The best animated film with a running time of more than 40 minutes, a significant number of the major characters animated, and at least 75 percent of the picture's running time including animation.
The Academy Award for Best Animated Feature is an Academy Award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) for the best animatedfeature film. An animated feature is defined by the academy as a film with a running time of more than 40 minutes in which characters' performances are created using a frame-by-frame technique, a significant number of the major characters are animated, and animation figures in no less than 75 percent of the running time.[1] The Academy Award for Best Animated Feature was first awarded in 2002 for films released in 2001.[2][3][4]
The entire AMPAS membership has been eligible to choose the winner since the award's inception. If there are sixteen or more films submitted for the category, the winner is voted from a shortlist of five films, otherwise there will only be three films on the shortlist.[5]
By 2001, the rise of sustained competitors to Disney in the feature animated film market, such as DreamWorks Animation (founded by former Disney executive Jeffrey Katzenberg), created an increase of film releases of significant annual number enough for AMPAS to reconsider.[6] The Academy Award for Best Animated Feature was first given out at the 74th Academy Awards,[12] held on March 24, 2002.[13] The academy included a rule that stated that the award would not be presented in a year in which fewer than eight eligible films opened in theaters.[14] It dropped the rule on April 23, 2019, to make voting for animated films more acceptable.[15] People in the animation industry, as well as fans, expressed hope that the prestige from this award and the resulting boost to the box office would encourage the increased production of animated features.[citation needed]
In 2009, when the nominee slots for Best Picture were doubled to ten, Up was nominated for both Animated Feature and Picture at the 82nd Academy Awards, the first to do so since the inception of the Animated Feature category.[16] This feat was repeated the following year by Toy Story 3.[17] From 2010 onward, with the increasing competitiveness of the Animated Feature category, Pixar (a perennial nominee) did not receive nominations for several recent films due to the more mixed critical response and comparatively low box-office receipts, while Pixar's sister studio Disney Animation won their first three awards but in similar response due to rivalry between critically-acclaimed animation studios outside of Disney.[18]
At the same year, the Academy enacted a new rule regarding the motion capture technique employed in films such as A Christmas Carol (2009) and The Adventures of Tintin (2011), directed by Academy Award for Best Director winners Robert Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg respectively, and how they might not be eligible in this category in the future.[19] The new rule now reads "An animated feature film is defined as a motion picture with a running time of greater than 40 minutes, in which movement and characters’ performances are created using a frame-by-frame technique. Motion capture by itself is not an animation technique. In addition, a significant number of the major characters must be animated, and animation must figure in no less than 75 percent of the picture’s running time."[19] This rule was possibly made to prevent nominations of live-action films that rely heavily on motion capture, such as Avatar (2009).[19]
In 2022, it was unclear whether Marcel the Shell with Shoes On would be eligible for the award at the 95th Academy Awards due to being a live-action/stop-motion animated hybrid. Director Dean Fleischer Camp said that he and A24 had to submit documentation in order to prove the film had enough animation to meet the award's minimum requirements.[20][1] The AMPAS officially deemed the film eligible for consideration in the Animated Feature category and was eventually nominated for said category.[21]
Toy Story is the only franchise to win this award twice, for its third and fourth films. Additionally, the third and fourth films are so far the only two sequels to win this award.
Studio Ghibli (Japan) has the most wins (two) and nominations (seven) for a non-US studio; Spirited Away and The Boy and the Heron are the only non-English language films to win.[47][48][49]
2005 and 2011 are the only two-time years that Disney and Pixar films were completely shut out of the Best Animated Feature category.
People
Pete Docter has the most wins of any individual (3), and is tied with Hayao Miyazaki and Chris Sanders for the most nominations (4). Additionally, Miyazaki has the most wins and nominations for a non-US individual.
Hayao Miyazaki became the oldest winner in 2024 at the age of 83; he previously held the record between 2003 and 2023. Andrew Stanton is the youngest winner, having done so at the age of 38.
Byron Howard was the first queer person to win the award, doing so in 2017 for Zootopia and again in 2022 for Encanto. This also makes him the only two-time queer winner.
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