Oscars 2026 live updates: Winners list, red carpet, how to watch

Shortly before 2 p.m., under the gaze of the Ripley’s Believe It or Not!’s cartoonish T-Rex figure that keeps watch over Hollywood Boulevard, stars like “One Battle After Another’s” Chase Infiniti — energetically shuffling in a lilac dress with the help of handlers lifting her train to ease her stride — Tig Notaro and Felicity Jones arrived to begin their red carpet journey.

It starts with a labyrinth of black velvet ropes that filters attendees by nominees and presenters, academy special guests and regular guests.

Hollywood’s biggest night is here, along with the biggest red carpet of awards season.

Not only is it massive in size — it takes about 2,400 hours and more than 400 workers to assemble the 25,000-square-foot red carpet, measuring 900 feet long and 60 feet wide — but enormous in influence. It boasts the most memorable, stylish and extravagant fashion in entertainment history. In fact, stars have been taking cues from Hollywood history at precursor awards shows. Old Hollywood glamour dominated January’s Golden Globes. And the Actor Awards, held two weeks ago, were themed “Reimagining Hollywood Glamour from the ‘20s and ‘30s.” So the Oscars red carpet may also pay homage to La La Land.

“Shark Tank” star and investor Kevin O’Leary, who acted in “Marty Supreme,” arrives on the red carpet at the Oscars on Sunday.

(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)

See more photos from the red carpet of the 2026 Oscars.

When last year’s wildfires forced Colleen Atwood to evacuate her home in Pacific Palisades, the Oscar-winning costume designer grabbed a few photographs, gathered her pets and left. She didn’t spend much time deciding what to take. She couldn’t imagine that her house on Aderno Way, where she’d lived for more than 30 years, would burn.

“I had to do a runner,” Atwood jokes, describing her hurried exit on a recent morning phone call from Australia, where she’s been working on Tom Hanks’ World War II drama “Greyhound 2.” “I didn’t really believe it was real.”

Natalie McQueen, left, and Josh Groban arrive on the red carpet at the 98th Annual Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood.

(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)

See more photos from the Oscars red carpet.

When Oscar nominations were announced Thursday morning, there was a newcomer on the list of familiar categories: achievement in casting.

The nominees — Nina Gold for “Hamnet,” Jennifer Venditti for “Marty Supreme,” Cassandra Kulukundis for “One Battle After Another,” Gabriel Domingues for “The Secret Agent” and Francine Maisler for “Sinners” — landed alongside best picture and the acting races, formally elevating a part of the filmmaking process that usually happens long before a movie reaches the screen. It’s the first new Oscar category introduced since animated feature was added in 2001.

The big question surrounding last year’s Academy Awards was whether the show would address the L.A. wildfires, which had rattled the city mere months prior.

This year, the elephant in the room is the ongoing Iran war, which like last year’s wildfires, puts a celebration like the Oscars in sharp relief. But for Conan O’Brien, balancing gravity and levity is part of his job description as host.

Ken Jeong arrives on the red carpet at the 98th Annual Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Sunday.

(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)

The red carpet for the 98th Academy Awards is underway. One of the early sightings is actor and comedian Ken Jeong.

Makeup artist Ken Diaz’s life is worthy of its own Hollywood story — or better yet, a Chicano epic.

At 16, Diaz was caught sneaking into the Paramount sound stage, just to see where they shot the “Brady Bunch.” Years later, he swept the floors of Universal Studios before wrangling ostriches and chasing lions on the set of the 1981 film “Roar.” The wild animals mauled and injured multiple cast members; in one instance, Diaz had to stop director Noel Marshall from internally bleeding.

Delroy Lindo flashed a grateful smile as he and “Sinners’ producer-writer-director Ryan Coogler took in a rousing standing ovation at last month’s NAACP Image Awards.

“We appreciate all the support we’ve been shown in the aftermath of what happened last weekend,” the veteran actor said in his first public appearance following the uproar that erupted when he and fellow “Sinners” star Michael B. Jordan were confronted with a racial slur at the BAFTA Awards six days prior.

Chris Walden, the Hamburg, Germany-born composer who has served as the lead music arranger of the Academy Awards for seven years, was recording on a scoring stage in Cologne more than 30 years ago when a German film executive peeked in and quipped, “That sounds like Hollywood.”

That moment confirmed two things for Walden: “First, I can actually write that music,” the composer said in a recent interview at his Franklin Hills home while in the thick of Oscars prep. “And secondly, it’s not wanted here.”

