Is Bunny the man to beat? Will “Golden” take the gold? Could Kendrick finally bag Album of the Year? Here are EW’s picks for this year’s Big Four categories.

Our 2026 Grammys predictions: Who will win (and who should)

Is Bunny the man to beat? Will "Golden" take the gold? Could Kendrick finally bag Album of the Year? Here are EW's picks for this year's Big Four categories.

By Jason Lamphier

Jason Lamphier is a senior editor at who covers news and music. Before joining EW, he was an editor at The New York Observer, Out, and Interview.

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January 30, 2026 8:30 a.m. ET

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Grammy nominees Doechii, Bad Bunny, Huntr/x, Lady Gaga, and Addison Rae. Credit:

Netflix; Getty Images

The 68th Annual Grammy Awards are almost here, and regardless of who walks away with a trophy (or five), history has already been made. When the nominees were announced in November, Bad Bunny became the first Spanish-language artist to receive nods for Album, Record, and Song of the Year in a single year. The Puerto Rican superstar and Super Bowl headliner already has three Grammys to his name — not to mention 17 Latin Grammys — and this year he could pick up as many as six more.

Leading the 2026 class is Kendrick Lamar, with nine nominations — including for Record, Album, and Song of the Year — followed by Lady Gaga, her *Mayhem *producer Cirkut, and Jack Antonoff, with seven noms each.

We'll have to wait until music's biggest night on Sunday, Feb. 1, to find out which artists leave Los Angeles' Crypto.com Arena victorious. Until then, we can't help but speculate who will snuff out the competition and continue to stump for our favorites. Here, **'s predictions for who will win in the Grammys' Big Four categories — and our picks for who *should* win.

Best New Artist

Olivia Dean performs at the ARIA Awards in Sydney on Nov. 19, 2025.

Mark Metcalfe/Getty

Olivia Dean**Katseye**The Marías**Addison Rae**Sombr**Leon Thomas**Alex Warren**Lola Young

The Best New Artist category is infamous for sneaking in artists who aren't really new, just newly ubiquitous — or, less often, newly acclaimed. But this year's crop of nominees actually feels sorta right, with Addison Rae, Sombr, and Alex Warren all having released their debut albums during the Recording Academy's eligibility period. Sombr made a significant dent in the pop landscape this past year, launching into the charts with two viral TikTok hits, racking up hundreds of millions of streams, and scoring a coveted spot as a musical guest on *SNL. *But the fact that he didn't make the cut for the Grammys' pop categories gives us pause. Addison Rae has the critics and club freaks on her side, and shouldn't be ruled out, while Leon Thomas' six nominations this year — he could sweep the R&B categories — proves that he has plenty of goodwill on his side.

But Olivia Dean is, as the kids say, the moment. The silky-voiced English songbird's massive single "Man I Need" was a commercial and critical smash, peaking at No. 2 on the *Billboard* Hot 100 and landing on a slew of 2025 year-end lists (including ours). It was also fresh on voters' minds after coming out late in the summer and then dominating the fall and early winter, just as they cast their ballots. The Academy loves a retro vibe — remember Silk Sonic winning all four categories they were nominated for in 2022 for their '70s throwback "Leave the Door Open" — and "Man I Need" is a charming hat tip to '80s soft-rock and soul-pop, evoking Whitney Houston in her early days. Is Dean a safe choice? Sure. But she's also the most deserving of the bunch.

**Who will win: **Olivia Dean******Who should win: **Olivia Dean

Song of the Year

Bruno Mars performs in Las Vegas in October 2021.

Bryan Steffy/Getty

Lady Gaga — "Abracadabra"**Doechii — "Anxiety"**Rosé, Bruno Mars — "APT."**Bad Bunny — "DtMF"**Huntr/x — "Golden" (from *KPop Demon Hunters*)**Kendrick Lamar with SZA — "Luther"**Sabrina Carpenter — "Manchild"** Billie Eilish — "Wildflower"

In a pool filled with the usual suspects — Bruno, Billie, Gaga — can a less garlanded nominee float to the top? Eilish's "Wildflower" was released as a single nearly a year ago, and it's off an album that came out nearly *two* years ago. That's ancient history in pop music. Gaga's high-octane return to form could eke out a win, but many of the other singles in this category made a bigger splash. "APT." has proven it has broad appeal, spending 12 weeks at No. 1 on *Billboard*'s Global 200 and becoming the second-fastest song — and fastest by a K-pop artist — to hit one billion streams in Spotify history. Mars and his co-writer Christopher Brody Brown have already won Song of the Year twice, so voters clearly have a soft spot for their work. If "APT." wins, it would become the first bilingual Best Song winner, and Rosé would become the first K-pop artist to snag the award.

But wait. Could another K-pop act wield its dazzling musical powers to thwart the competition? "Golden," the signature track from *KPop Demon Hunters*' fictional girl group Huntr/x, reached No. 1 in more than 30 countries. It also recently earned the Golden Globe for Best Original Song and an Oscar nomination in the same category. Two years ago, Eilish's *Barbie* soundtrack nominee "What Was I Made For?" scooped up the Golden Globe and the Oscar for Best Original Song, also winning the Grammy for Best Song. *Demon Hunters *was an even bigger juggernaut than *Barbie, *so who's to say our animated heroines won't achieve a similar victory?

However, don't discount Lamar's "Luther." The rapper won in this same category last year for "Not Like Us," which was a racier affair and not as successful as his SZA collab, which topped the Hot 100 for 13 consecutive weeks and became the second-biggest single of 2025. As much as we'd love to see our top pick, Bad Bunny's "DtMF" — the title track from his album *DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS,* a paean to his homeland of Puerto Rico — take the gramophone and become first non-English offering to win this category, an all-Spanish song may still be a tough sell for many Academy members.

