ANIA MAGLIANO – MAISIE ADAM – PHIL ELLIS – REECE SHEARSMITH – SANJEEV BHASKAR
As the BAFTA and Rose d’Or winning television series celebrates its tenth anniversary on our screens, Taskmaster has revealed the brand-new line-up of comedians who will take part in the 20th series of the international hit show. The almighty Taskmaster Greg Davies and his faithful admin keeper Alex Horne have gathered some of the most brilliant and eclectic comedy minds and assigned them one mission: to become a Taskmaster Champion.
Preparing themselves to step into the spotlight and get tasking are; critically-acclaimed breakthrough comic Ania Magliano (Live at the Apollo, BBC), comedian and presenter Maisie Adam (A League Of Their Own, Sky), award-winning comic Phil Ellis (Phil Ellis is Trying, BBC Radio 4), BAFTA-winning writer, actor, and comedian Reece Shearsmith (Inside No.9, BBC), and actor, writer, and television presenter Sanjeev Bhaskar (Goodness Gracious Me, BBC Two). Who out of these brave individuals will outwit their comrades and impress the Taskmaster the most?
Elsewhere, this summer has seen Taskmaster partner with English Heritage for a brand-new collaboration. Joining forces for the first time, they are bringing a unique entertainment experience to 17 stunning heritage sites across the country from 19th July to the 31st August presenting a series of engaging and playful tasks at iconic locations such as Stonehenge, Whitby Abbey and Dover Castle. For further information visit www.english-heritage.org.uk/whats-on
Meanwhile, Taskmaster Education has recently partnered with the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) to launch a new creative skills opportunity for UK secondary school students aged 11 to 16 called ‘Taskmaster Club 100’ where 100 UK secondary schools will get to have a go at Taskmaster Club for free. This innovative new initiative focuses on building essential skills through fun classroom activities and aims to make creative learning opportunities accessible to students across the UK from every background and in diverse educational settings. Further information can be found https://taskmastereducation.com/news/ipo-offer-taskmaster-club-free-100
Executive Producers for the series are Alex Horne, Richard Allen-Turner, Rob Aslett, James Taylor, Jon Thoday and Andy Devonshire (The Apprentice and The Great British Bake Off), who also acts as Series Director, while Andy Cartwright is Series Producer. Commissioned for Channel 4 Head of Live Events, Tom Beck.
Transmission details to be revealed in due course
RECENT CRITICAL PRAISE FOR TASKMASTER:
“Chaos reigns. Of course it does- it’s the grand final of this purely delightful show”
Ali Catterall, The Guardian
“The funniest show on TV returns for another series… delightfully delirious”
Graham Kibble-White, The Daily Telegraph
“Channel 4’s wonderfully silly game show is a golden ticket for up-and-coming comedians… hilariously chaotic”
Gerard Gilbert, The I
“Taskmaster is endlessly, relentlessly funny… Another instalment of pure, blissfully silly joy that shouldn’t be missed”
Sara Wallis, The Mirror
“this format shows absolutely no sign of running out of steam – it remains ingenious, hilarious, and utterly unparalleled” ★★★★★
Steven Perkins, TV Times Magazine
“It’s a strong start, made more fun by the great chemistry between the gang”
Gemma Quade, The Sun
“The most absurd and brilliant game show returns”
Sara Wallis, Mirror
“such great TV”
Huw Fullerton, Radio Times
“the fiercest and most absurd show on television… the opening episode features some truly hilarious moments… Brilliantly bonkers TV”
Closer
“It’s easy to see why comedians keep signing up… it looks like one of the most fun shows on TV”
Daily Express
★★★★
Boyd Hilton, Heat
“Brace yourself for more hilarious high-jinx”
Ed Gleave, Daily Star
“We’ve now reached series 19 of Taskmaster, but luckily there’s no sign that the show is running out of ideas for weird and wonderful tasks – or comedians who want to have a go at them”
Yours Magazine
★★★★
Daily Mail
“After ten years and now 19 series, the comedy colossus marches on”
Heat
“The fiercest and most absurd show on telly… top-notch entertainment”
Take A Break
“a delight”
Hannah J Davis, The Guardian
“It’s easy to see why comedians keep signing up for Taskmaster – at its best, it looks like one of the most fun shows on TV”
Evening Mail
For more information contact:
Avalon
Florrie Sheehan – FSheehan@avalonuk.com
Perrine Davari – PDavari@avalonuk.com
Channel 4
Kate Conway – kconway@channel4.co.uk
Notes to Editors:
- Taskmaster is a BAFTA winning and International Emmy nominated comedy entertainment show originally created by Alex Horne. Greg Davies stars as the all-powerful “Taskmaster” who, with the help of his loyal assistant Horne, sets out to test the wiles, wit and wisdom of five comedians through a series of strange and surreal challenges in what is the most hard-fought and ridiculous comedy entertainment format on TV.