Despite the awkward persona Amelia Dimoldenberg projects in her decade-old YouTube interview show “Chicken Shop Date,” the 32-year-old Londoner expresses wonderment that her little web series that could has taken her all the way to the Academy Awards red carpet, where she’ll be returning as a correspondent for the third year in a row.

“I do often take moments to be like, it’s mental,” Dimoldenberg exclaims via Zoom two months out from the March 15 ceremony, a period she’ll be using to cram the Oscar contenders in order to come up with hundreds of questions to have in the metaphorical back pocket of her designer gown.

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Six months and 16 Oscar nominations ago, Delroy Lindo hopped on a Zoom call with the awards consultants running the campaign for Ryan Coogler’s genre-defying American horror story, “Sinners.” Actors don’t often participate in these meetings. But Lindo had received so much love for his turn as bluesman Delta Slim since “Sinners” premiered in April, he figured, “Why not sit in?” Mostly, he just wanted to ask one simple question: How can we make the most of this moment?

“The Voice of Hind Rajab,” a heartbreaking retelling of the efforts to save a 6-year-old Palestinian girl amid Israel’s attacks on Gaza, will be honored at the 98th Academy Awards on Sunday — without one of its star players.

Actor Motaz Malhees, who stars in the film as Red Crescent dispatcher Omar, confirmed Thursday that he will be absent from the festivities because of President Trump’s travel ban against Palestinians. “I had the honor of playing one of the lead roles in a story the world needed to hear,” Malhees said on Instagram, “but I will not be there.”

What does one do on the morning of the Academy Award nominations? Wake up early? Try to sleep in? Wait for your publicist to call?

In this episode of The Envelope podcast, the “Weapons” star discusses finding viral fame with her Oscar-nominated role as Aunt Gladys after years of ups and downs.

How has Oscars style evolved over the years? Our archival gallery features the looks of all of the lead actress, lead actor, supporting actress and supporting actor winners since the turn of the century.

SEE THE PHOTOS >

Wagner Moura’s riveting star turn in “The Secret Agent” made him the first Brazilian man nominated for an Academy Award for lead actor. So in addition to the usual congratulations from friends and family, Brazil itself took joy in the announcement. “It was a big thing in Brazil, which makes me so excited,” Moura says, sitting in a conference room at The Times after a photo shoot. “I’m so happy that Brazilians are embracing culture and art as something that they’re proud of, particularly this film and [international feature winner] ‘I’m Still Here’ last year, which was also a political film that takes place during the dictatorship.”

Brazil’s brutal military dictatorship lasted from 1964 to 1985. “The Secret Agent,” set primarily in 1977, centers on Moura’s character Marcelo, who goes into hiding because a villainous businessman wants to kill him.

In this episode of The Envelope video podcast, Teyana Taylor describes the “slingshot” of success that’s come with “One Battle After Another” and shares her insights as to why fictional revolutionary Perfidia Beverly Hills does what she does in the film.

The 2026 original song contenders come from deep inside the characters singing them: a simple man wistfully looking back on his ordinary life; a budding bluesman with talent to burn down the house; a 17-time Oscar nominee; a demon-hunting K-pop star channeling the real-life singer-songwriter behind her; and a joyous expression of life from inside a documentary’s main “character,” a retirement home for musicians.

‘Dear Me’ from ‘Diane Warren: Relentless’

In this episode of The Envelope podcast, the “Sentimental Value” star reflects on growing up onscreen and following in big sister Dakota Fanning’s footsteps.

Eight months ago, production designers Misty Buckley and Alana Billingsley began proposing new ideas for the 2026 Academy Awards stage. Three months ago, contracted companies started building sets for the show. Three weeks ago, the Oscars production team loaded its equipment into the Dolby Theatre: more than 800 lighting fixtures, a custom PA system and massive fiber optic cables that run underground. Now, with less than 72 hours until the ceremony, Oscars co-executive producer Rob Paine said their “circus” is finally camera-ready.

Electricians run cables through underground manholes at the Dolby Theatre to power generators for broadcast trucks.

(Ye Fan / The Academy)

Tears have been shed. Heads have been shaved. Blimps have been moored.

The movie that broke the all-time record for nominations came out nearly a year ago, while the favorite to win best picture hit theaters in September.

So, yes, it’s time for both a reset and a coronation, time to (finally) close the book on an awards season that, until recently, felt short on surprises and long on … well, just plain long.

