Prediction markets correctly call 19 of 24 Oscar category winners as the role of market-based forecasts expands in awards season.
Prediction markets generated more than $200 million in reported trading tied to the 2026 Academy Awards, as contracts related to Hollywood’s biggest night drew heavy activity on Kalshi and Polymarket.
The total reflects trading across dozens of Oscars-related markets on the two platforms, including contracts predicting who would win individual awards, as well as mention and attendance markets. Ahead of the big night, both platforms also offered markets predicting which films, actors and other contenders would receive Oscar nominations.
Combined totals compiled from individual markets show roughly $113 million in trading on Kalshi and about $100 million on Polymarket’s international platform, pushing overall Oscars-related activity to around $213 million. Kalshi told Barron’s that its Oscars markets generated more than $105 million in trading, though the company did not specify which markets were included in that figure. Totals compiled for this analysis include nomination markets that resolved earlier in the awards season.
Academy Awards trading helped boost both platforms’ weekly volume numbers in the entertainment category, with Kalshi’s markets rising 326% week over week and Polymarket’s Culture markets nearly doubling in volume.
While those volumes are notable for a cultural event like an awards show, they are dwarfed by trading tied to some major sports events. Earlier this year, prediction markets tied to the Super Bowl generated $1.63 billion in combined trading across Kalshi and Polymarket.
Note: Volume figures across the two platforms are not directly comparable. Kalshi reports trading volume based on the number of contracts traded, attributing $1 per contract, while Polymarket reports the dollar value of trades at the contract’s market price. Because contracts usually trade between $0.01 and $0.99, the same trade can appear larger in Kalshi’s volume totals than on Polymarket.
Best Picture and Best Actor lead Academy Awards trading
Most of the trading around the Oscars was concentrated in a small number of headline awards.
On Kalshi, the two largest markets were Best Actor and Best Picture, each generating roughly $25 million in trading. Other major categories including Best Supporting Actor, Best Director, and Best Actress each attracted between roughly $6 million and $7 million in volume.
Trading on Polymarket followed a similar pattern. The Best Picture market alone generated about $39 million in trading, making it the single-largest Oscars market across both platforms. Best Actor followed at roughly $13 million.
A handful of other categories also generated meaningful activity. On Kalshi, Best Cinematography produced about $3.65 million in trading, while Original Screenplay, International Feature, and Animated Feature each generated between roughly $1.4 million and $1.6 million.
A portion of the overall Oscars trading activity came earlier in the awards season through nomination markets, which allowed traders to speculate on which contenders would receive official nods. Those markets resolved once nominations were revealed in January but generated roughly $17 million in trading on Kalshi and about $4 million on Polymarket, adding more than $20 million in additional volume to the overall Oscars market totals.
Both platforms also hosted non-winner markets tied directly to the ceremony itself. On Kalshi, a market asking which celebrities would attend the ceremony generated about $2.9 million in trading, while a separate mention market tied specifically to host Conan O’Brien tracked whether certain words or phrases would be said during his monologue or throughout the broadcast, producing roughly $1.6 million in volume. Polymarket listed a broader “What will be said during the Oscars” market not tied to the host, which generated about $258,000 in trading, along with roughly $163,000 in its celebrity attendance market.
In a March 16 post, Kalshi noted how rapidly its Oscars markets have grown over the past couple of years. In 2024, just $2.3 million was traded in the markets, while last year saw $29.6 million traded.
Prediction markets correctly call 19 of 24 categories
Markets on Kalshi and Polymarket correctly predicted the winner in 19 of the 24 Academy Award categories, according to final market prices shortly before the ceremony.
In the major awards, traders largely got it right. Market odds on both platforms correctly favored the eventual winners for categories like Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and both screenplay categories in the hours leading up to the ceremony.
But several smaller categories produced surprises.
In Best Cinematography, traders strongly favored One Battle After Another, which carried odds above 75% on both platforms before the ceremony. The award instead went to Sinners cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw.
Prediction markets were also wrong in Best Documentary Feature, where The Perfect Neighbor entered the ceremony as the favorite before Mr. Nobody Against Putin ultimately won the Oscar.
Short film categories also proved difficult for traders. Markets favored Butterfly in Best Animated Short Film, but the award went to The Girl Who Cried Pearls. The Best Live Action Short Film category produced one of the night’s most unusual outcomes when the Academy declared a tie, awarding Oscars to both Two People Exchanging Saliva and The Singers.
The final miss came in the first-time Best Casting category, where markets favored Sinners but the award ultimately went to One Battle After Another. Despite those surprises, the overall hit rate was still relatively strong.
Polymarket traders performed slightly better earlier in the awards season during the Golden Globes. CEO Shayne Coplan boasted about the markets correctly predicting 26 of the ceremony’s 28 winners.
Tie in short film category highlights settlement differences
The tie in the Best Live Action Short Film category exposed differences in how prediction markets resolve unusual outcomes, echoing earlier controversy over how Kalshi and Polymarket settled contracts tied to Iran’s Supreme Leader leaving office.
On Kalshi, traders were able to bet directly on a tie outcome alongside the individual nominees and each market prominently featured a note clarifying how ties would be resolved. But the markets treated that result as extremely unlikely. Reporting from Variety found that only about 40 traders bought the Short Film tie contract when it was priced at roughly 1% odds ahead of the ceremony. At that price, a $50 trade would have returned about $5,000.
Polymarket handled the situation differently. Because the platform’s market rules require a single winning contract, the market resolved based on alphabetical order, meaning the contract for The Singers was treated as the winning outcome over Two People Exchanging Saliva.
Entertainment markets broaden prediction market reach
Prediction market odds received significant attention ahead of the ceremony, with prices from Kalshi and Polymarket increasingly cited in media coverage of the awards race and used as a real-time gauge of expectations in major categories.
The Golden Globes featured integrated Polymarket odds in the actual show broadcast, which drew mixed reactions from viewers. While the Oscars broadcast didn’t have integrated odds, the CNN pre-ceremony red carpet show did show Kalshi odds throughout, which the hosts regularly discussed. CNN has an exclusive deal to incorporate Kalshi’s real-time prediction market data across its television, digital and social platforms.
Kalshi got a different kind of shout-out on the red carpet that drew some attention. Investor and television personality Kevin O’Leary, who appears in the Oscar-nominated Marty Supreme, told reporters he traded $1,000 on co-star Timothée Chalamet to win Best Actor.
Together, the broadcast references, media coverage and trading activity surrounding the Oscars ceremony illustrate how prediction markets are increasingly becoming part of the broader conversation around major cultural events, showing they extend beyond the sports and election markets that tend to dominate public attention. As platforms expand into entertainment markets, awards shows like the Oscars are emerging as one of the clearest examples of how market-based forecasts are beginning to shape mainstream cultural discourse.
Mike Breen
Mike Breen has been a professional writer and editor covering a wide range of topics for more than 30 years. He’s been a freelance gaming industry writer since 2020, reporting on sports betting, online casinos, and more for various Catena Media sites, and he began reporting on prediction market industry news in 2025 for Prediction News. Prior to that, Mike was a founding editor at his hometown altweekly newspaper in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he extensively covered local arts, music and news.Mike’s published writing has received recognition and several awards from organizations like the Society of Professional Journalists and the Association of Alternative Newsmedia.When Mike is not working, he enjoys playing and listening to music, attending comedy shows, watching movies, and spending time with his family and three cats.
