The 2026 MAMA Awards nominations were announced on October 12, revealing a year-end field headlined by BTS, BLACKPINK, and aespa competing across the ceremony's marquee categories — and confirming the annual Mnet event will return to Japan, with the two-night ceremony set for November 20 and 21 at Kyocera Dome Osaka.
2026 MAMA AWARDS NOMINEES: BTS, BLACKPINK, AND AESPA LEAD THE GROUP CATEGORIES
Best Male Group features BTS, TXT, ATEEZ, BIGBANG, CORTIS, ENHYPEN, NCT WISH, and Stray Kids — a field spanning the genre's established headliners and its rising second tier. BTS return as defending champions following their 2025 double win, entering with ARIRANG, the year's most commercially dominant K-pop release: a Billboard 200 No. 1 album with 4 billion Spotify streams logged by August. TXT and Stray Kids, both consistent MAMA contenders, bring active release campaigns and global touring slates into the ballot. CORTIS, a late-2025 debut from SM Entertainment, are the cycle's only first-nomination group in the male category.
Best Female Group places ILLIT, aespa, BABYMONSTER, BLACKPINK, Hearts2Hearts, IVE, LE SSERAFIM, and NMIXX in contention. BLACKPINK return after DEADLINE — their first full-group studio album in four years — which debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200. aespa's Lemonade, released in June, gave SM Entertainment's group their first Billboard 200 top-five album and anchored a world tour that sold out arenas from Tokyo to London. Hearts2Hearts, a 2026 debut formed through CJ ENM's latest reality competition, make their first MAMA nomination appearance alongside ILLIT, who won the Mnet K-Royalties Award at the 2025 ceremony.
ALBUM OF THE YEAR: ARIRANG, DEADLINE, LEMONADE, AND THIS & THAT IN CONTENTION
Album of the Year includes BTS's ARIRANG, BLACKPINK's DEADLINE, aespa's Lemonade, and Stray Kids' THIS & THAT — a four-way competition between the genre's biggest commercial releases of 2026. ARIRANG is statistically the frontrunner: it is the fastest album by any Asian act to pass 4 billion Spotify streams, holds the record for fastest album to have every track cross 200 million streams individually, and produced three concurrent Billboard Hot 100 entries in its release week. BLACKPINK's DEADLINE arrived after a three-year group hiatus, debuting with the highest first-week sales of any girl group album in 2026. aespa's Lemonade and Stray Kids' THIS & THAT complete the field with similarly robust streaming and sales profiles.
BTS also appear in Best Vocal Performance Group for 'SWIM' — the album's third single, which logged 150 million Spotify streams in its first month — and in Best Music Video for '2.0,' the ARIRANG era's most cinematic production. The double Best Music Video-Best Album overlap positions ARIRANG as MAMA's most versatile nominee of the 2026 cycle.
KYOCERA DOME OSAKA, NOVEMBER 20–21: HOW TO VOTE AND WHAT TO EXPECT
The 2026 MAMA Awards ceremony runs across two nights at Kyocera Dome Osaka in Japan, marking the event's second consecutive year at the venue. CJ ENM confirmed the dates as November 20 and 21, with Mnet Plus streaming the ceremony worldwide. Fans' Choice voting is open on Mnet Plus and X from October 12 through October 22 — a ten-day window that determines fan-driven category outcomes. The Fans' Choice ballot covers Artist of the Year, Worldwide Fan Choice, and select performance categories; final winners across all categories are determined by a combination of fan votes, digital chart performance, album sales, and jury scoring.
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