Every year, the Grammys are built up for months (the nominations for this year’s ceremony were revealed on Nov. 7) as artists run campaigns to hopefully be awarded with the golden gramophone. In the lead up to the night, people love to try and predict the winners and some even get so confident that they bet real money on it. 

For anyone who’s curious about the state of the predictions this year, here are the front runners for the big four categories. 

The big four in question consist of Album of the Year, Record of the Year (an award about the sound and performance of a song, given to the artist and any producers on said song), Song of the Year (an award for a single or one track from an album, given to any of the songwriters on the winning song), and Best New Artist (awarded to an artist who had a big impact and broke out during the year being recognized). These four awards are always televised and can feature a blend of any genre.

Music fans aren’t the only ones who get excited about the ceremony. Many of the nominees shared videos of themselves reacting to being nominated and even the Grammys themselves getting in on the excitement.

First, Best New Artist. The nominees this year are as follows:

Olivia Dean, a soulful jazz inspired pop artist. She released her second album “The Art of Falling in Love” on Sept. 26, 2025 after multiple big singles like “Man I Need” which is still charting in the top 10 of the Billboard hot 100 as of writing this. She opened for Sabrina Carpenter on her “Short N’ Sweet” tour, which most definitely gave her a major boost in audience. 

Jaime Rodriguez from Gold Derby wrote, “…Dean’s style is pure Grammy catnip. Her flavor of pop R&B and neo-soul is similar in style to awards favorites like Adele and Amy Winehouse.” Derby continued to mention that her winning would continue the streak of women winning Best New Artist since 2018.

Next, KATSEYE. A girl group formed from women worldwide but created with a k-pop format through the Netflix series “Pop Star Academy”. They’ve had multiple viral songs such as “Touch”, “Gnarly”, and “Gabriella”. They are yet to release an album but have two EP’s to their name.

Also, The Marias – an indie group that combines dreamy synth-pop with the lead singer, Maria Zardoya’s dreamy vocals and Puerto Rican descent. They’ve been active for almost a decade but broke out into the mainstream in 2025 with a 2024 deepcut titled “No One Noticed”. They also had a follow up smaller viral song called “Sienna”. They’ve done songs with the likes of Bad Bunny and Selena Gomez.

Another nominee is Addison Rae. She blew up on TikTok at the age of 19 and now sits at 88 million followers on the platform. She had a rocky start to music following her 2023 EP which wasn’t received well by the general public but got more left of center artists like Charli xcx to tune in. Charli has praised Addison multiple times, saying on an episode of Jake Shane’s podcast that she has “amazing taste” and that working with her feels like working with herself. In 2025 she released her self-titled debut album to critical acclaim and went on a fairly successful headlining concert tour.

Next up, sombr. A very young artist at only 20 has blown up on TikTok and been able to translate this success to the charts with songs like “Undressed” and “Back to Friends”. He is recognized for his emotive vocals, personal and vulnerable writing, and ability to produce his own stuff which many pop stars don’t do.

Leon Thomas iii, former Victorious star, is probably the least well known artist on this list but not for lack of talent. The show Victorious did contain singing but it wasn’t until he started releasing his own work and exploring R&B that he got to bloom into his own artist. His 2025 album “MUTT” was received positively by audiences but largely ignored by critics.

Arguably the artist with the most successful year from this crop is Alex Warren. Another artist who left TikTok stardom behind to pursue music but to very differing views. His song “Ordinary” spent 10 weeks at number one on the Billboard charts and has continued to linger in the top 20. You’d think that would mean people are enjoying him but his 2025 album averaged a 48/100 from critics and yielded no other hits. Despite that, he has many hardcore fans and an undeniably large hit.

Lastly, Lola Young. Like most of the artists that breakout nowadays, she gained a following on TikTok due to a viral song. In this case, “Messy”. It’s a fitting title considering the year she had. On the press cycle for her album and this song, she pushed herself far beyond what any artist – especially a new one – should be doing which led her grueling tour schedule to come to a sudden stop after passing out on stage at All Things Go festival. 

She has recovered and plans on continuing doing what she loves but when you’re so new it can be harmful to your trajectory to disappear for some time no matter the reason. Still, her 2025 album did well critically and people have a positive view of her as an artist.

Next, Record of the Year.

