, also noted the growth in participation from the region for the 2026 edition of the D&AD Awards, “Significant growth in submissions from the UAE, India, Argentina, and Saudi Arabia signals that world-class creative ambition is no longer concentrated in a handful of markets.”
Here are all the winners and the shortlisted campaigns from the region.
D&AD Awards 2026 – White Pencil winner
Impact BBDO picked up its first ever White Pencil for Annahar’s Active Journalism campaign. The D&AD White Pencil is awarded to exceptional projects that use the power of creativity to drive behavioural, environmental, societal or policy change. The campaign won the only D&AD White Pencil awarded for the 2026 awards in the Sustained Impact category, where the pencil replaces the Yellow Pencil.
Annahar put its strategic philosophy Active Journalism into motion, moving from reporting events to catalysing them over four years, contributing to sustained impact for its cause. It created four escalating campaigns that reshaped Lebanon’s politics, culture and future: sacrificing a print edition to provide paper and ink for voting ballots, giving space to other newspapers within its own to protect freedom of press, creating an AI President in the absence of a human one, and authoring the nation’s first unified history using its own headlines.
Speaking on the agency’s win, Ali Rez, Chief Creative Officer IMPACT BBDO, said, “The impact category demonstrates that profit can thrive alongside doing good for humanity. Creativity is at its most powerful when it solves human problems, and this extends to how brands behave as well. I was pleased to see a lot of meaningful work from big brands this year that not only contributed to their business success but also served a bigger purpose.”
Active Journalism
Awards: White Pencil (Sustained Impact/ Local Solution)
Country: Lebanon and UAE
Brand: AnNahar
Agency: Impact BBDO Dubai
Production company: Impact BBDO Beirut
D&AD Awards 2026 – Yellow Pencil winner
TBWA\RAAD also won its first-ever Yellow Pencil for International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)’s Laws Under Attack for its Not a Target execution, earning the campaign a place among a selective global list of 38 campaigns this year. The Gold Pencil is awarded to outstanding work that achieves true creative excellence.
The campaign was created to bring visiblity to violation of the Geneva Conventions, which promises to protect hospitals, ambulances and medical personnel. Active hospitals and ambulances were marked with large-scale rooftop messages reading “This is not a target”, which were placed in the line of sight of drones and those directing them. By turning healthcare facilities into media, the campaign aimed to expose violations in real time and forced leaders to confront and recommit to the laws of war.
“Winning TBWA\RAAD’s first-ever D&AD Yellow Pencil is an incredibly proud moment for our team, but it’s also bittersweet”, said Derek Green, Chief Creative Officer at TBWA\RAAD. “You never want the reason for work like this to exist in the first place, because no matter what side you’re on during a war, hospitals, ambulances and schools should be off limits. That was agreed by 196 nations 76 years ago when they signed the Geneva Conventions. “Not a Target”wasn’t created to win awards. It was created with the International Committee of the Red Cross to remind the world that these laws still matter, and that humanity should never become collateral damage.”
Awards: Yellow Pencil (Spatial Design/ Public Spaces); Shortlist (Impact/ Initiative)
Countries: Lebanon and UAE
Brand: The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
Agency: TBWA\RAAD
D&AD Awards 2026 – Graphite Pencil winners
A total of four Graphite Pencils were awarded to MENA campaigns with three of them going to regional agencies. The pencil is awarded to stand-out work that rises above the rest and is worthy of consideration for a Yellow Pencil.
Untaught History Edition
Impact BBDO bagged two for another Annahar campaign Untaught History, which also contributed to the White-pencil winning overall Active Journalism entry. Given the lack of a unfied trusth history since Lebanon’s independence, AnNahar used its own headlines to publish the first one, as a newspaper edition. It brought together journalists and historians to examine 82 years of front pages to reconstruct the history chapters.
Patience (Sabali)
Awarded in the music video category for its narrative, Birth Paris created a music video that is inspired by many stories of exodus in North Africa. The video Sabali explores the patience of the migratory journey from a human perspective. The video was also awarded two Wood Pencils for its cinematography.
Awards: Graphite Pencil (Music Videos / Narrative); Wood Pencils x2 (Cinematography / Long Form; Music Videos / Cinematography); Shortlists x2 (Music Videos / Direction; Direction / Long Form)
Countries: Algeria, France, Mali and Senegal
Client: Amadou & Mariam and DJ Snake
Agency: Birth Paris
Production Companies: 2HORLOGES, Assy Productions and Birth Paris
Saints-Pères Paris
The fourth pencil was won by UAE agency, The Refreshment Club for French brand Saints-Pères Paris, which also won a Wood Pencil in the Spatial Design category. The agency tackled a challenge the porcelain category has long struggled with: repeat purchase. So the agency introduced a new strategy designed to bring people back into the store through a ritual: the world’s first olive oil bar – The Extra Virgin Bar. A curated olive oil bar featuring exceptional oils from around the world, served in dedicated Saints-Pères vessels designed to be refilled over time. By shifting porcelain from a static object to a daily ritual, the brand moved from one-time purchase to ongoing engagement.