- 214 episodes have been produced in the UK so far, as part of a landmark six season deal with Channel 4 in 2020, which was renewed for a further six series by the broadcaster along with a brand-new spin off series Junior Taskmaster, following nine record-breaking series on UKTV’s Dave.
- Taskmaster has triumphed as one of Channel 4’s most popular programmes in recent years, Taskmaster is already watched by a broad multi-generational audience and is in Channel 4’s top three series of audience share of young viewers (16-34) in the coveted 9pm slot, with Gogglebox and Derry Girls. Taskmaster is also hugely popular on Channel 4’s streaming service, with the average views per episode [0-7Days, O&O] growing since 2021. Taskmaster is also hugely popular on Channel 4 streaming, where it is available for free and, since 2021, the average views per episode [0-7Days, O+O] have grown for the title with each series. Taskmaster is one of the youngest skewing shows on Channel 4, with nearly a quarter of its audience last year aged 16-34, across both linear and streaming. Across 2024 Taskmaster was in the top 5 most streamed shows on Channel 4, for all individuals.
- Taskmaster won Best Entertainment Team at the BAFTA TV Craft Awards 2025, Best Comedy Entertainment at the Rose D’Or Awards 2024 and received its fifth BAFTA nomination for the 2025 television awards. Previously it has won Best Comedy Entertainment Show at the National Comedy Awards 2022 and 2023, Best Comedy Entertainment at the BAFTAs 2020 and Best Entertainment Programme at the Broadcast Awards 2018, having previously received two more nominations for the Broadcast Awards. It has also been nominated for the Bruce Forsyth Entertainment Award at the NTA’s 2021 and 2022, Best Comedy Entertainment at Rose d’Or 2023, Studio Entertainment at Rose d’Or 2021, Best Entertainment Programme at the RTS Awards, Broadcasting Press Guild Awards, the Broadcast Digital Awards, Edinburgh TV Award, the TV Choice Awards, Best Returning Format in the International Format Awards 2020, and received two BAFTA Craft nominations in 2023 and 2025. While it’s spin of series Junior Taskmaster took home the prize for Best Comedy Entertainment Programme at the Royal Television Society Awards 2025.
- The original Taskmaster programme can now be seen in 120 countries.
- Over 92 seasons and 921 episodes have been commissioned outside the UK with local versions now in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Croatia, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, and Portugal where it ranked first for most watched entertainment programs on its channel RTP 1. Taskmaster Australia launched on Network Ten where it became the channel’s top new show of the year and received a nomination for Most Outstanding Comedy at the Logies, produced by Avalon Television with Kevin&Co and featuring Tom Gleeson as the Taskmaster with Tom Cashman as the Taskmaster’s Assistant, and and Taskmaster New Zealand series 5 will launch on TVNZ in 2024, while it won Best Entertainment Show at the NZ TV Awards. The first season of Le Maitre du Jeu for Bell Media, which aired in Canada in September 2022, increased Noovo’s performance in the Thursday time slot by 50%, while the UK original won Canada’s film and TV Rockie Awards 2023 for best Comedy and Variety show. Taskmaster Canada is now in production for series four.
