A year after taking a submit-everyone approach to Emmy season, Saturday Night Live is drawing the line somewhere.
With first-round nomination voting now underway for the 78th Emmy Awards, the NBC sketch series has entered just 11 of this season’s hosts for consideration—down from all 20 Season 50 hosts last year, a 45% drop.
The shift comes one year after SNL submitted a record 42 performers across the comedy acting categories, including its full cast, every Season 50 host, and a slate of high-profile cameo players from its milestone anniversary season.
This year, a total of 28 performers made the cut. That list includes the show’s entire cast in the supporting comedy categories, among them Michael Che, Mikey Day, Andrew Dismukes, Marcello Hernández, James Austin Johnson, Colin Jost, Kenan Thompson, Bowen Yang (who left at the season’s midpoint), Chloe Fineman, Sarah Sherman, Ashley Padilla, Jane Wickline, Veronika Slowikowska, Tommy Brennan, Jeremy Culhane, Ben Marshall, and Kam Patterson.
It’s in the guest performer categories where SNL has narrowed the field.
On the Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series ballot, the show submitted Jack Black, Bad Bunny, Colman Domingo, Will Ferrell, Ryan Gosling, Connor Storrie, and Harry Styles. On the Outstanding Guest Actress side, it submitted Ariana Grande, Melissa McCarthy, Amy Poehler, and Olivia Rodrigo.
That leaves nine of this season’s hosts out of the running at the submission stage: Sabrina Carpenter, Miles Teller, Nikki Glaser, Glen Powell, Josh O’Connor, Finn Wolfhard, Teyana Taylor, Alexander Skarsgård, and Matt Damon.
Last year, not only did the show submit each of its hosts, it also submitted a series of guest performers, including Maya Rudolph as Kamala Harris, Dana Carvey as Joe Biden, Andy Samberg as Doug Emhoff, Jim Gaffigan as Tim Walz, and Mike Myers as Elon Musk. No cameo-only performers appear among this year’s submissions.
It’s not the first time SNL has taken a more selective approach to Emmy submissions. In 2015, the show drew scrutiny when nine hosts appeared on the ballot, all of them men, despite the season having included several female hosts. It was unclear at the time whether those entries came from the show or from the performers themselves, but in recent years SNL appeared to move toward a more coordinated submit-everyone strategy.
This year, at least outside of its cast, the show is back to making choices.
A complete list of this year’s submitted SNL performers follows below.
Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series
Tommy Brennan
Michael Che
Jeremy Culhane
Mikey Day
Andrew Dismukes
Marcello Hernández
James Austin Johnson
Colin Jost
Ben Marshall
Kam Patterson
Kenan Thompson
Bowen Yang
Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series
Chloe Fineman
Ashley Padilla
Sarah Sherman
Veronika Slowikowska
Jane Wickline
Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series
Jack Black
Bad Bunny
Colman Domingo
Will Ferrell
Ryan Gosling
Connor Storrie
Harry Styles
Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series
Ariana Grande
Melissa McCarthy
Amy Poehler
Olivia Rodrigo
First-round Emmy nomination voting runs June 11–22, 2026, with nominees set to be announced July 8.
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