Trump wants a Nobel Peace Prize. What exactly is the award, and how is a winner chosen?

It’s no secret that President Trump wants a Nobel Peace Prize. He has repeatedly expressed his desire to win what many consider to be the world’s most honorable award, citing his efforts in brokering peace deals and ending wars.

President Trump said during his United Nations General Assembly address last month that he deserved the Nobel Peace Prize, claiming he has “ended seven un-endable wars” since he returned to the White House in January. Experts say that while the president has played a key role in ending some of the conflicts, his claims of being a peacemaker are complicated, because some of the international conflicts he cited haven’t been wars, or they haven’t been fully resolved.

He repeated the claim last Tuesday and took it a step further, saying he’s hopeful that the number of conflicts resolved will be eight with the help of his 20-point peace plan to end the fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

“If this works out, we’ll have eight, eight in eight months. That’s pretty good,” Trump said Sept. 30 to military leadership in Quantico, Va. “Will you get the Nobel Prize? Absolutely not. They’ll give it to some guy that didn’t do a damn thing,” he said. “​​But it’ll be a big insult to our country, I will tell you that.”

Several people and organizations have nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize this year, including Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu, the government of Pakistan, and the Cambodian prime minister. In August, Armenia and Azerbaijan said they would nominate Trump for the honor as well. Trump has been nominated a few times before, with the support of two Norwegian lawmakers in 2018 for his peace efforts between North and South Korea, again in 2020 for his peace agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Israel, and in 2024 by Tennessee Republican Rep. Claudia Tenney for his Middle East peace efforts.

The deadline to submit nominations for the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize was Jan. 31, so any nominations submitted after that would have to be for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize. Here’s what else we know about the honor.

What is the Nobel Peace Prize?

Swedish businessman and inventor Alfred Nobel died in 1896 and left behind one of the world’s largest fortunes. In his will, Nobel wanted part of his wealth to be made up of a dedicated fund, “the interest on which shall be annually distributed in the form of prizes to those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind,” according to the Nobel Peace Prize website. 

His will specified that the prizes should be awarded in the fields of physics, chemistry, medicine or physiology, literature and peace. 

Who decides who wins?

The Norwegian Nobel Committee, which is selected by the Norwegian parliament, has five members who are responsible for selecting the peace prize laureates each year. They review all valid nominations and prepare a short list for further consideration. In 2025, there were a total of 338 valid nominations — 224 are individuals and 94 are organizations. 

Over the course of eight months, from February through September, the committee, along with a group of Norwegian and international advisers, meets regularly to discuss and narrow the field of candidates. “The advisers, selected on the basis of their professional experience and academic expertise, prepare individual reports on the candidates that the committee has put on its short-list,” the Nobel Peace Prize website explains.

The committee reaches a decision on the winner at their last meeting, held at the beginning of October, before the announcement. They strive to get a consensus on the winner, but rarely is the decision reached by a simple majority vote when a consensus isn’t reached.   

What’s the criteria for winning?

Nobel’s will said the Peace Prize should be awarded “to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations and the abolition or reduction of standing armies and the formation and spreading of peace congresses.” 

Kristian Berg Harpviken, the award committee’s secretary, told Reuters that the prize “needs to be placed in the current context.” He participates in the deliberations but doesn’t vote on the winner.

“They will look at the world, see what is happening, what are the global trends, what are the main concerns, what are the most promising processes that we see,” he said.

“And processes here can mean anything from a specific peace process to a new type of international agreement that is under development or that has recently been adopted.”

When is it being awarded this year?

The 2025 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced at a press conference on Friday, Oct. 10 at 5 a.m. ET (11 a.m. CEST) at the Norwegian Nobel Institute in Oslo, Norway. (You can watch the livestream of the announcement here.) 

The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded at an official ceremony at Oslo City Hall on Dec. 10, the day of Nobel’s death. The time-honored tradition gathers close to 1,000 guests, which include representatives of the Norwegian royal family, government and parliament representatives. A banquet is held at the Grand Hotel in Oslo, where the winner is often greeted by a torchlight procession in their honor.

What exactly is the prize?

By winning the prize, the laureates are presented with a medal that features a portrait of Alfred Nobel on the front. On the back is a Latin inscription “Pro pace et fraternitate gentium” (For peace and fraternity among peoples), and around the 5 mm thick edge are the engraved words “Prix Nobel de la Paix” (Nobel Peace Prize), as well as the year and the name of the winner.

The winners also get a diploma and a check for a large amount, which is currently over $1.1 million (11 million Swedish crowns). 

Who can be nominated?

Any living person, active organization or institution can be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. However, a person can’t nominate themselves, and a nomination is only valid if the person submitting it meets certain criteria, listed here, like current heads of state, for example.

Do we know who is nominated in 2025?

No. The Nobel Committee doesn’t reveal a list of nominees for an award until at least 50 years have passed. 

Which U.S. presidents have won the Nobel Peace Prize?

• 2009: Barack Obama “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”

• 2002: Jimmy Carter “for his decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development.”

• 1919: Woodrow Wilson “for his role as founder of the League of Nations.”

• 1906: Theodore Roosevelt “for his role in bringing to an end the bloody war recently waged between two of the world’s great powers, Japan and Russia.”