The Pulitzer Prizes for 2005 were announced on April 4, 2005:

Journalism

• Beat reporting: Amy Dockser Marcus of The Wall Street Journal for her "stories about patients, families and physicians [of the] world of cancer survivors".
• Breaking news photography: Associated Press staff Murad Sezer, Khalid Mohammed
• Breaking news reporting: Staff of The Star-Ledger, Newark, New Jersey, for "coverage of the resignation of New Jersey's governor after he announced he was gay and confessed to adultery with a male lover".
• Commentary: Connie Schultz of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland
• Criticism: Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal
• Explanatory reporting: Gareth Cook of The Boston Globe for explaining "the complex scientific and ethical dimensions of stem cell research".
• Editorial cartooning: Nick Anderson of The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky.
• Editorial writing: Tom Philp of The Sacramento Bee
• Feature photography: Deanne Fitzmaurice of the San Francisco Chronicle
• Feature writing: Julia Keller of the Chicago Tribune for her "account of a deadly 10-second tornado that ripped through Utica, Illinois".
• International reporting:
  • Kim Murphy of the Los Angeles Times for her "coverage of Russia's struggle to cope with terrorism, improve the economy and make democracy work".
  • Dele Olojede of Newsday, Long Island, New York, for his look at Rwanda 10 years after the Rwandan genocide.
• Investigative reporting: Nigel Jaquiss of Willamette Week, Portland, Oregon, "for his investigation exposing a former governor's long concealed sexual misconduct with a 14-year-old girl".
• National reporting: Walt Bogdanich of The New York Times for his "stories about the corporate cover-up of responsibility for fatal accidents at railway crossings".
• Public service: Los Angeles Times, for "exposing deadly medical problems and racial injustice at a major public hospital".

Letters and drama

• Biography or autobiography
  • de Kooning: An American Master by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan (Alfred A. Knopf)
• Drama
  • Doubt, a parable by John Patrick Shanley (TCG)
• Fiction
  • Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (Farrar)
• General non-fiction
  • Ghost Wars by Steve Coll (The Penguin Press)
• History
  • Washington's Crossing by David Hackett Fischer (Oxford University Press)
• Music
  • Second Concerto for Orchestra by Steven Stucky (Theodore Presser Company)
• Poetry
  • Delights & Shadows by Ted Kooser (Copper Canyon Press)