Holland's Next Top Model

Show format

Each season of Holland's Next Top Model has from 8–11 episodes and starts with 10–15 contestants. Each episode, one contestant is eliminated, though there have been cases of a double elimination or non-elimination by consensus of the judging panel. Makeovers are administered to contestants early in the season, and at least one trip to an international destination is scheduled.

Each episode covers the events of roughly a week of real time (however, while overseas, an episode roughly covers three to four days, totaling two weeks of filming abroad), and features a fashion challenge, photo shoot or commercial, judging, and critique of each contestant and her performance by the judging panel. Each episode is usually associated with a theme in the world of modeling, such as dealing with the press in interviews, selling a commercial product, appearing in a runway show or going on "go sees".

Challenges

An episode usually begins with the contestants receiving training in an area concurrent with the week's theme. For example, contestants may get coached in runway walking, improvisational acting, or applying make-up to suit various occasions. A related challenge soon follows, such as a mock runway show or interview, and a winner is chosen by a judge. She receives a prize, such as clothing, a night out, or an advantage at the next photo shoot, and she is usually allowed to share the benefits with a certain number of other contestants of her choice.

Photo shoots

The next segment is a photo shoot, and each contestant's performance will reflect heavily on her judging for that week. Each season features photo shoots such as bikini or lingerie shots, beauty shots, posing nude or semi-nude, posing with a male model, and posing with animal(s). Usually one photo shoot per season is replaced with a commercial shoot.

Judging and elimination

The final segment of each episode is judging. Each contestant's photo is then shown and evaluated by the judging panel. After all photos have been evaluated, the contestants leave the room as the judges deliberate. The elimination process is ceremonious, as the host hands out photos to the safe contestants one by one, in order of merit. The bottom two contestants are called forward for criticism, before it is revealed which of the two has been eliminated. In contrast to the American version of the show, the final episode features the last three or four contestants competing in a live finale.

Cycles

Just a day before the live finale of cycle 4, it was confirmed that contestant Patricia van der Vliet would be a finalist after having been in the hospital suffering from Crohn's disease. The Dutch viewers were allowed to vote for their favorite model well in advance of this notice, two weeks before the finale, but viewers of the show were unsure whether van der Vliet would advance to the final in spite of her illness. In the final episode, van der Vliet was eliminated due to having the least votes from the public vote. The judges disagreed heavily with the final result, and the finale was criticized by viewers who saw the fourth placer as having been at a disadvantage with the other three contestants.

After cycle 4, the show merged with Topmodel, the Belgian adaptation of the show. The merged version of the show was renamed Benelux's Next Top Model. Despite the Benelux reference in the title, the program was not broadcast in Luxembourg or Wallonia, and did not feature contestants from Luxembourg. After a two season run, the show returned with a fifth cycle under its original name. Three of the five jury members from the last season of Benelux's Next Top Model returned to the fifth season of the show, as did many other production and crew members. The two winners of the merged version, Rosalinde Kikstra and Melissa Baas, were also recognized among the winners on the official website.

Cycle 8 winner Loiza Lamers is the first and to date, only openly transgender winner of the Top Model franchise.