The 10 funniest jokes from this year's Edinburgh Festival Fringe revealed

Adam Rowe wrote the gag while on stage in Liverpool

A joke about being fired from a jobcentre has been crowned the funniest joke of this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Adam Rowe conquered the 11th annual Dave’s Funniest Joke Of The Fringe award with the line: “Working at the Jobcentre has to be a tense job – knowing that if you get fired, you still have to come in the next day.”

The comedian won with 41% of a public vote on a shortlist of gags picked by comedy critics, closely beating stiff competition from Leo Kearse's short gag: “I had a job drilling holes for water – it was well boring.”

Rowe began doing stand-up comedy in 2010, leaving behind a bar job after being named Liverpool comedian of the year in 2011. The award-winning joke was part of his Undeniable show, which the comic has been touring over the last year.

Explaining how he came up with the joke, Rowe said: “I actually wrote it when I was on stage... I was doing the usual compering thing, asking people what they do for a living.

“A guy said he worked in the Jobcentre and I said the joke that has now won the award. Because it got such a nice reaction on the night I thought I had to do something with it as a line.

“I didn’t expect to be winning an award for what was essentially a brain fart!”

Tim Vine, Stewart Francis and Zoe Lyons have all previously won the prestigious award. Maths student Ken Cheng took home the prize last year: “I’m not a fan of the new pound coin, but then again, I hate all change.”

Voted on by 2,000 people, the award lists jokes anonymously to avoid bias towards well-known comedians. See the rest of the top 10 jokes below.

The top 10 jokes from the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2018

1. “Working at the JobCentre has to be a tense job – knowing that if you get fired, you still have to come in the next day” – Adam Rowe

2. “I had a job drilling holes for water – it was well boring” – Leo Kearse

3. “I took out a loan to pay for an exorcism. If I don’t pay it back, I’m going to get repossessed” – Olaf Falafel

4. “In my last relationship, I hated being treated like a piece of meat. She was a vegan and refused to touch me” – Daniel Audritt

5. “What do colour blind people do when they are told to eat their greens?” – Flo and Joan

6. “I’ve got a new job collecting all the jumpers left in the park at the weekends, but it’s not easy. They keep moving the goalposts” – Darren Walsh

7. “Trump said he’d build a wall but he hasn’t even picked up a brick. He’s just another middle-aged man failing on a DIY project” – Justin Moorhouse

8= “I lost a friend after we had an argument about the Tardis. I thought it was a little thing, but it seemed much bigger once we got into it” – Adele Cliff

8= “Why are they calling it Brexit and not The Great British Break Off?” – Alex Edelman

10. “I think love is like central heating. You turn it on before guests arrive and pretend it’s like this all the time” – Laura Lexx