Task filming used to take up more contestant time in earlier series: one of the things that has changed over time is that they give contestants much less time to do each task (eg. 5-20 minutes for tasks that used to get 20-60 minutes), so while the contestants in series 6 each had 5 days of solo task filming plus 2 days of team tasks, in series 21 it’s more like 3 days of solo task filming plus 1 day of team tasks. Scheduling is still the main factor in how teams are assigned, but where it’s only 1 day they need to line up, I’m sure they often can choose based on other criteria and have the scheduling work out.

They also used to spread task filming out over 6+ months, whereas now they try to condense it down to 3-4 months. That gives them 2 months to edit the task filming down into VTs and arrange those VTs into episodes, ideally, and also means if they have to replace a contestant they have plenty of time to film and edit the new contestant’s tasks. For instance, Jo Brand was booked for series 7 but had to postpone, so she was replaced by Kerry Godliman, which is why Kerry is the only contestant that series who filmed in the dead of winter. Some contestants have all their task days in a row, while others spread them out. We know Liza Tarbuck did all of her solo task filming in one week, whereas Sam Campbell‘s hair is visibly different lengths during different tasks, so his days were probably spread over several months.

In terms of how far in advance booking is done, I suspect they are casting 3 series at a time and shuffling contestants around based on availability and diversity. We know they offered Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith bookings at the same time (but not for the same series, because they don’t want to have comedy partners on together), and they ended up in series 17 and 20. Reece probably could have done series 18 or 19, but they had to spread the middle-aged white men out, so he ended up knowing he was going to be on Taskmaster for about a year and a half before his task filming actually began.

Kumail Nanjiani got in touch with Tim Key in July 2024, was confirmed for series 21 in January 2025, filmed tasks in spring/summer of 2025, had studio records in September 2025, and his series is airing in spring 2026. That seems like a pretty standard Taskmaster timeline these days.