The first TIME100 Next list arrived in November 2019, and its mix of names told you everything about how TIME thinks. Lil Nas X was on it, months after “Old Town Road” broke streaming records. So was Zion Williamson, then a rookie with the New Orleans Pelicans. So was Kerby Jean-Raymond, the designer behind Pyer Moss, whose runway shows had turned into cultural statements. A rapper, an athlete, a fashion designer. None of them applied. All of them were impossible to ignore that year.
That is the core of how to get on TIME100 Next. The list is a bet on momentum. TIME’s editors are looking for people whose influence is clearly rising and who are likely to matter even more in a few years. You cannot fill in a form to prove that. You can, however, build the kind of public record that past honorees share, and make sure the people who feed TIME’s process can see it.
What TIME100 Next Actually Rewards
TIME has published short explainers each year on how it chose the list. The broad process is consistent. Editors gather recommendations from TIME’s reporters and correspondents around the world, from past TIME100 honorees, and from experts in different fields. They then narrow the pool through debate and reporting, with an eye to the range of the final list across regions, industries and kinds of influence.
The categories give you a clue to what counts. TIME has sorted honorees into groups such as Artists, Phenoms, Leaders, Innovators and Advocates. A Phenom is someone whose achievement is unusual for their age or stage, often in sports or entertainment. A Leader holds power in business or government. An Innovator built something new, such as a company, a technology, or a scientific advance. An Advocate is moving a cause forward. Artists are making culture. Every honoree fits one of those boxes, and every honoree is clearly rising.
Momentum is the word to hold onto. TIME100 Next is not a lifetime achievement list and not a ranking of who is biggest today. It favors people at an inflection point. A founder whose company just went from niche to national, an athlete in a breakout season, an activist whose campaign just changed a law, a scientist whose paper is reshaping a field. If your story is steady growth over ten years, it may be a great story, but it is not a TIME100 Next story.
It also helps to understand who TIME is writing for. The list is a package for a general audience, with short tributes, striking portraits and a mix of famous and unfamiliar names. Editors want the reader to recognize some honorees and discover others. That means a rising figure who is well known inside a field but unknown to the public can be what the list needs, as long as the editors can explain their importance in a few lines.
Range also matters. TIME is a global brand, and the list reflects that. The editors balance regions, fields and backgrounds. That means you are not competing with everyone. You are competing with the handful of people who could fill a similar slot, such as the rising climate scientist, the breakout author from Southeast Asia, or the new mayor reshaping a major city. Being the clearest example of your kind of influence matters more than being the biggest name overall.
Five Patterns in Past Honorees
Study several years of TIME100 Next and the same five patterns show up again and again. We call them the Momentum Patterns, and they work as a checklist for any list built on editorial discovery rather than applications.
The first pattern is a breakout moment in the past twelve months. Almost every honoree has a specific event TIME can point to: a hit release, a record, a major funding round, a landmark ruling, an election, a viral campaign. The moment gives the editors a reason to say “now.” Without it, the case feels like it could wait a year.
The second is coverage from outlets TIME’s staff reads. Honorees nearly always arrive with a trail of serious press, such as profiles in major newspapers, features in respected magazines, and coverage in the leading trade outlets for their field. That trail matters because TIME’s editors often first hear about people through other journalism. It also makes fact-checking easy.
The third is a clear, one-line story. Read the short tributes TIME publishes for each honoree, often written by a well-known peer. Each one can be summed up in a sentence: the designer who turned runway shows into protest, the founder who made a cheap test for a deadly disease, the rookie who changed how a team plays. If people struggle to say what you are known for in one line, the editors will too.
The story usually carries a larger idea. Lil Nas X was not only a rapper with a hit, he was proof that a song could break through on TikTok and challenge genre lines at the same time. Zion Williamson was not only a talented rookie, he was the most hyped prospect in years. The best one-line stories connect a person to a change people can feel.
