KPop Demon Hunters topped the Annie Awards with a clean sweep, collecting major feature prizes while juried awards and TV winners rounded out a night of recognition for animation crafts and community impact
KPop Demon Hunters dominated the 53rd Annie Awards, sweeping every category in which it was nominated and walking away with the night’s biggest prizes. The Netflix feature won Best Feature, shared Best Direction (Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans), and saw Arden Cho take home Best Voice Acting for her performance as Rumi. Beyond the marquee awards, the film racked up a string of technical honours—production design, music, writing, character design, character animation, FX and editorial—recognizing both its storytelling and craft.
The evening balanced studio power with independent wins and television recognition. Neon’s genre-bending Arco (sometimes reported as Acro) claimed Best Feature – Independent after a festival run that included Cannes, while legacy franchises fared unevenly: Disney/Pixar’s Elio, despite entering with ten nominations, failed to convert any into wins, and Zootopia 2 left empty-handed. DreamWorks’ The Bad Guys 2 did pick up the feature-storyboarding prize.
Television and short-form categories spread awards across age groups and formats. Netflix’s Love, Death + Robots collected multiple prizes in the early television slate, and Pixar’s Win or Lose won Best TV/Media – Limited Series. Adult animation, children’s and preschool programming all found representation: Dan Mintz took Best Voice Acting – TV/Media for Tina Belcher on Bob’s Burgers; The Wonderfully Weird World of Gumball won in the children’s category; Wow Lisa claimed the preschool prize. Common Side Effects earned several craft awards for its writing and editorial work, underlining its narrative and technical strengths.
Juried and special honours highlighted lifetime achievement, community initiatives and technical innovation. The Winsor McCay Awards for career achievement went to Christopher Miller & Phil Lord, Michaël Dudok de Wit, and Chris Sanders. The June Foray Award recognized Sandy Rabins for founding AnimAID, a relief effort supporting animation workers affected by the L.A. wildfires. Wacom received the Ub Iwerks Award for technical achievement, and LightBox Expo was given a Special Achievement Award for its role in connecting creators, students and fans. Merit and student awards also spotlighted emerging talent; among them, A Sparrow’s Song (Filmakademie Baden‑Württemberg) won a student prize.
Other notable winners across categories included Ryusuke Furuya for Best Character Animation – Feature, Snow Bear for Best Short Subject, video game recognition for South of Midnight, and a slate of craft awards going to studios such as Sony Pictures Animation, Blur Studio, DreamWorks, Framestore and the BBC Natural History Unit.
What it means: the Annies reinforced the growing influence of streaming studios—Netflix’s sweep will bolster its awards-season narrative—and reminded the industry that independent films and juried recognitions still shape the conversation. Voters rewarded a blend of high-profile spectacle and behind-the-scenes excellence, and observers expect many of these results to factor into Oscar campaigning and wider awards strategies in the months ahead. Official lists of winners remain the definitive reference for the full results.