Awards: Graphite Pencil (Brand Transformation / Customer Experience & Engagement); Wood Pencil (Spatial Design / Retail Interiors)
Countries: UAE and France
Brand: Saints-Pères Paris
Agency and production company: The Refreshment Club Dubai
D&AD Awards 2026 – Wood Pencil winners
Regional agencies also took home seven Wood Pencils with FP7 McCann Dubai winning three pencils across two campaigns. These pencils are presented to the best of the year in advertising, design, craft, culture and impact, and mark the entry point of the campaigns into winning the awards.
Life Donor Card
The Life Donor Card campaign saw Mastercard transform everyday financial interactions into powerful, emotional experiences that actively save lives, with FP7 McCann Dubai contributing as the Design Agency. The Life Donor Card turned routine card payments into constant reminders of generosity by leveraging existing consumer behaviours and seamlessly embedding donor consent to create a tangible brand experience.
Awards: Wood Pencils x 2 (Experiential: Activation & Participation / B2B Activations; Health & Wellbeing/Direct); Shortlist (PR / B2B)
Countries: UAE, Germany and UK
Brand: Mastercard
Agencies: McCann London, MRM Germany and FP7 McCann Dubai
Production companies: Dentsu X Germany, Tony Petersen Film and Weber Shandwick Munich
Let It Fly
Publicis Groupe agency Saatchi and Saatchi won a Wood Pencil in the direct for the Let It Fly campaign, which flipped used world’s first luggage stickers to turn cultural purchases into extra baggage allowance. Travellers who purchased selected cultural items receive locally-designed collectible stickers, with each sticker adding extra baggage allowance to their journey. The initiative encouraged visitors to the Kingdom Saudia Arabia to take home meaningful cultural pieces without the worry of luggage limits.
Awards: Wood Pencil (Direct / Printed Materials); Shortlist (Media / Direct)
Countries: Saudi Arabia, UAE and Chile
Brand: Saudia, Saudia Airlines
Agencies: Saatchi & Saatchi UAE and Publicis KSA
Production companies: Believe and Twist Productions
4th Judge
Netting Big Time Creative Shop a pencil at the D&AD, the 4th Judge introduced the first AI-powered boxing judge for the Ring. Trained on over a century of data, the system analysed fights in real time, scoring rounds alongside official judges. Debuting during a major title fight, it provided an objective, data-driven scorecard to compare against human decisions.
Award: Wood Pencil (Sports Entertainment / Use of AI & Technology)
Countries: Saudi Arabia, Brazil and Argentina
Brand: The Ring
Agency: BigTime Creative Shop Riyadh
Production companies: Bumblebeat, Flavor Studio and Genosha
Mahmoud Kahil Awards
Tarek Atrissi Design developed a custom Arabic typographic style for the 10th anniversary of the Mahmoud Kahil Awards. To bring the lettering to life, it blended classical calligraphy with the expressive lettering of vintage Arabic comic books. Illustrations by award-winning artists were then integrated directly into the visual language to create rich narrative-driven compositions that merged celebratory visuals with illustrations reflecting the grim impact of war on children.
Award: Wood Pencil (Type Design & Lettering / Lettering); Shortlist (Typography / Posters)
Countries: Lebanon and Spain
Brand: Mahmoud Kahil Award
Agency: Tarek Atrissi Design
Recipe for Change
FP7 McCann Dubai won its third Wood Pencil as for its Recipe for Change campaign. The campaign created a model that turned displaced Lebanese women’s recipes into a source of income. Each dish became intellectual property, licensed to restaurants globally. Women created the product, restaurants brought it to market, and Puck enabled the system, in a new three-way collaboration creating income for all partners.
Award: Wood Pencil (Impact / Collaboration)
Countries: UAE
Brand: Puck
Agency: FP7 McCann Dubai
Production companies: Craft Dubai, No Garlic No Onions and Très Content
D&AD Awards 2026 – Shortlists
A total of six campaigns from the region were shortlisted at the D&AD Awards 2026, an exclusive list of work that demonstrates merit and is worthy of recognition. Shareet Studios’ WABA Ramadhan entry into the shortlist marks the second time-ever a Kuwaiti campaign has been shortlisted.
The Untranslatables
Shortlists: Writing for Design / Graphic and Direct / Printed Materials
Countries: UAE and USA
Brand: Kinokuniya
Agency: Memac Ogilvy UAE
Production companies: Bigsea, Illozoo and The Goldmine Films
DIY by IKEA
Shortlist: Press & Outdoor / Press Campaigns
Countries: UAE and UK
Brand: IKEA Dubai
Agency: VML London
Production company: Curious Productions
LumpDolls
Shortlist: Product Design / Inclusive
Countries: UAE and Tunisia
Brand: Carrefour
Agencies: Publicis Impact and Saatchi & Saatchi UAE
Production company: Panda Prod
The Coolest Ihram
Shortlist: Health & Wellbeing / Product Design
Countries: Saudi Arabia and UAE
Brand: Saudia
Agency and production company: Landor Dubai
There We Are
Shortlist: Media/ Film
Country: UAE
Brand: Home Centre
Agency: Publicis UAE
Production company: Prodigious ME
WABA Ramadhan
Shortlist: Editing / Short Form
Countries: Kuwait
Brand: WABA
Agency and production company: Shareet Studios
The D&AD Awards black pencils remain to be announced and the winners will be revealed in a ceremony in London on 24 September 2026.