Largest Dance Competitions in the United States

I was curious which ballroom competitions are the largest in North America. For example, I'm pretty sure the Ohio Star Ball is the largest, but what are the top 5 or so?

Also, what about swing competitions? Argentine Tango? Salsa? Hustle?

I guess I would have to say that the larger of the comps include Ohio, USDSC, Heritage, and Emerald.

Larinda

"Largest" can have different meanings. If you mean largest number of entries, then definitely competitions like the Ohio Star Ball and Emerald Ball are near the top. But largest number of entries does not mean largest number of people competing: for example, if someone enters 50 single-dance events and 4 scholarships then that generates 54 entries for just one couple. I suspect that the "largest number of people" competing title might go to the Manhatten Amateur Classic or to the USABDA National Dancesport Championships. There were over 350 couples competing at last year's Nationals. In terms of "largest number of spectators" that would probably be one of the big comps at BYU. They host the NDCA National Youth/Junior/Pre-teen championships along with the NDCA US Professional Standard championships, and I hear the venue is packed with 10,000 spectators.

I don't have exact numbers, so what I've written is based on personal observation and guessing, but you get my point that 'largest' can mean a few different things.

curious too....

I would say Emerald, Millennium, Manhattan, USDC, Ohio, Holiday. A good way to check is to look at the number of days a competition lasts. If they last 5 days or more, it's a big competition!

On the amateur side of things, I think the largest in terms of entries are some of the big college competitions like the National Collegiate Dancesport Championship. I have the general impression that MIT and DCDI are up there as well, but there are others here who haven't been out of college quite as long as I have who could do a better job naming specific college comps.

The sheer size of those has a lot to do with the ginormous syllabus fields though. Top to bottom, there's a lot to be said for the fields at MAC and USA Dance (which was USABDA back when this thread started) Nationals.

Last year DCDI had 789 individuals registered, MIT had about 900 based on my calculations. National Collegiate Dancesport Championships was about 800 as well.

Depth of field is the criteria i would use. Comps the discuss entries are not the same as comps that discuss entraNTS...

I usually just hear reports on number of entries. I hardly ever hear number of actual dancers....but I just do ProAm, perhaps it is presented differently.

Yes, in pro am they count entries, since quantities are much different in pro am. In am/am dancing, there is for instance usually only one silver standard event for an age group, and usually you are limited to two age groups, so that would mean 5 x 2 or 10 'entries'. I hear of pro am students doing 50, 100, or more. One entrant could account for hundreds of entries...

Just to throw another number out there, OSB last year had around 1650 individual entrants. Of course we have to keep in mind, 1 pro can dance with a half dozen or more students, so number of entrants doesn't quite give as good a number for comparison either. A somewhat better statistic might be number of partnerships, which is not tracked anywhere I'm aware of (if only I could get my grubby hands on some comp databases). As a competitor, the only metric that matters to me is how many couples are in my category. As a spectator, it's a mix of how many couples I know, and how many top couples are present that matters. For instance, I like to go to small local comps because I get to watch people I know, even if my event is uncontested, and if a few of my favorite pros are present, it's a bonus!

Is anyone able to advise on what are some of the bigger comps for pro/am in Canada?

I woudln't say there is much that's "big" for pro-am on the westcoast for Canada.

Perhaps Toronto?

Not much that's "big" this way either. Montreal (both Classique and Dansesport) and Toronto (Crystal Leaf and Toronto Open) tend to be the larger comps, but the pro-am fields are still tiny compared to comps in the US. From what I've seen, it's rare to have anything other than a straight final in championships and scholarships, though the likelihood seems to be higher in the senior 1 and 2 categories, and in bronze.

(I personally get excited if the field for my events is 4 or larger, but sometimes even with small numbers the competition is quite strong.)

I can say on the west coast we are trying to 'grow' the pro/am comps, but most of them have a total of one year under their belt so far, and are not attracting many beyond the local area. I did one comp and was completely uncontested in every event. Another I did had 1-2 competitors in only half.

I was thinking Montreal and Toronto might be good options. More so than the West Coast for sure.