The frontrunner for this category is “Luther” by Kendrick Lamar and SZA, another very successful collaboration between this duo following “All The Stars”. 2024 was a massive year for Kendrick Lamar mainly because of his highly publicized feud with Drake. On the morning of Nov. 22, 2024, Kendrick surprise released an album called “GNX”. “Luther” was the runaway hit from the album and dominated the Billboard charts all throughout 2025. He also won both Record of the Year and Song of the Year last year just a week before playing the Super Bowl half time show.

Another strong contender is “DtMF” by Bad Bunny. The title is an acronym for “Debí Tirar Más Fotos,” the name of his 2025 album. It translates to “I should’ve taken more photos”. It’s one of his more emotional tracks, discussing nostalgia and longing for people you’ve lost. It mixes the native to Puerto Rico style of music, plena, with electronic sounds to create a unique soundscape.

The last main contenders are “APT.” by ROSÉ and Bruno Mars due to its chart dominance and name recognition and “Abracadabra” by Lady Gaga for the same reasons. Also, both Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga are Grammy darlings with 16 and 14 wins, respectively. The rest of the nominees are possibilities but would be wildcard wins.

Next is Song of the Year. It is a very similar category to Record of the Year. Lady Gaga, ROSÉ, and Bruno Mars continue to be frontrunners for the same reasons as their potential in Record. 

The song of note that wasn’t present in Record is “Golden” by HUNTR/x, a song from K-Pop Demon Hunters that occupied the top 10 on the Billboard charts for months on end, still there as of writing this. The movie it comes from was also a major success, quickly becoming the most watched movie in Netflix history.

Last but certainly not least is the big one: Album of the Year.

It’s always the last award of the night and is considered to be the biggest honor. The nominees are as follows: “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” by Bad Bunny, “SWAG” by Justin Bieber, “Man’s Best Friend” by Sabrina Carpenter, “Let God Sort Em Out” by Clipse, “Mayhem” by Lady Gaga, “GNX” by Kendrick Lamar, “MUTT” by Leon Thomas iii, and “Chromokopia” by Tyler, the Creator. 

One thing of note is vote splitting – when there’s too many similar candidates pulling attention which leads to a third party to pull through. In the case of the Grammys, this happens when there’s an abundance of albums, songs, or artists from the same genre are in the same category. 

Grammy voters themselves are split into categories based on their genre of expertise. You won’t have pop voters deciding who wins in the country categories for example. Anyone can vote in the general categories like Album of the Year but are likely to stay loyal to their genre. This year there are three pop albums and three rap albums in the Album of the Year category which means it is unlikely, though not impossible, for any of those albums to win. That leaves “MUTT” by Leon Thomas iii as the sole R&B album and “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” by Bad Bunny as the only Latin album.

You’ll hear a lot of discourse around major awards like Album of the Year because only so many people can be nominated. The number has shifted over the years but it’s been eight nominees a year as of late. That leads to the term “snubbing,” which is when someone is deliberately ignored or slighted. On spaces like Twitter and TikTok, you’ll find many fans discussing projects they felt got snubbed every year.

This year, the most common albums you’ll see thrown around are as follows: “Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party” by Hayley Williams, the highest critically acclaimed album of 2025 by a woman had a bizarre rollout. It was initially released as 17 separate singles before eventually being released as a full, 20 song album. It got recognized in the alternative and rock categories but none of the major ones. 

“Virgin” by Lorde, despite being critically acclaimed and driving much conversation along got zero nominations. When Lorde debuted she was seen as this wise-beyond-her-years teenager and the Grammys showered her in praise. Since she took a slight dig at them in 2018, they seemingly refuse to recognize her. 

Tate Mcrae and The Weeknd’s respective 2025 albums also got omitted, much to the shock of fans. Both were majorly successful with The Weeknd having an entire accompanying movie with stars like Jenna Ortega but they simply didn’t make the cut for the academy.

The clear frontrunner is Bad Bunny with the main reason being his album was the highest acclaimed album of 2025 with an average critic rating of 95/100. Lucas Villa of NME said, “Bad Bunny masterfully channels his pride for Puerto Rico into a diverse collection of songs that meld sounds of his childhood with where he stands now as Latin music’s most dynamic artist.” Leon Thomas iii still has a chance because the Grammys love to occasionally award the underdog wildcard candidate but his lack of notoriety isn’t doing him any favors.

All in all, these are just my opinions and takeaways based on how the Grammys are known to operate and observations of pop culture. Many other people have their own predictions and I urge you to look for more than one opinion and form your own as well. This is a fun event and a good way to connect with other enjoyers of music and pop culture.