Backpack voted Fat Bear Week 2026 winner, beating out another offspring of former champ

Backpack has been crowned the 2026 Fat Bear Week champion, beating out a fellow offspring of a former Fat Bear Week winner.

Voters were split between bear 910 and 89 Backpack in the final round of the weeklong contest to see who is the chunkiest bear at Katmai National Park & Preserve in Alaska. Backpack received 103,334 votes, and the runner-up received 98,253 votes, according to Explore.org.

“Your votes, your posts, your favorite bear campaigns, and your shared love for Katmai’s wild places turned this week into a collective story shaped by thousands of voices. It’s a reminder that just like America’s 250th anniversary, traditions endure because people keep them alive,” Katmai National Park & Preserve said in a social media post.

“This year, we honored resilience in our bears and in our nation, recognizing the landscapes, communities, and shared stories that connect us.”

Sixteen total bears faced off for Fat Bear Week 2026, but Backpack stood out as an early favorite, beating out other contenders in the first two rounds by more than 100,000 votes each.

The competition got tougher in the semifinal rounds, with Backpack barely edging out 164 Bucky — while 910 easily overtook 132.

In the end, Backpack made his mother, Holly — also the 2019 Fat Bear Week champion — proud.

Holly introduced Backpack to Brooks River at the Katmai National Park and Preserve in 2006, according to park officials. The first-year cub’s name was inspired by his habit of climbing onto Holly’s back when the two waded through the river.

When he was about 2 years old, Backpack suffered a significant leg injury, and park rangers questioned his chances of survival. But eventually, he recovered and became independent in 2008, and has since grown into the large adult worthy of joining the Fat Bear Week Hall of Champions.

How Fat Bear Week 2026 “broke the internet”

The bracket for this year’s contest expanded from last year’s 12 competitors, and the first round of voting was so popular, park officials said it “broke the internet.”

Voting, which started Tuesday, Sept. 22, had to be extended an additional day after bear lovers overwhelmed the website and some voters weren’t able to access the polls “because apparently the internet was not prepared to handle this much fat bear,” Katmai officials said on social media last week.

The voters had to enter an email address each time for their vote to count.

The competition, which started in 2014 as a one-day event to showcase southwest Alaska bears, in 2025 received more than 1.7 million votes from more than 100 countries, according to the National Park Service.

Past Fat Bear Week winners

Over the past 12 years, there have been six champions, three of whom have been repeat winners of Fat Bear Week.

The most dominant contestant has been 480 Otis, winning the first-ever Fat Bear event in 2014 and taking the crown again in 2016, 2017 and 2021. Otis is one of the older bears at Brooks River and hasn’t been observed since the year he last won.

One of Otis’ biggest competitors was 409 Beadnose, a repeat winner in 2015 and 2018. She’s also 910’s mother. She was estimated to be in her 20s, and she also hasn’t been spotted since she last won. Brown bears can live to be approximately 30 years old in the wild.

After several years as a favorite, 435 Holly became the first winner in 2019 who wasn’t Otis or Beadnose.

The other two repeat winners are 747 (2020, 2022) and 128 Grazer (2023, 2024), the mother of one of this year’s contenders.

Last year’s winner was 32 Chunk, who unfortunately did not make it out of the first round of voting this year.