The article discusses the different preparation strategies employed by top spellers ahead of the 2026 Scripps National Spelling Bee semifinals. Some competitors, like 14-year-old Shrey Parikh, rely on coaches, purchased study materials, and learning word roots and patterns. Others, such as 12-year-old Sarv Dharavane, shun external help and rely purely on memorization from the Merriam-Webster dictionary. Coaches and former champions weigh the pros and cons of each approach, emphasizing that a balance between memorization and conceptual understanding is often key to success at the highest levels.
Anay Mahesh, 13, of Orlando, Fla. , reacts after answering incorrectly during the quarterfinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee , Wednesday, May 27, 2026, in Washington.
before making a stunning exit from his school bee last year. Now in his final year before he ages out of the competition, he’s fully committed. The 14-year-old from Rancho Cucamonga, California, works with three coaches. He pays for word lists and study guides.
He tries to learn every Greek and Latin root, every language pattern, every spelling bee-worthy word he can find. And he competes throughout the year in online bees that pit him against the country’s other top spellers. Shrey’s approach has proven effective for spellers seeking to hold the trophy, and it was good enough to make him one of 54 kids competing in Wednesday’s semifinals and seeking a spot in Thursday’s finals.
But at least one semifinalist has gone old-school, shunning outside help and using the dictionary as his guide.
“At the end of finals, most of the words aren’t going to have a really clean-cut language pattern or rule that you can pull from. So I think memorization is really important,” said Sam Evans, who coached each of the past two champions.
“Sometimes it gets a bad reputation, but you have to do it. ” Sarv Dharavane, 12, Dunwoody, Ga. , spells his word during the quarterfinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee at DAR Constitution Hall, Wednesday, May 27, 2026, in Washington. It’s all but impossible to reach the finals without knowing the components that make up words absorbed into English: roots and languages of origin.
But some champions have stood out for their incredible recall, the ability to instantly visualize any word they’ve run across or even recite dictionary definitions verbatim:Sarv finished third in 2025 as a relative unknown in the spelling community. There’s a reason for that. The 12-year-old sixth-grader from Dunwoody, Georgia, has no coach. He doesn’t participate in online bees.
And his only study guide is the source for every word in the competition: Merriam-Webster’s Unabridged dictionary.
“I didn’t really change anything because my strategy got me far last year, but I did more of what I did before,” Sarv said. “I used to read the dictionary and set aside difficult words to study later,” he explained. “I did it a lot, so I got a lot of words and it was really easy just to go through them.
I’ve always been able to remember pretty well, and I can read through long lists without getting tired, so this strategy works pretty well for me. ”Shrey Parikh, 14, of Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. , competes during the first preliminary round of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, Tuesday, May 26, 2026, in Washington. Parents in the audience watch closely during the quarterfinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, Wednesday, May 27, 2026, in Washington.
Sanil Thorat, 10, of Shreveport, La. , reacts after answering correctly during the quarterfinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, Wednesday, May 27, 2026, in Washington. Shrey Parikh, 14, of Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. , competes during the first preliminary round of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, Tuesday, May 26, 2026, in Washington.
Master roots, master language patterns, and learn how to spot the exceptions, and you can spell a word that you’ve never seen or don’t remember. Shah accepted that he could never memorize the dictionary — “No one can,” he said — and he believed if he got a word he didn’t know, he could figure it out. In an interview Wednesday, Shah said memorization was important, especially for quirky words with obscure origins.
He said the best spellers, including Avant-garde, found a balance between memorization and mastery. Having a conceptual understanding of how words are spelled can also help spellers perform under pressure when their memory fails them, said Shah, who admitted he finds it daunting to memorize a huge volume of words. Former champion Sohum Sukhatankar, who coaches Shrey, said spellers need to fill their brains with the most useful information.
“When you’re at the highest level, you have to be prepared for hundreds of thousands of words,” he said. “You want to do as little memorization as possible to avoid the chance that you just forget it, so it’s all about efficiency. ”Shrey knows he might have to guess when he’s at the microphone, but he wants to eliminate variables. That makes sense, given that a year ago, he wasn’t even the top speller at his school.
“I had a fever at my school bee last year, and I just blanked on the word ‘calipers’ … and I missed it,” he said. “I was really devastated. ” It took a few months before Shrey was motivated to start studying again. Once he did, he added Sukhatankar to his coaching team.
He’s learned how to slow down when he’s at the microphone because of a bad experience in 2023, when he rushed through a word, didn’t enunciate it clearly and judges determined he got it wrong. He’s also a believer in study guides. Shrey said an interactive, AI-assisted platform called Onyma that offers personalized learning and competition with other spellers — launched this month by Sukhatankar and Evans — has helped with his preparation.
He also uses SpellPundit, an online resource created by two former spellers and their parents that made a splash atwhen the majority of that year’s eight co-champions used it. The company claims every champion since as a customer. Shrey won the annual SpellPundit bee, the South Asian Spelling Bee and several other online bees, which he doesn’t necessarily see as an advantage.
Evans believes spellers who want to win should use their study time efficiently, but there’s no barrier to learning every possible word.
“There’s a common joke among spellers that says everything’s in the dictionary, so it’s all ‘on-list,’” he said. “The dictionary is the most basic thing that spellers need to know. ”
Scripps National Spelling Bee Spelling Strategies Memorization Word Roots Dictionary Study Competition
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