Hollywood just renamed one of its biggest awards shows. Here’s what actually changed and why it matters.

After nearly 30 years, the Screen Actors Guild Awards is getting a new identity. Starting in 2026, it will officially go by The Actor Awards presented by SAG-AFTRA.

Why the name change?

A big part of it comes down to clarity. The trophy handed out every year has always been called The Actor. For three decades, the show and the statuette existed in two different branding universes.

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Now that the show reaches viewers in more countries through Netflix, the team behind it wants a title that instantly makes sense to international audiences. In a joint statement announcing the change, executive producer Jon Brockett and SAG-AFTRA Awards Committee chair JoBeth Williams explained why the rename was overdue as reported by Billboard, “The statuette has always been called The Actor, and we’re simply aligning the show’s title with the name of the award itself and the union behind it.”

It also fixes a long-overdue union update

In 2012, two major Hollywood unions, the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA), officially merged.

AFTRA was a separate labor union that represented performers in television, radio, voice work, broadcast news, and recording artists. SAG, meanwhile, mainly represented film and traditional TV actors. Both groups often covered similar talent, negotiated similar contracts, and dealt with the same studios and networks.

After years of overlap and competing jurisdictions, the two organizations voted to combine forces and become SAG-AFTRA, a single union representing about 160,000 performers across film, TV, streaming, radio, voice acting, and digital media.

But even after the merger, the awards show kept the old “SAG Awards” name, which never fully reflected the combined union.

By officially calling the ceremony The Actor Awards presented by SAG-AFTRA, the organization is finally aligning the show’s branding with the union that actually runs it. One unified body instead of two legacy names from a decade ago.

*The cast of Conclave at the SAG Awards 2024 | Photo from Getty Images*

What’s staying the same

Here’s the part awards season fans care about: the show itself isn’t changing.

We will still get 15 awards voted on by SAG-AFTRA’s 160,000 members, a major preview of Oscar results in the acting categories. Both film and TV performance awards and the same prestige the SAG Awards built over the years

A quick throwback

The show debuted in 1995 on NBC before settling on cable via TNT and TBS for almost two decades. It jumped to Netflix in 2024, marking a new era of global visibility and arguably setting the stage for this rebrand. The name change also lands as SAG-AFTRA ushers in new leadership under Sean Astin, who took over from Fran Drescher after her very public strike-era tenure.

And because this isn’t just any awards show getting a new name, it helps to remember the kind of history it carries. The SAG Awards built its reputation on moments people still talk about. Here are some of our faves:

*Barbra Streisand accepts the SAG Lifetime Achievement Award onstage | Photos from Getty Images*

Barbra Streisand’s Lifetime Achievement speech (2024). A full-room standing ovation and one of the ceremony’s most emotional nights.

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Parasite’s two-minute standing ovation (2020). A first for a Korean film nominated for ensemble.

*The cast of “Parasite” at the 2020 SAG Awards*

Everything Everywhere All at Once sweeping the awards (2023). Multiple wins and James Hong’s sharp speech on representation that instantly became a highlight of the season.

*Leonardo DiCaprio accepts outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role for “The Revenant*.”

Leonardo DiCaprio finally winning (2016). Eight nominations later, he walked away with The Revenant win,which fans had been waiting for.

Sterling K. Brown’s historic win (2018). The first black actor to win outstanding male actor in a drama series for This Is Us.

The newly named Actor Awards presented by SAG-AFTRA will debut under its updated title when the show returns on March 1, 2026, streaming live on Netflix.

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