NEW YORK (AP) — Madonna leads the 2026 MTV Video Music Award nominations, the network announced Tuesday.
The pop superstar has been nominated in every decade of her musical career. She has 19 competitive MTV VMA wins and in 1986 became the first solo female artist to receive the Video Vanguard Award.
She is up for 11 awards at this year's ceremony, including video, artist and song of the year as well as best collaboration, dance, direction, art direction, cinematography, editing, choreography and visual effects.
If she were to sweep, she'd tie Beyoncé and Taylor Swift for the title of most-awarded musician in VMA history. They have 30 each. (Eminem is the male artist with the most VMAs, with 15.)
Speaking of Swift: She follows Madonna with the second-most nominations, with nine. If she takes home even one award, she will become the most-awarded artist in VMA history.
Swift is up for video and artist of the year as well as best pop, direction, art direction, cinematography, editing, choreography and visual effects.
Madonna and Swift are followed by Ariana Grande and Sabrina Carpenter with seven nods to their name as well as Bruno Mars, PinkPantheress and Zara Larsson with five. Blackpink's LISA has four and Shakira, Tate McRae, GENER8ION and Yung Lean are tied for three.
Rounding out the artist of the year category nominees are Grande, Mars, Carpenter and Morgan Wallen, in addition to Madonna and Swift.
The top prize of the night, video of the year, sees Swift's “The Fate of Ophelia” compete against Madonna’s “Confessions II — The Film,” Grande’s “Hate That I Made You Love Me,” Mars' “I Just Might,” Carpenter’s “Tear” and GENER8ION’s “Storm” starring Yung Lean.
The two-hour show will broadcast live on CBS on Sunday, Sept. 27, at 7:30 p.m. Eastern and 4:30 p.m. Pacific, from the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles. It will also simulcast on MTV and be available to stream on Paramount+ in the U.S.
The show will become available to stream globally the next day on Paramount+ and MTV.
CBS is home to a number of award shows, including the Tony Awards and the American Music Awards. It has aired the Grammys since 1973, though that show will head to ABC in 2027.
This year’s Video Music Awards features 26 first-time nominees, which include GENER8ION and Yung Lean (with their aforementioned three nods, for their “Storm” collaboration) and the K-pop boy band CORTIS and viral “Boston” singer Stella Lefty with two each. Other notable first-time nominees include Don Toliver, Kali Uchis, Noah Kahan, Olivia Dean, Tucker Wetmore and Sienna Spiro.
The best dance category has returned for the first time in seven years. Nominees include McRae's “Nobody’s Girl,” Bebe Rexha and Faithless' “New Religion,” Harry Styles' “Aperture,” Lady Gaga and Doechii's “Runway,” Madonna's “Confessions II — The Film,” PinkPantheress' “Stateside” with Larsson and Slayyyter's “Dance …”
Fan voting began online Tuesday across 13 categories and ends Sept. 25 at 6 p.m. Eastern and 3 p.m. Pacific.
Voting in the best new artist category will remain active during the show.
An earlier version of this story had an incorrect spelling of Lady Gaga and Doechii’s song “Runway.”
Madonna appears at The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute benefit gala in New York on May 5, 2025, left, and Taylor Swift appears at the MTV Video Music Awards in Elmont, N.Y., on Sept. 11, 2024. (Photos by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian forces staged one of their biggest drone attacks on Russia since Moscow’s invasion more than four years ago, firing almost 800 drones just two days after launching a similar salvo, officials said Tuesday.
Meanwhile, a Russian missile strike on a village in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region killed at least 10 people and wounded eight others as the barrage demolished homes, officials said Tuesday.
The warring countries are locked in an escalating duel of long-range aerial strikes. Fighting on the roughly 1,250-kilometer (780-mile) front line in eastern and southern Ukraine is restricted by large numbers of drones and ground robots threatening troop movements, and neither side is making significant battlefield progress, analysts say.
Over the past year Ukraine has devised and deployed domestically produced long-range drones for strikes deep inside Russia. Its drone technology has impressed governments and defense manufacturers around the world.
