Strictly Come Dancing announces Dani Dyer, Alex Kingston and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink for 2025 lineup

The stars set to grace dancefloor on this year’s series are being revealed over the next week

Strictly Come Dancing has announced Dani Dyer, Alex Kingston and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink as celebrity contestants for the 2025 series.

They join Gladiators star and Olympic sprinter Harry Aikines-Aryeetey on the line-up.

Dyer, who shot to fame after winning Love Island in 2018, said of her appointment: “Getting the opportunity to be on Strictly is the second most amazing thing I’ve done this year.

“I feel very very blessed and cannot wait to get my dancing shoes on,” the 28-year-old TV personality added.

Actor Kingston, known for her roles as Elizabeth Corday in US medical drama ER and River Song in sci-fi show Doctor Who, said she was inspired to join the show after seeing her friend, Miranda actor Sarah Hadland, finish as a runner up on last year’s series.

Dani Dyer and Alex Kingston are joining ‘Strictly’ (BBC)

The British performer, 62, also said she has wanted to take part on the show for years.

Dutch football star Hasselbaink, who currently works alongside Gareth Southgate as assistant coach for the England football team, said he decided to join the show at the request of his family.

Announcing his participation on The One Show, Hasselbaink, 53, said the dancing competition will bring him “totally out of my comfort zone”.

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink is a ‘Strictly 2025’ contestant (BBC)

Meanwhile, 36-year-old Aikines-Aryeetey, known as Nitro to Gladiators fans, said: “I'm so excited to be part of the Strictly family this series and I'm ready to give it all I've got.”

The athlete, a former Team GB sprinter who joined Gladiators in 2023, took part in last year's Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special alongside professional dancer Nancy Xu.

Aikines-Aryeetey said the Christmas Special “was so nice I just had to do it twice”.

He has competed at two Olympic Games and is a three-time European champion and two-time Commonwealth champion. He also became the first athlete to win gold medals at both 100 and 200 metres at the World Youth Championships. He won the 2005 BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year, aged 17.

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He follows in the footsteps of his Gladiators co-star Montell Douglas, who appeared on last year’s 20th anniversary series of Strictly and was eliminated in week 10.

The remaining contestants will be announced throughout August.

The rumoured names for this year’s series include former GB athlete Mo Farah and Sort Your Life Out presenter Stacey Solomon.

Strictly has already revealed two new additions to the professional cast for 2025. Alexis Warr, former winner of the US series So You Think You Can Dance in 2022, and Julian Caillon, a ballroom TV star from Australia, will both be arriving on the dancefloor this autumn.

Harry Aikines-Aryeetey, best known as Nitro on ‘Gladiators’, will be joining ‘Strictly’ in 2025 (BBC)

They will be joining returning professionals Dianne Buswell – who won the BBC dance competition with Chris McCausland in 2024 – alongside Nadiya Bychkova, Katya Jones, Neil Jones, Nikita Kuzmin, Gorka Marquez, Luba Mushtuk and Jowita Przystal.

Amy Dowden, who pulled out of last year’s competition following a foot injury, will also return to the show. She will be joined by Carlos Gu, Kai Widdrington, Johannes Radebe, Aljaž Škorjane, Nancy Xu, Lauren Oakley, Michelle Tsiakkas, Vito Coppola and Karen Hauer.

It’s been revealed that Marquez, one of Strictly‘s best-loved regular professionals, will not be partnered with a celebrity in the 2025 series. He will be absent for up to four weeks of the BBC show’s next run, as he is appearing as a judge on the Spanish version of the competition, Bailando Con Las Estrellas, in October.

All four judges – Craig Revel Horwood, Motsi Mabuse, Shirley Ballas and Anton Du Beke – will return.

Strictly Come Dancing airs on BBC One from September through to December.