Things will get very hot and spicy in Tauranga City tomorrow as the national final of the 2026 New Zealand National Chilli Eating Challenge comes to town!

Tauranga has held a regional “heat” of the competition for four years, but this year The Barrel Room is the national host – meaning locals can feel the burn to try to claim the NZ Chilli Eating Champion crown, and $500 cash.

Organiser Mark Jackson said the event would run from 12pm to 6pm, swallowing up Wharf St’s pedestrian-only strip in the CBD and offering a festival atmosphere tomorrow from noon.

The Rock radio station will MC the event, with live music on an outdoor stage and seven hot-sauce suppliers from around New Zealand at stalls offering tastings and products for sale to entertain the crowds. Nearby restaurants and bars will be selling spicy special dishes, Jackson said.

Regional heats were held in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Whanganui, Christchurch, and Dunedin to find the country’s fiercest chilli eaters.

“We expect to have most of the regional champions in Tauranga to compete in the final as long as they can get themselves there, as well as some locals and an Australian champion too,” he said. “Last year’s NZ champion, Jesse Painter from Christchurch, will also travel to Tauranga to defend his title.”

Jackson planned for about 15 competitors in the final and had sourced 20 chilli varieties. “They go from a jalapeno, which is our mildest, through to a brainstrain. Those go up to 1.8 million Scoville,” he said.

The Scoville scale measures the pungency, or “heat” of chilli peppers. “This scale determines how hot a chilli is. For example, 1 Scoville takes 1.8 million drops of water to remove the heat. If you look up 1.8m drops of water, it’s about 500L.”

That’s why the competition was serious business. “It’s not for the faint-hearted, that’s for sure.”

The final will begin at 3pm on the outdoor stage – and viewing points will be in hot demand.

“I will line up the chillis, and each contestant will be given a chilli. We count it down, they throw it in their mouths and chew it. It has stay in their mouth for at least 30 seconds,” Jackson said.

After that, contestants can swallow the chilli. “We have a five-minute break, then go again and again until the last man is standing, basically.”

Mark said the final usually ended with “two crazy people”. “It can get down to a speed race to crown the winner.”

The Barrel Room general manager Liam Jackson said local representation would be high, thanks to the “fast-track pass straight to the national final” on offer to locals.

The Barrel Room general manager Liam Jackson is preparing for a big crowd to watch 2026’s New Zealand National Chilli Eating Challenge final on wharf St. Photo / Kelly O’Hara

So if you can handle the heat and think you’d cause an upset, sign up now, he says.

“We’ve got eight locals signed up so far. It’s going to be amazing!”

Whether Tauranga’s past chilli-eating champion Shannon Leigh would compete remained unknown, said Liam. “He’s keeping his cards pretty close to his chest on whether he will enter – you’ll have to come along and see!”