**Who will win: **Huntr/x — "Golden"******Who should win: **Bad Bunny — "DtMF"

Record of the Year

Lady Gaga performs the Mayhem Ball Tour in Inglewood, Calif., on July 28, 2025.

Kevin Mazur/Getty

Bad Bunny — "DtMF"**Sabrina Carpenter — "Manchild"**Doechii — "Anxiety"**Billie Eilish — "Wildflower"**Lady Gaga — "Abracadabra"**Kendrick Lamar with SZA — "Luther"**Chappell Roan — "The Subway"**Rosé, Bruno Mars — "APT."

No, your eyes don't deceive you. The Record of the Year nominees are nearly identical to the nominees for Song of the Year — just swap out a handful of demon hunters for a very sad commuter. To refresh, while Song of the Year focuses mainly on the crafting of melodies and lyrics, Record of the Year is all-encompassing, honoring the artists, producers, and engineers behind the track. So who in this category delivered the full package?

Though Doechii's "Anxiety" was a TikTok hit and commercial breakthrough for the rapper-singer — who scored five nominations this year — it leans heavily on its sample of Gotye and Kimbra's "Somebody That I Used to Know," which already won Record of the Year back in 2013; a win for it would feel like retread. "Wildflower" and "DtMF" are at a disadvantage for the same reasons they are in the Song of the Year category, while "The Subway" and "Manchild," as beloved as they were, didn't have the same impact as their 2025 Record of the Year–nominated predecessors, "Good Luck, Babe!" and "Espresso."

"APT." is catnip for the Academy, an anodyne, fun-for-the-whole-family tune from a Grammys darling. Another piece of hardware for Mars would make him the first artist to win Record of the Year four times, but voters could also pat themselves on the back knowing that triumph would also make Rosé the first K-pop artist to win a Big Four category. Lamar was popular enough to take home both Record *and* Song of the Year in 2025, and his duet with SZA is now one of the biggest hip-hop and R&B singles of all time. A smooth, buttery collab from two of the industry's most lauded artists, it also has cross-generational appeal, weaving in a sample of Luther Vandross and Cheryl Lynn's 1982 cover of "If This World Were Mine," a song originally performed by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell in 1967. So this one may be "Luther"'s to lose. All that said, "Abracadabra" was a welcome homecoming for Gaga, nodding to her darker earlier output with its "lethal cocktail of gothic theatricality, powerhouse vocals, club-tailored production … and an impish, nonsensical chorus that only she could concoct," as EW's Wesley Stenzel put it when we named it the Best Song of 2025. She's never won in this category (more on that later), and Mother has certainly paid her dues. Could she finally cast her spell over the holdouts?

**Who will win: **Lady Gaga — "Abracadabra"******Who should win: **Kendrick Lamar with SZA — "Luther"

Album of the Year

Bad Bunny performs for his Most Wanted Tour in Brooklyn in April 2024.

Kevin Mazur/WireImage

Bad Bunny — *DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS ***Justin Bieber — *Swag***Sabrina Carpenter — *Man's Best Friend* **Clipse, Pusha T & Malice — *Let God Sort Em Out***Kendrick Lamar — *GNX***Lady Gaga — *Mayhem***Leon Thomas — *Mutt***Tyler, the Creator — *Chromakopia*

While none of the albums on this list are bad, half of them eclipse the other half. *Swag* boasts some great production (if there's any justice in this world, Bieber's collaborator Dijon will win the Grammy for Producer of the Year), but it's too long and uneven. *Chromakopia *came out a million years ago — Tyler, the Creator had already released *another* (arguably better) album by the time it got its nomination. *Man's Best Friend* was a serviceable but less memorable sequel to *Short n' Sweet, *and it's hard to imagine Clipse beating out Kendrick in 2026. Leon Thomas' *Mutt *is the wild card here, but his classic R&B stylings — again, keep in mind the Academy's proclivity for retro — might be enough to rock the boat. And he does have six nominations, so voters clearly respect the guy.

Ultimately, though, this category will be a tight race between Gaga, Lamar, and Bad Bunny. Gaga and Lamar have been up for this award four times before, but they've never won it. While their nominated work here isn't their finest, it's very likely that one of them could have their *Cowboy Carter *moment this year. Shockingly, Gaga has never won any of the Big Four. But more shockingly, a hip-hop album hasn't won AOTY since Outkast's *Speakerboxxx/The Love Below* took the trophy 22 years ago (only one other hip-hop album has ever won: Lauryn Hill's *The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill *in 1999). A victory for the genre feels long overdue, as does a win for Lamar. A Pulitzer winner going 0-5 as a lead artist in this category would not be a good look for the Academy.

But *GNX* doesn't have it in the bag. Of all the nominees, *DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS *is the most ambitious conceptually and stylistically, a moving and invigorating tribute to Puerto Rico that fuses Bad Bunny's trademark reggaeton with traditional sounds from his homeland, including plena, salsa, and jíbaro. While its title track may lose out to the stiff competition in the ROTY and SOTY categories, the album is greater than the sum of its parts. Its celebration of heritage, identity, and freedom stands in direct opposition to aggression, cruelty, and anti-immigrant, racist rhetoric we're witnessing under our current administration. Awarding Benito's Spanish-language opus the highest honor of the night a week before he headlines the most-watched event in the country would be a pretty powerful political statement.

**Who will win: **Bad Bunny — *DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS*

**Who should win: **Bad Bunny — *DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS *

*The 2026 Grammys air live on Feb. 1 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT on CBS and Paramount+. Check out the list of all the major Grammy nominations here.***

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Source: “EW Grammys”