The Headies has officially unveiled the nominations for its 18th edition, setting the stage for another expansive assessment of Nigerian music’s changing centre of gravity – and this year’s list finds established heavyweights increasingly sharing space with a generation whose ascent has unfolded at remarkable speed.
Covering eligible music released and distributed on digital streaming platforms between August 1, 2024 and April 30, 2026, the nominations stretch across recordings, songwriting, albums, performance, music video, digital impact and the increasingly continental scope of The Headies. Categories range from familiar honours including Song of the Year, Next Rated and Album of the Year to regional African awards and the newly framed Best African Diaspora-Canadian Artiste category.
Among the clearest stories in the nominations is FOLA’s arrival in the upper tier of the awards conversation. The singer appears in Next Rated alongside Fido, Llona, Mavo and Shoday, but his recognition extends substantially beyond the emerging-artiste category: You appears among the nominees for Afrobeats Single of the Year and Best Recording of the Year; Catharsis enters Best R&B Album; while FOLA himself appears among the Digital Artiste of the Year contenders.
That spread matters. Next Rated has historically functioned as one of The Headies’ most closely watched indicators of Nigerian music’s next mainstream class. But FOLA’s presence across recording, album, digital and emerging-artiste categories suggests an artist already beginning to outgrow the conventional boundaries of the breakthrough designation.
The Song of the Year race is particularly revealing
Six records make up one of the night’s marquee categories:
Kunmie — Arike
Poco Lee, Shoday & Rahman Jago — Hey Jago
Ayra Starr — Hot Body
Fido — Joy Is Coming
Asake & Wizkid — MMS
Davido & Omah Lay — With You
It is a fascinating cross-section of contemporary Nigerian listening habits. Established global names like Davido, Wizkid, Asake and Ayra Starr coexist with Kunmie, Fido and Shoday—artists whose recent ascents illustrate how rapidly streaming, social discovery and audience behaviour can redraw Afrobeats’ hierarchy.
The Afrobeats Single of the Year category carries a similarly heavyweight field: Rema’s Fun, Asake and Wizkid’s Jogodo, Shallipopi’s Laho, Davido and Omah Lay’s With You, FOLA’s You, and Burna Boy’s Bundle by Bundle.
And there is an interesting distinction between the two categories. The Headies formally defines Afrobeats Single of the Year around the year’s outstanding Afrobeats recording, while Song of the Year specifically recognises cultural impact. That makes the different compositions of the two shortlists worth watching when winners are eventually announced.
Next Rated captures the changing guard
Perhaps nowhere is the generational transition clearer than:
NEXT RATED
Fido
FOLA
Llona
Mavo
Shoday
There is no legacy superstar to anchor this category—and that’s precisely the point.
FOLA has built significant momentum across music and digital culture; Shoday’s Hey Jago has travelled far enough to enter Song of the Year; Mavo also appears among the Digital Artiste of the Year nominees; while Fido and Llona complete a shortlist that feels representative of a Nigerian music ecosystem where discovery is happening increasingly quickly and from increasingly varied points of origin.
This is a category Music Custodian should pay particular attention to—not simply because of who wins, but because these are among the names The Headies believes are positioned for mainstream superstardom next.
R&B and alternative music are occupying meaningful space
The Best R&B Album nominations offer another compelling snapshot:
Before We Became Strangers — Kunmie
Catharsis — FOLA
I Am the Blueprint — Qing Madi
Love Is a Kingdom — Tems
Reflection Station — Tay Iwar
This One Is Personal — Tiwa Savage
That is an unusually interesting field because it stretches across different generations and interpretations of Nigerian R&B—from Tiwa Savage and Tems to Tay Iwar, Qing Madi, Kunmie and FOLA.
Alternative music gets its own substantial album conversation too, with Show Dem Camp’s Afrika Magik, Sewa’s Detox, BOJ’s Duplicity, Wizard Chan’s Healers Chapel, Scottyolorin’s Olorin Pack and Zaylevelten’s Then 1t Got Crazy competing for Best Alternative Album.
That breadth is worth highlighting because one of the persistent dangers of international conversations about Nigerian music is reducing an enormous ecosystem to a single Afrobeats monoculture. The Headies’ genre categories tell a more complicated story.
Performance finally matters as performance
Another category I particularly like for our reportage is Best Performer (Live).
The nominees are not being rewarded merely for celebrity or touring volume. The Headies defines the non-voting category around an outstanding live performance before an audience that was also officially released in video form.
This year’s nominees include:
Adekunle Gold — Live at the National Theatre, Lagos
Asake — Red Bull Symphonic
Ayra Starr — Global Citizen Festival 2025
Johnny Drille — Johnny’s Room Live 6
Ruger — Live at Indigo at The O2, London (2025)
That category quietly documents another stage in African music’s development: the live show itself becoming part of an artist’s body of work, rather than merely the promotional activity surrounding recordings.
And digital power has its own hierarchy
The Digital Artiste of the Year shortlist places:
Asake, Ayra Starr, BNXN, Chella, FOLA, Mavo, Seyi Vibez and Wizkid in competition.
Again, look at the composition.
Wizkid and Asake sit alongside FOLA, Mavo and Chella.
That is perhaps one of the clearest illustrations of what the current Nigerian music market looks like: legacy and scale remain powerful, but digital discovery can compress the distance between an emerging act and an established superstar remarkably quickly.
The Headies is also looking increasingly continental
The official category structure continues to recognise artists across West, East, North and Central Africa, while the 18th edition introduces a Best African Diaspora-Canadian Artiste category recognising Canadian or Canada-affiliated artists of African descent.
And there is an obvious strategic reason for the latter.
The Headies is heading to Toronto.
The October programme goes considerably beyond a single awards ceremony. A Headies Talent Showcase is scheduled for October 17; Headies Rewind follows on October 20; nominees’ events begin October 21; and October 22 includes both a Global Trade & Investment Summit and Creative Summit alongside Headies Honours. Nominee interviews and the red carpet precede the main ceremony on October 23.
The organisation is therefore positioning the 18th Headies as something larger than an awards night: part music celebration, part diaspora convening and part creative-economy platform.
That is worth watching.
The previous Headies ceremony returned to Nigeria after editions staged in Atlanta. Now Toronto represents another attempt to place Nigerian—and increasingly African—music within a wider international industry environment.
What the nominations tell us
The most interesting thing about the 18th Headies nominations isn’t simply who received the most nods.
It’s who now gets to stand beside whom.
FOLA beside established stars in major recording categories.
Mavo beside Wizkid in Digital Artiste of the Year.
Kunmie beside Tems and Tiwa Savage in R&B.
Fido and Shoday appearing in a Song of the Year conversation alongside Davido, Wizkid, Asake and Ayra Starr.
These aren’t necessarily declarations of equivalence in career scale. They are evidence of movement.
And perhaps that’s what an awards institution should capture at its best: not merely confirming the stars everybody already knows, but documenting the moment when tomorrow’s names begin appearing in today’s biggest conversations.
When the 18th Headies arrives in Toronto on October 23, the trophies will tell us who won.
The nominations (Check Full List Here) already tell us something potentially more interesting:
Nigerian music’s next hierarchy is being formed in real time.