Kyiv officials aim to make the Russian public feel the war’s consequences and pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin into negotiating a peace settlement. Putin has so far shown no sign he intends to stop the invasion.
“Putin continues to drag out the war instead of accepting Ukraine’s realistic ceasefire proposals and ending the bloodshed,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said in a post on X.
Russian air defenses overnight intercepted 791 Ukrainian drones over a number of Russian regions, as well as annexed Crimea and the Black and the Azov seas, the Defense Ministry in Moscow said, in what was the second-largest drone attack since January 2025, according to an Associated Press tally.
More than 600 Ukrainian drones flew toward the Moscow region, where 180 were shot down, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said. He didn’t provide further details.
Officials reported no deaths or major damage. Ukraine has increasingly launched swarms of hundreds of drones in an attempt to overwhelm Russian air defenses.
In the Moscow region that surrounds but doesn’t include the Russian capital, three people were wounded, Gov. Andrei Vorobyov said.
Three people were also wounded in the Ryazan region adjacent to the Moscow region where three private houses were damaged by the attack, Gov. Pavel Malkov said.
The overnight attack started a fire at a warehouse of Wildberries, Russia’s biggest online retailer, in an industrial zone. Ukraine has repeatedly targeted the company’s depots, which it says help supply the Russian military.
Wildberries said its facility sustained “insignificant damage.”
Coverage of the attack in state and Kremlin-backed Russian media was mostly muted, as is often the case.
Russia’s main television channels — state-run Russia 1 and Channel One — did not mention the attack at all in their morning news bulletins.
But Russian state news agency RIA Novosti featured it among the main news on its website’s homepage, describing it as “one of the most large-scale attacks on Moscow since the beginning of the summer.”
State newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta on its website prominently featured a roundup of what Moscow region Gov. Andrei Vorobyov reported about the attack on the area, describing it as “massive” in the headline. Pro-Kremlin tabloid MK featured a news brief about the attack on its home page.
A Russian missile strike on the village of Pechenihy in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region killed 10 civilians, according to preliminary information, said Oleh Syniehubov, head of the Kharkiv regional military administration.
Another 17 people were wounded, he said. Zelenskyy called it “a brutal attack” that damaged 10 homes, a cafe, a post office, a store and at least seven vehicles, according to Syniehubov.
“We will definitely respond to this Russian strike,” Zelenskyy said on social media.
Also, three people were killed and three others were wounded over the past day in Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Sumy region, including drone strikes and an explosive device blast, Ukraine’s National Police said.
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who took office last month, said the U.K. will continue to stand by Ukraine after Russia said that Ukraine’s reported use of British drones for attacks on Russian soil would bring unidentified consequences for London.
“We are providing support so that Ukraine can defend itself, and that’s been the British position all the way through this conflict by previous prime ministers," Burnham said. “It remains the case with me.”
British newspaper The Sunday Times reported that two U.K. companies made drones used by Ukraine to hit Russia.
Following the report, the Russian embassy in the U.K. said in a statement that “London’s actions will inevitably carry consequences.”
Hatton reported from Lisbon, Portugal. Brian Melley in London contributed.
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - In this photo, provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, rescuers carry a body that they removed from under the rubble of a private house following a Russian air attack in Pechenihy, Kharkiv region, Ukraine, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)
A street cleaner observes a daily nationwide minute of silence in memory of soldiers killed in the war with Russia, in Kyiv, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
In this photo, provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, fire is seen on the site of a Russian air attack in Pechenihy, Kharkiv region, Ukraine, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)
In this photo, provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, rescuers carry a body that they removed from under the rubble of a private house following a Russian air attack in Pechenihy, Kharkiv region, Ukraine, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)
In this photo provided by Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov's official telegram channel, flame and smoke rise from a construction site after a Ukrainian drone attack in an undisclosed area in the Moscow region, Russia, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov's office via AP)
In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, fire is seen on the site of a Russian air attack in Pechenihy, Kharkiv region, Ukraine, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)
