The Oscars 2026: Everything You Need To Know
Awards season’s crown jewel is gradually refining its bevels. The Oscars 2026 might still be a month away, but whispered early contenders, novel approaches to the red carpet and a renewed appetite for cinematic spectacle could make this year’s Academy Awards sharper and shinier than ever
Who is nominated for the Oscars 2026?
Nominations for the 98th Academy Awards have now been unveiled, and at the heart of the ceremony sits Sinners, which has landed an extraordinary 16 nominations. The film breaks the Academy’s long-standing record held by All About Eve, Titanic and La La Land for the highest number of Oscar nominations received by a single film in one year. Sinners secured a Best Actor nomination for Michael B. Jordan and strong representation across craft categories (such as for Ruth E. Carter’s stunning costume design), while also garnering recognition in areas where it hadn’t managed to receive any nominations so far, such as for makeup and hairstyling, sound and original score. The question remains, however, whether a record-breaking nominations list will translate into a similarly historic trophy haul on the night.
Best Picture remains a high-stakes squeeze. Alongside Sinners, One Battle After Another emerges as a formidable rival, buoyed by nominations for Paul Thomas Anderson’s direction, Leonardo DiCaprio for Best Actor, and Teyana Taylor for Best Supporting Actress. Hamnet continues to be the name on everyone’s lips, while Sentimental Value consolidates its position as the Academy’s most warmly embraced international crossover, landing nominations for Best Picture, Director, Original Screenplay and multiple acting categories.
For Best Actress, Renate Reinsve (Sentimental Value) joins Jessie Buckley (Hamnet), Rose Byrne (If I Had Legs I’d Kick You), Kate Hudson (Song Sung Blue) and Emma Stone (Bugonia). While Amanda Seyfried (The Testament of Ann Lee) and Tessa Thompson (Hedda) ultimately fell outside the final nominations, their performances remain emblematic of the season’s broader trend: restrained and deeply psychological work.
When, where and how will the Oscars take place?
This year’s Academy Awards will be held on Sunday, March 15, 2026, at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood. The ceremony will be televised live in more than 200 territories around the globe.
Conan O’Brien will resume hosting duties for a second consecutive year, after a widely praised debut. While continuity is welcome, there is growing appetite for evolution in the hosting role. Following broad acclaim for Nikki Glaser’s assured, sharp-turn performance hosting the Golden Globe Awards this year and the annual clamoring for beloved comedy duo Tina Fey and Amy Poehler to revive their awards season double act, many in the industry are hopeful the Academy will usher in another female host in the near future.
Will 2026 mark the return of the blockbuster Oscar?
After several years of the Academy championing intimate, independent and character-driven films, 2026 is shaping up as a potential inflection point. What’s returning is not blockbuster cinema in its most literal, commercial sense, but a renewed reverence for films designed to be experienced collectively, on the biggest screen possible, with an audience rather than alone. In that context, many of this year’s frontrunners complicate the old binaries. Sinners, Frankenstein and One Battle After Another are full of scale and ambition, but their weight lies just as much in mood and craft. Meanwhile, films like Sentimental Value and Train Dreams operate as emotional blockbusters, in the sense that their power accumulates through the audience’s sustained immersion in characters’ worlds, but without visual excess.
What 2026 appears to be celebrating is movie-going as an event. Films that justify the act of gathering, watching together, and staying with the experience after the lights come up.
Oscars’ red-carpet fashion matters more than ever
In 2026, the red carpet feels newly consequential. As cinema reasserts the value of the shared, big-screen experience, awards-season fashion has ebbed back into a similar cultural role. This year’s Golden Globes offered a good look at that shift: bold, legible silhouettes; couture worn with intent, and a decisive move away from algorithm-friendly minimalism. Among the women in Best Actress contention, we saw looks as an (albeit very subtle) nod to the characters they play. Teyana Taylor’s fluidly architectural Schiaparelli echoed the coiled intensity of One Battle After Another’s Perfidia Beverly Hills; Tessa Thompson’s emerald, fish-scaled Balenciaga dress had a rigid column silhouette pointing to the modernist restraint of Hedda Gabler; while Jessie Buckley, much like Agnes in Hamnet, appeared submerged in character, her pale-blue custom Dior gown evoking grief, water and emotional translucence.
For the fashion industry, this renewed seriousness is very rewarding. Major houses like Schiaparelli, Dior, Balenciaga, Valentino Garavani and Louis Vuitton are returning to red-carpet dressing with fresh vigor, seeing awards season again as a stage for designer authorship rather than pure reach. In a fractured media landscape, beyond the Met Gala, the Oscars red carpet remains fashion’s most potent global broadcast.
Remember these iconic Oscars outfits?
Who could forget Cher’s 1986 Bob Mackie ensemble (complete with feathered headpiece, bejeweled bralette and matching low-slung skirt), Celine Dion’s back-to-front white satin tuxedo, or Björk’s swan dress? All have gone down in history as some of the most iconic looks of all time. Memorable Oscar debuts include Rihanna, who stepped out in a brown leather Alaïa look while pregnant, for her first appearance in 2023, and Lily Gladstone in custom Gucci at the 2024 ceremony. While wearing vintage on the red carpet has become a trend in recent years, it certainly isn’t a new idea. Both Julia Roberts and Reese Witherspoon picked up their Oscar statuettes in the early 2000s, wearing archival gowns by Valentino Garavani and Dior, respectively. Meanwhile, Halle Berry made history by becoming the first Black woman to win Best Actress for her role in Monster’s Ball, which she collected wearing a beautiful, embroidered tulle and gathered taffeta gown by Elie Saab.
As for the 2026 ceremony? From Teyana Taylor and Ariana Grande, through to Jessie Buckley, Chase Infiniti and Emma Stone, the stars of this year’s hotly tipped films will be in attendance. And with the most in-demand stylists and designers at their fingertips, they are all guaranteed to captivate in custom looks come Oscars night.
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