BuzzFeed Viral Fellowship 2025 for Young Writers in the U.S.

Applications are open for the BuzzFeed Viral Fellowship 2025. The BuzzFeed Viral Fellowship is a year-long program for aspiring and hungry writers eager to hone their skills, and to learn by doing. The program is a crash course in how to consistently create content that captures readers’ attention, pushes the cultural conversation forward, and reaches a massive audience.

BuzzFeed is both a tech and a media company and they have long used audience data and trend insights to publish widely shared articles that surprise and delight people. The Viral Fellowship is a chance to be part of this hugely analytical and creative practice. You’ll learn — and learn to get obsessed — with how content is packaged and how to keep finding huge audiences.

Fellows need a strong grasp of the nuanced cultural conversations happening all over the internet and should be excited about contributing to those conversations. They are looking for people who are fascinated by social media, human psychology, and trends of all kinds. On any given day, you might be researching behind-the-scenes facts and Easter eggs about a trending piece of pop culture, curating the funniest content from around the web, or reporting on the trending topic of the day.

Fellows will work with and learn from members of the BuzzFeed team — some of the smartest, weirdest, most creative, and most viral creators out there. This is the perfect opportunity for someone interested in pursuing a career in digital media. You won’t be running errands for senior staff, or transcribing someone else’s interviews, you will be pitching ideas, taking assignments, brainstorming, collaborating, and writing dozens of stories that will be published to BuzzFeed.com and promoted across our social channels.

Benefits of BuzzFeed Viral Fellowship

• This is a paid position (starting at $20/hour). The Fellowship allows for candidates to work fully remote in select locations. If you’re local to NY or LA, there will also be opportunities to work alongside in their Times Square or Hollywood offices.

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Eligibility for BuzzFeed Viral Fellowship

They are looking for culture and internet obsessives with a passion for the things people are sharing, liking, recommending, and talking about. You should also have:

• A positive, curious, playful disposition;
• A genuine, wide-eyed love of pop culture and internet trends in all their forms;
• An interest in social platforms and what drives people to share content;
• Curiosity and excitement about social platforms (TikTok, Instagram, Reddit, YouTube, Tumblr, etc.);
• Curiosity and excitement about utilizing emerging AI technology to create unique and entertaining content.

In addition, you should demonstrate the following:

• Some experience creating content for the internet (it doesn’t have to be formal — anything from published articles to creative Twitter threads to personal TikTok accounts);
• Ability to quickly identify social trends and topics;
• Ability to handle critical feedback and improve from it;
• Eagerness to collaborate;
• Ability to interpret key audience data points relating to your work and use it to adapt and evolve your approach moving forward.

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Application

The deadline to apply for this Fellowship is June 20, 2025 by 5pm EST.  All application materials will need to be submitted when you apply. The intended (and tentative) start date for this Fellowship is July 22, 2025.

Submit the following when applying to be an Editorial Fellow:

• Instead of a formal cover letter, include a few short paragraphs about what topics you’d want to write about for BuzzFeed, and what interests you about the content BuzzFeed makes
• Create a BuzzFeed.com/community profile and create 1-2 posts that reflect your voice and interests. Submit articles or lists, rather than quizzes! When you submit your posts, include “This is for the Editorial Fellowship.” in the description.  You’ll be asked to provide the links to your posts when you complete the application.  SO, SUBMIT YOUR COMMUNITY POSTS PRIOR TO COMPLETING THIS APPLICATION! They encourage you to check their Trending page to see examples of posts that reflect what they are looking for, and to take note of the variety of topics and formats.
• P.S. They love AI tools (seriously, they’re the best), but for your edit test, they want to hear YOUR voice, not ChatGPT’s.
• Provide links to your public social media accounts.
• Attach a resume — keep it to one page!

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