The fourth is endorsement from respected peers. Many honorees have public backing from people TIME already recognizes, such as a past TIME100 name, a well-known executive, an established artist, or a respected scientist. The magazine often asks those peers to write the tributes. If no one with standing has ever publicly vouched for you, that is a gap.
The fifth is impact that reaches beyond one niche. TIME’s audience is broad. Honorees usually have influence that a general reader can understand. A developer tools founder who is famous among engineers may be enormously successful, but unless the story connects to something bigger, such as how software gets built or who gets to build it, it is a harder sell for a general-interest list.
How to Build a Record TIME Can Find
If you score well on two or three of those patterns, the work ahead is about filling in the rest. Start with coverage, because it feeds everything else.
Earned media in serious outlets is the single biggest factor you can influence. Plan your communications around your breakout moments. When you raise a big round, release major work, publish research or win a significant case, make sure it is announced with a clear story, real numbers and access to you for interviews. Target the reporters who cover your field at major national outlets and the leading trade publications. One strong profile in a respected outlet can be worth more than fifty brief mentions.
Next, sharpen the one-line story. Write it down. Test it on people outside your industry. Then use it everywhere, in your bio, your company boilerplate, your speaker introductions, your social profiles. Consistency teaches the media to describe you the same way, and when TIME’s editors read about you, they get the same clear message from every source.
Build peer relationships deliberately, but not cynically. Collaborate with people whose work you admire. Show up where your field’s most respected people gather, such as specific conferences, residencies, fellowships and boards. Contribute something of value. Over time, those relationships turn into public endorsements, co-authored work, joint appearances, and the occasional mention to a journalist who asks who they are watching.
Think about the visual side too. TIME100 Next is a photographed list, and editors pay attention to people who are comfortable in front of a camera and on stage. If you have strong recent photos, video interviews and talks online, it is easier for editors to picture you in the package. That is not vanity. It reflects how the list is produced and consumed.
Finally, keep your public footprint clean and easy to verify. TIME fact-checks. When an editor searches your name, they should find an accurate personal site or company page, consistent bios, a list of press coverage, and no confusion with other people. A knowledge panel helps here, because it gives the editor a clean summary in the first second of their search.
Should You Pitch at All?
This is the question most people get wrong. Pitching TIME directly with “please consider me for TIME100 Next” is almost always a mistake. It signals that you are campaigning, and lists like this one depend on the sense that honorees were discovered, not marketed. Editors are wary of anything that looks like a PR push for placement.
What works is pitching stories. If you have real news, pitch TIME’s reporters who cover your field the same way you would pitch any outlet: with the news, the evidence, and why it matters to their readers. Being covered or quoted by TIME as a source puts you inside the magazine’s memory in a natural way. When the list discussions begin, a reporter who has written about you can raise your name with real context.
Also consider TIME’s other franchises. The magazine runs several lists and events, including TIME100 Creators, TIME100 Health, TIME100 Climate and TIME100 AI, as well as the TIME100 Most Influential Companies. Coverage or recognition in one part of TIME’s ecosystem makes you more visible to editors working on others. A founder who appears in a TIME100 AI package is already known to the newsroom when TIME100 Next comes around.
A good story pitch to TIME looks like a good pitch anywhere. It is short. It leads with the news, such as a launch, a result, a ruling or a first. It explains in one or two sentences why the story matters beyond your field, which is what makes it fit a general-interest magazine. It offers something the reporter cannot get elsewhere, such as data, access or a firsthand account. And it is sent to the one reporter whose beat it fits, not to a newsroom inbox.
If the story is not right for TIME, pitch it elsewhere. Strong coverage in other national outlets still builds the trail of press that TIME’s editors look for. Every serious profile makes the next one easier to get.
The other legitimate channel is the people TIME already asks. If a respected figure in your field knows your work well, there is nothing wrong with keeping them informed of your progress. If TIME asks them who they are watching, you want to be the first name that comes to mind.
So take an honest look at the five patterns and ask which one is missing for you. Is it the breakout moment, the coverage, the story, the endorsement, or the reach, and what would it take to fix it in the next twelve months?