The race towards music’s biggest night: A critical look at the 2026 Grammy’s

Where do music, fashion and prestige meet? Where do all the world’s most famous musicians get together to receive coveted and career-defining awards? The Grammy Awards.  The annual event is scheduled to take place on the first day of February at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. The Grammy Awards began in 1959 as a modest, untelevised ceremony created by the Recording Academy to honor artistic excellence in the music industry. They have since evolved into one of the world’s most prestigious and influential music award shows, often called “music’s biggest night” by music critics. Grammys are one of the most important entrainment events in the world. Moreover, getting awarded a Grammy can be career changing and open many new doors for artists, especially early in their career.

 Although the Grammys usually give out dozens of awards, the most renowned are known as the “Big Four”. These are the awards for best new artist, song of the year, record of the year and album of the year. 

Firstly, we will discuss the nominees for the best new artist award. In 2026 the award for best new artist received eight nominations: Olivia Dean, Leon Thomas III, Alex Warren, Lola Young, KATSEYE, The Marías, Sombr and Addison Rae. According to Billboard, the favorites to win the award: Sombr, Alex Warren and Olivia Dean. Sombr came to notoriety earlier this year for his hits “Back to Friends” and “Undressed”, both of which achieved top 20 in the Billboard Hot 100.  Alex Warren’s romantic sound was discovered by the mainstream in 2025 when his song “Ordinary” blew up and reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100. Olivia Dean, who started releasing music in 2019, came into the public consciousness last year when her song “Man I Need” started trending on TikTok.

The award for Album of the Year is considered the most prestigious award amongst the big four. This year the competition is fierce with nominees like Mayhem by Lady Gaga, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS by Bad Bunny, CHROMAKOPIA by Tyler the Creator and Hurry up Tomorrow by the Weekend and many more. While all these albums have a chance of winning, the critic has generally agreed that Lady Gaga is the most likely winner. This is because, not only did this album achieve extreme commercial success in 2026 with the song “Abracadabra”, but the album also conveys nostalgia since it is heavily resembles the dance-pop albums that Gaga released early during her career. According to John Stein who is the head of North America Editorial at Spotify said, “Lady Gaga always feels like a strong contender for this category, and her being a household name helps here.”

A common misconception is that the Record of the Year and Song of the Year award are the same, as they both award individual songs instead of an artist or album. However, they each award different aspects of the song.  According to the Grammy website “Record Of The Year deals with a specific recording of a song and recognizes the Artists, Producers and Engineers who contribute to that recording, while Song Of The Year deals with the composition of a song and recognizes the songwriters who wrote the song.” Because of this the favorites to win one award usually aren’t the strongest contenders in another.

The songs that are nominated for the song of the year in the 2026 Grammy Awards are: Abracadabra by Lady Gaga, Anxiety by Doechii, APT. by ROSÉ and Bruno Mars, DtMF by Bad Bunny, Golden by HUNTR/X, Luther by Kendrick Lamar and SZA, Manchild by Sabrina Carpenter,  Wildflower by Billie Elish. Although predicting winners for the song of the year's award is notoriously difficult, billboard has chosen a few songs that it thinks are strong contenders. APT. Is a strong contender as this song spent a total of 12 weeks on the first spot of the billboard hot 100. Golden by HUNTR/X is also a favorite as the song achieved significant success during 2025 and topped the charts for weeks; if it wins, it will become the first K-Pop song to ever win in this category. Another strong contender is Luther by Kendrick Lamar and SZA as the song was on number one for 13 consecutive weeks and debuted in number 3 on the billboard hot 100. However, all the nominees in this category achieved significant success in 2025 and all have a real chance of taking the award home. 

Finally, the nominees for the record of the year award are: DtMF by Bad Bunny, Manchild by Sabrina Carpenter, Anxiety by Doechii, WILDFLOWER by Billie Elish, Abracadabra by Lady Gaga, luther by Kendrick Lamar, The Subway by Chappel Roan, APT. By Rosé and Bruno Mars. According to the critics a strong contender for the award is luther, however, it might not win solely because Kendrick Lamar, who is the artist of the song, won the category last year with his song Not Like Us. Abracadabra’s extravagant sound may also be a strong favorite for this category. Moreover, APT. by Bruno Mars and Rosé is also a strong contender due to its high position in the charts and broad public appeal. If the song wins Mars will become the first artist to win four times in this category. 

While the competition for the grammy’s is always strong, this year, all the big four awards have multiple strong contenders that produced incredible music in 2025. Because of this, it will be extremely hard for the grammy voters to pick just one winner for each award. With so many strong contenders in each category, the only certainty is that this year's Grammy Awards will be unforgettable. 

Bibliography: 

Billboard Staff. “2026 Grammy Awards: Predictions and Nominee Breakdown.” Billboard, 2025. 

Recording Academy. “About the Grammy Awards.” Grammy.com, Recording Academy, 2025. 

Minsker, Evan. “Lady Gaga’s ‘Mayhem’ and the Return of Dance‑Pop.” Pitchfork, Condé Nast, 2025. 

Shaffer, Claire. “Bad Bunny’s Global Impact and His 2026 Grammy Nominations.” Rolling Stone, 2025. 

Garcia, Thania. “K‑Pop’s Rise at the Grammys: HUNTR/X and the Road to Song of the Year.” Variety, 2025. 

Trust, Gary. “Billboard Hot 100: Year‑End Chart Analysis for 2025.” Billboard, 2025.