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Ryan Coogler was deep into writing “Sinners” when he realized the movie was missing something: He needed a moment that would jolt the audience and plunge them into a different space.

“Instead of watching the rest of the movie from here,” Coogler tells me, pointing to his head, “you take them here,” he says, patting his heart. “Like ripping you out of one movie and dropping you into another.”

Ryan Coogler’s period vampire drama “Sinners” set an Oscar record Thursday morning, earning 16 nominations, the most ever received by a single film.

The total surpassed the previous high of 14 nominations, a milestone shared by “All About Eve” (1950), “Titanic” (1997) and “La La Land” (2016).

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When Rose Byrne won a Golden Globe last month for her starring role as a mother on the verge of a nervous breakdown in Mary Bronstein’s “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You,” her acceptance speech briefly threatened to overshadow the actual honor. In it, she explained that her longtime partner, Bobby Cannavale, was absent from the ceremony because he was at a reptile convention in New Jersey, where he hoped to fulfill their children’s dreams by purchasing a bearded dragon.

It was a charming and funny aside that some users of social media naturally used to criticize Cannavale and try to gin up a controversy. (Insert eye-roll emoji here.) Byrne, now an Oscar nominee for the same role, found herself having to explain that parenthood almost always comes with scheduling conflicts and answer follow-up questions about the reptilian addition to her family.

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Joachim Trier’s “Sentimental Value” is nominated for an impressive nine Academy Awards, among them the first best picture nod for a Norwegian film and the auteur himself for both directing and co-writing (with longtime collaborator Eskil Vogt) the family drama’s original screenplay.

But perhaps the film’s most remarkable achievement, Oscar-wise, is four first-time acting nominations.

To vote for the Oscars, you have to watch all the nominated movies.

This may seem obvious. But until this year, the motion picture academy operated entirely on the honor system, strongly encouraging members to see everything before voting.

Now voters have to show their work — up to a point.

The 2026 Oscars are just hours away.

The 98th Academy Awards will be held Sunday at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, where Hollywood’s biggest names will celebrate the best films of the year for a final time.

Chance Gugler touches up the red carpet backdrop on Friday ahead of today’s 98th edition of the Academy Awards in Hollywood.

(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)

What goes into the

If this year’s best picture nominees had a theme, it’s: Back off and let me do my work, whether it’s lady-bossing, creature-building, race-car driving, “Hamlet”-writing, ping-pong playing, revolution-stoking, juke-joint opening or logging the timber that built America. I dug moments in every one of them. But my work isn’t done until I pick the nominee I wish would win in each of these categories — and then shout out to the skipped films that deserved to be in the conversation.

Teyana Taylor has ordered two plates of chicken wings for the table. After last night, she’s not taking any chances.

The rest of us do not know this when we meet inside a deserted restaurant at a West Hollywood boutique hotel. Chase Infiniti arrives first and slides into the middle of the booth we’ve picked out, thinking ahead so it’ll be easier for her two “One Battle After Another” co-stars to join us. Regina Hall and Taylor show up together a couple of minutes later, still talking about last night’s Governors Awards, which reunited the trio after a few weeks apart.

This was a year of big swings and I’m not just talking about Timothée Chalamet’s ping-pong serve. The Academy Awards feel like they’re in motion, too — a body less affixed to an idea of what a best picture contender is and more willing to race after talent from around the globe. But they can’t all be winners. Here’s my ranking of the 10 nominees, from whiff to smash.

10. ‘Hamnet’

The 32nd Actor Awards scrambled a best picture race that had felt settled after “One Battle After Another” won the top prize at the Producers Guild Awards.

We pay attention to the Actor Awards because the show takes place while Oscar ballots are out and are, for the most part, a reliable precursor to the Academy Awards. How trustworthy will they be for the acting winners this year? Let’s take a look.

It’s been more than two decades since the Oscars were celebrated as the United States was launching a war in the Middle East.

In 2003, the Academy Awards ceremony at the Dolby Theatre occurred just days after U.S. troops invaded Iraq, elevating security concerns surrounding Hollywood’s biggest night so much that they tightened security like never before.

“Sinners” has made Oscars history.

The 98th Academy Award nominations were announced Thursday and Ryan Coogler’s musical horror earned 16 overall nominations, breaking the record for the most nominations for a film previously held by “All about Eve” (1950), “Titanic” (1997) and “La La Land” (2016). “Sinners’” nominations include best picture, directing, original screenplay and individual acting nods for stars Michael B. Jordan, Wunmi Mosaku and Delroy Lindo.