Madonna picked up 11 nominations for the 2026 MTV Video Music Awards, more than any other artist on the ballot, with Taylor Swift trailing close behind at nine nods, according to nominations announced this week ahead of the September 27 ceremony.

Key Points

• Madonna leads all nominees with 11 nods, including Video of the Year for “Confessions II — The Film” and Song of the Year for “Bring Your Love” with Sabrina Carpenter.
• Taylor Swift follows with nine nominations, including Video of the Year for “The Fate of Ophelia”.
• Ariana Grande and Sabrina Carpenter each picked up seven nominations, while Bruno Mars, PinkPantheress, and Zara Larsson earned five apiece.
• The show airs live from the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles on Sunday, September 27, at 7:30 p.m. ET on CBS, MTV, and Paramount+.
• Fan voting runs through MTV’s official platform across 13 categories, with general voting closing September 25 at 5:59 p.m. ET and Best New Artist balloting continuing until moments before the on-air announcement.

Nearly all of Madonna’s nominations trace back to a single project: “Confessions II — The Film” is up for Best Dance, Direction, Art Direction, Cinematography, Editing, Choreography, and Visual Effects, in addition to the top-line Video of the Year slot. It’s the kind of across-the-board sweep of the crafts categories that used to define VMA nominations in the format’s MTV-as-tastemaker heyday, when a single high-concept video could dominate a whole ballot the way “Vogue” or “Express Yourself” once did for Madonna herself.

The competitive stakes go beyond a single trophy night. Madonna currently holds 19 competitive VMA wins, and a sweep of her nominated categories would tie her with Beyoncé and Taylor Swift for the title of most-awarded artist in VMA history at 30 wins each. Swift, notably, is chasing the same record from the other side of the ballot — she already shares the current lead with Beyoncé, and one more win moves her into sole possession of it.

For an artist who first appeared at the inaugural VMAs back in 1984, rolling around the stage in a wedding dress to perform “Like a Virgin,” an 11-nomination haul more than four decades later is its own kind of trivia. The VMAs have changed format, network, and city more than once since then, but Madonna’s name on the nominee list has proven to be one of the show’s more durable constants — and this year, it’s back at the very top.