TikTok reveals first-ever U.S. awards nominees for breakthrough artist of the year
TikTok has revealed the nominees for its first-ever U.S. Awards and the Breakthrough Artist category is packed with rising stars. See who made the list and why it matters.
TikTok is stepping into the American awards-show arena with its first-ever U.S. TikTok Awards, and the platform is kicking things off by spotlighting some of the most influential rising musicians shaping culture today. In one of the night’s flagship categories, Breakthrough Artist of the Year, TikTok has nominated Alex Warren, Katseye, Laufey, Ravyn Lenae and Sombr, five artists whose careers have surged thanks to the platform’s unique ability to launch music into the global spotlight.
Set for December 18 at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles, the event marks TikTok’s boldest move yet toward becoming a major force in entertainment beyond the app itself. The show’s theme is “New Era. New Icons.”. The ceremony will stream live on TikTok and air simultaneously on Tubi, reflecting the company’s growing influence across both social media and traditional entertainment channels.
The Breakthrough Artist category highlights artists whose musical impact has been woven into the fabric of TikTok’s creator culture. Each nominee has experienced a surge in visibility through viral sounds, fan-driven trends, or community-led storytelling that propelled their work far beyond conventional promotion.
Alex Warren enters the awards with significant momentum. His emotional, hook-driven pop songs became widely used in TikTok videos over the past year, helping establish him as one of the platform’s most recognisable emerging voices. Laufey, whose blend of jazz and modern pop has captivated a younger generation, has seen her music become a staple on the app, often soundtracking reflective, intimate moments shared by users. Ravyn Lenae’s silky R&B sound resonated deeply across the platform, with thousands of creators choosing her tracks for everything from choreography to aesthetic edits. Katseye, the globally emerging girl group, has built an enormous fan presence on TikTok, with their performance clips and behind-the-scenes content generating intense engagement. Meanwhile, Sombr has risen rapidly through the platform’s alt-music community, with their genre-bending approach inspiring countless remixes, duets and reinterpretations.
What makes these nominations particularly meaningful is how closely they reflect TikTok’s evolving role in music discovery. The platform has become a powerful vehicle for introducing artists to global audiences, often faster than traditional industry channels. Viral sounds transform overnight into chart-topping hits, and emerging musicians can build careers based on direct fan interaction, rather than relying solely on label-driven campaigns. The nominees represent the wide spectrum of genres and artistic identities that TikTok’s algorithm amplifies, and how organic engagement can reshape entire musical trajectories.
The awards give TikTok a way to formally recognise the impact creators and musicians have within its ecosystem, while offering artists a new path to visibility, legitimacy and career growth. For fans, it’s an opportunity to celebrate the musicians they’ve championed, often from the earliest stages of their rise.
Voting for the inaugural awards will take place directly inside the app, allowing the community to decide the winners. With millions of daily music-driven interactions, TikTok’s fanbase is expected to shape the results in unpredictable and highly engaged ways.
As the ceremony approaches, the Breakthrough Artist nominations stand out as a snapshot of the modern musical landscape, one where virality, creativity, authenticity and fan connection matter as much as radio play or traditional marketing. Alex Warren, Katseye, Laufey, Ravyn Lenae and Sombr each reflect a different facet of the new era of music discovery, and their presence on this list signals that the future of the industry is already unfolding on TikTok.