It’s a blessing living in a green place, and while lots of cities across the world have adopted innovative practices like rewilding projects or installing ‘green corridors’, we shouldn’t overlook the simple power of trees. They keep our streets shady, they help us breathe and they’re bloomin’ lovely to look at.
The European Tree of the Year competition celebrates the significance of trees to local communities all over the continent, and they’ve just announced their winner for 2026.
The Oak of Laukiai, a 400-year-old oak tree in the Lithuanian village of Rukai, won the competition with a score of 6,153 ‘tree points’.
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According to Tree of the Year, this old Oak stood forgotten for quite some time. However, about a year ago, the local community made efforts to restore the land and area around it, and even organised a celebration to honour it.
In second place was the Old Wild Apple Tree from Diel in Slovakia, and in third place was the Crooked Elm from Szyslowiec in Poland.
How is the European Tree of the Year selected?
Before the trees are put to a public vote, each participating country will select a tree via a local competition, where local communities, organisations and schools nominate a tree in their region. Then the trees are put to a public online vote, made fair by a new ‘tree points’ system which takes into account countries with larger populations and weighs out the scoring accordingly.
This year marks the fifteenth edition of the award.
‘The competition was extremely close – the ranking remained uncertain until the very last moment,’ said Petr Skrivanek, Coordinator of the European Tree of the Year, ‘This year’s magnificent trees attracted huge attention across Europe. During the voting period, the website recorded around 1.5 million visits, with more than 200,000 unique voters – people who care about nature and the environment’.
Below are some snaps of a handful of the finalists.
For more information about this lovely competition – and to watch the awards ceremony on YouTube – head straight to the official Tree of the Year website.
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