The Great Pottery Throw Down 2026: Britain’s Beloved Ceramics Competition Returns

Series 9 Launches with Fresh Talent and Familiar Faces

The ninth series of The Great Pottery Throw Down begins on 4 January 2026 on Channel 4, bringing audiences back to the creative world of amateur ceramics. The Great Pottery Throw Down returns to Gladstone Pottery in Stoke-on-Trent for a ninth series with a dozen more talents competing to be named Britain’s Best Home Potter. The show continues to captivate viewers with its unique blend of artistic challenge, technical skill, and heartwarming moments that have made it a Sunday evening staple for British families.

Meet the 2026 Contestants

This year’s competition showcases remarkable diversity both in background and geography. The Series 9 Potters are aged 28 to 63, and the six women and six men hail from Bridgend, Herefordshire, Sheffield, Inverness, Cornwall, Oxfordshire, Swansea, Merseyside, Folkestone, West Midlands, Hampshire and Glasgow. The Potters’ day jobs include an English Teacher; Communication Support Worker; Midwife; Habitat Restoration Ecologist; Tattooist; Art Teacher, plus a former Psychiatric Nurse; University Facilities and Estate Manager; Actor and Toy Shop Owner, and Chemistry Teacher. This varied lineup promises fresh perspectives and creative approaches to the challenges ahead.

Judges and Host Return

BAFTA-winning actress Siobhán McSweeney returns as host with our regular ceramics superstar judges Keith Brymer Jones and Rich Miller. They are joined once again by Princess – a potter from Series 7 – as the kiln technician. Judge Rich Miller has described the upcoming series as particularly competitive, noting “We had a much closer set of skills amongst our potters it was a really close-fought, exciting series”.

What to Expect This Series

The rest of the episodes include the potters making bricks, bookends, jugs, animalistic sculptures, souvenirs inspired by the seaside, tagine pots and floral posies. There are also technical challenges including sgrafitto and the Japanese method raku. The show’s format continues to test contestants through main creative challenges and smaller technical tasks, with one potter crowned ‘Potter of the Week’ while another faces elimination each episode.

Why The Great Pottery Throw Down Matters

The programme has become more than entertainment—it celebrates craftsmanship and the therapeutic power of working with clay. As the series enters its ninth year, it continues to inspire viewers to explore pottery themselves, with many community studios reporting increased interest following each broadcast. The show’s ability to combine technical expertise with genuine emotion has created a unique space in British television, proving that audiences crave content celebrating skill, patience, and artistic endeavour in an increasingly fast-paced world.