2025 Oscars: Best Supporting Actress Predictions

Nominations voting is from January 8-12, 2025, with official Oscar nominations announced January 17, 2025. Final voting is February 11-18, 2025. And finally, the 97th Oscars telecast will be broadcast on Sunday, March 2 and air live on ABC at 7:00 p.m. ET/ 4:00 p.m. PT. We update our picks through awards season, so keep checking IndieWire for all our 2025 Oscar predictions.

The State of the Race

Best Supporting Actress may be the acting category most thrown out of whack by the holiday releases. Netflix seems so set to dominate the category this season, with Zoe Saldaña and Selena Gomez for “Emilia Pérez,” a Best Picture frontrunner; Danielle Deadwyler for “The Piano Lesson,” two years after the infamous “Till” snub; and any one of the stars of “His Three Daughters,” but especially Natasha Lyonne.

And, sure, there have been plenty more actresses waiting in the wings, whether they be David Lynch muses Isabella Rossellini and Joan Chen for their performances in festival favorites “Conclave” and “Dìdi,” respectively, or former Oscar nominees like “Nickel Boys” star Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor and “The Brutalist” star Felicity Jones who seem closer to a lock. 

But the response that “Wicked” has gotten is too hard to ignore. Even the people that do not enjoy the film have, for the most part, given kudos to Ariana Grande’s portrayal of Glinda the Good Witch in her Shiz University days. Though she is now thought of as one of the biggest pop stars in the world, the film finally allows her to draw from her Broadway roots in a way none of the other opportunities she’s had, on Nickelodeon or otherwise, have been able to. 

As is the case every year, the one thing buoying both Grande and current frontrunner Saldaña is the idea that they are committing category fraud. Ultimately, their films are called “Wicked” and “Emilia Pérez,” and neither one of those titles is in reference to their characters. For whatever amount of screentime they have, their films are centered around someone else, so it is hard to imagine voters will be so incensed as to move them to the Best Actress category. That rarely ever happens.

With “A Complete Unknown” having finally screened, stars Monica Barbaro and Elle Fanning have entered the Oscar race with more traditional supporting performances. Though Fanning’s character never gets a chance to break past the trope of playing girlfriend to a creative genius, Barbaro’s portrayal of Joan Baez is delightfully assured, and requires her to sing, which often gives any actor looking for an award an edge.

Contenders are listed in alphabetical order, below. No actress will be deemed a frontrunner until we have seen the film.

Frontrunners:
Danielle Deadwyler (“The Piano Lesson”)
Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (“Nickel Boys”)

Ariana Grande (“Wicked”)
Felicity Jones (“The Brutalist”)
Zoe Saldaña (“Emilia Pérez”)

Contenders:
Michele Austin (“Hard Truths”)
Monica Barbaro (“A Complete Unknown”)
Leonie Benesch (“September 5”)
Joan Chen (“Dìdi”)
Toni Collette (“Juror #2”)
Selena Gomez (“Emilia Pérez”)
Jennifer Lopez (“Unstoppable”)
Natasha Lyonne (“His Three Daughters”)
Saoirse Ronan (“Blitz”)
Isabella Rossellini (“Conclave”)