Sea of Thieves Sail Design Competition

Have you ever looked at your ship’s sails and thought “those would be 100% better with a reference to our crew’s inside joke about Flameheart having a puppy called Hot Dog”? Of course you have, and now’s your chance to prove it!

Our first ever Sail Design Competition is your invitation to sketch and share your dream set of sheets, with the potential for them to be added to Sea of Thieves , and other pirates’ customisation chests, as part of our ninth anniversary celebrations next March.

From now until October 23rd, pirates of all artistic ability are invited to use the template below (which you can download by clicking here), or whatever tools and canvas they have to hand, to draw their own set of sails (sticking to the number of sheets and relative size you’d see on a Sea of Thieves Galleon – make sure every sail is visible)!

Once you have your sketch, enter by simply posting your piece to Twitter/X, Bluesky, Instagram, TikTok or Threads with the tag #SoTSailDesignComp, or sharing your image in the dedicated #sot-sail-design-comp channel on the official Sea of Thieves Discord server. From all the entries posted to social channels, an internal team of artists at Rare will choose their three favourites that they feel stand out in terms of creativity and originality, but are also designs they feel would be a good fit to be spotted on the horizon when sailing the Sea of Thieves.

A final concept for these three sets of sails will then be agreed in collaboration with the original artist, and shared as a community vote that will run in the Sea of Thieves Community Hub during January 2027. The winning entry from this poll will go on to become an in-game cosmetic that all players will be able to acquire during our ninth anniversary celebrations starting in March.

And that’s not the only prize! Alongside the top-voted sails appearing in the game, with a chance for their creator to be referenced in the item name or description, we’ll also award enough Ancient Coins for a year’s worth of Season Pass: Premium Tiers, covering all the Seasons that begin between our ninth and tenth anniversaries.

The two other sail scribblers who make it to the poll stage won’t be left adrift either – both artists will also receive a stack of 999 Ancient Coins, enough to cover the purchase of a Season Pass: Premium Tier or a couple of choice goodies from the Pirate Emporium. While the sails are planned for distribution as part of our anniversary activities, that’s not a design direction your entries need to adhere to. The brief is simply ‘design some sails’ – we want to see the creativity that this broad direction brings.

There’s also no limit to the number of entries you can submit, so you can keep them coming with every wave of inspiration that strikes you! With that said, there are of course some restrictions barring the use of other companies’ IP, licensed content and generative AI in the creation of an entry, among other rules. Please refer to the full competition terms and conditions for all the details.

So, whether it is indeed a rendition of your crew’s Flameheart pooch headcanon, a patchwork dedication to your favourite rock, the Battle for Golden Sands retold in the style of the Bayeux Tapestry or simply a singular abstract artistic creation that only you could reel up from the depths of your piratey soul, we can’t wait to see what you design. Have fun, and good luck!