- The format has seen huge success in Europe, with the Swedish version reaching ratings of over a 65% market share in a primetime weekend slot on SVT and series 11 and 12 in production for TV4, produced by Avalon Television with Baluba. Norway’s local version of Taskmaster, Kongen Befaler, won the Norwegian TV Academy Award (Gullruten) for Best Comedy Show in 2024, where a twelfth season is in production for Discovery. Finland’s version of Taskmaster, Suurmestari, won Game Show of the Year at the Venla Gaala awards, with a five series aired and six more ordered by MTV3, with the channel also launching the first international version of Junior Taskmaster later this year. Stormester, Denmark’s Taskmaster, which is now in its ninth series, won Best Game Show at the 2022 Vindere Awards making it their most successful comedy entertainment series ever with a 50% share of all viewers, with TV2 launching successful Taskmaster spin off series, ‘Champion of Champions’ in 2023 and ‘One More Chance’ 2024, which achieved an incredible 82% share in the 15-34 demo.
- The Taskmaster YouTube channel has seen huge success internationally, particularly in North America, reaching over 12 billion impressions since it first launched in October 2019, with just over 1.1 billion views and over 1.8 million subscribers, of which 42% are from North America. The channel has had over 234 million hours’ worth of content viewed with 57% of those hours from North America (133 million hours watched). The show has grown significantly in popularity with American audiences throughout 2025. There has been an 85% increase in North American viewership year on year, with over 100 million views from Northa America so far this year, while there have been 130k new subscribers from North America in 2025 alone, an increase of 189% year on year.
- The Taskmaster book ‘200 Extraordinary Tasks for Ordinary People’ was published in 2018, while a second book ‘Bring Me The Head of the Taskmaster’ was published in September 2021. Both books featured as Sunday Times Bestsellers at launch and were followed by the launch of a brand-new book celebrating the ten year anniversary of Taskmaster; ‘An Absolute Casserole: The Taskmaster Compendium’ which launched in November 2024. Combined they have collectively sold over one million units globally. The Swedish version of the book has sold 108,000 copies to date.
- For the first time, Taskmaster entered the world of virtual reality with the brand new upcoming virtual reality game, Taskmaster VR. Published by Scallywag Arcade, a Draw & Code studio, Taskmaster VR launched in 2024 for Meta Quest 2 and 3.
- The festive season saw the launch of brand-new Taskmaster Crackers which entirely sold out before they hit the shelves at pre-sale. Having currently sold over a quarter of a million crackers to fans across the world, production went into overdrive to meet phenomenal demand in time for Christmas. They became an official No.1 best-seller on Amazon and have been ordered by fans across 58 countries around the globe including in North America, Australia, Thailand, South Korea and Iceland among other countries.
- Taskmaster: The Board Game was released in Autumn 2019 and entirely sold out a week after it went on sale. A second game, Taskmaster: The Secret Series Game was released in 2022. Taskmaster: The Card Game was released also released in 2022. Across the range, over 400,000 games have been sold to date. All the games are available to buy from the official Taskmaster shop, TaskmasterStore.com.
- Taskmaster Education takes elements of the show and uses them to inspire, engage and teach children and young people. Tasks can be adapted to meet a near infinite range of teacher objectives, whether curriculum-based or more focused on social and emotional development. Taskmaster Club launched in September 2023, offering schools across the country the opportunity to host after school clubs that bring Little Alex Horne and the silly joy of Taskmaster into their classrooms. Over 800 schools in the UK have registered to date on com.
- Taskmaster is working with Homeless Link; the national membership charity for frontline homelessness services, creating a virtual Taskmaster at Home event with all the money raised going to homeless charities across the UK. Having raised over £125,000, more information on the virtual event can be found here.
- For the first time ever, fans could step into the shoes of their favourite comedians and complete tasks themselves with Taskmaster: The Live Experience. The launch of the brand-new interactive adventure saw it receive rave reviews, selected as one of Time Out’s ‘Top London Comedy Shows to See’, and Metro’s ‘best adventures to be had in London’. The most ludicrous experience in London extended its run well into 2025 to keep up with demand for tickets.
Taskmaster can be watched on:
TaskmasterSuperMax+
Taskmaster YouTube Channel
Channel 4 / All 4
iTunes
Google
Amazon
Microsoft
