Madonna is opening the MTV Video Music Awards this year. MTV and CBS confirmed the news on Wednesday, and it ends a 23-year gap since she last performed on that stage.

The 2026 ceremony airs live from Los Angeles on September 27, starting at 7:30 p.m. ET on CBS, with a simulcast on MTV and a stream on Paramount+. Snoop Dogg hosts. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it's the first time the VMAs have landed in LA in nearly a decade, the last one being 2017 when Katy Perry ran the show at The Forum.

For Madonna, this closes a loop that goes back to the very beginning. She opened the first-ever VMAs in 1984 with "Like a Virgin," a performance that's still taught as a masterclass in how to make an award show matter. Her 1990 "Vogue" turn, dressed as Marie Antoinette, and the "Express Yourself" number both followed that same instinct for spectacle. The last time she actually performed at the VMAs was 2003, opening the show with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera in the kiss that dominated pop culture conversation for months. She popped in again in 2021 for MTV's 40th anniversary, but that wasn't a full performance.

The nominations tell their own story

Madonna isn't just opening the show, she's the most nominated artist of the night with 11 nods, including Artist of the Year and Video of the Year for "Confessions II – The Film." The Hollywood Reporter notes this is the third time in her career she's led the nominations, after 1990 and 1998. She's picked up 19 VMA wins across her career, spanning Video of the Year, Artist of the Year and Song of the Year.

Taylor Swift trails with nine nominations. Sabrina Carpenter and Ariana Grande are tied at seven. Bruno Mars, PinkPantheress and Zara Larsson each have five.

The timing isn't an accident. Madonna's album Confessions II came out in July and TheWrap reports it's been sitting near the top of the charts since. She'd already tested the water this year with a couple of one-off shows, a Times Square Pride set and a surprise cameo during Sabrina Carpenter's Coachella headline slot. Neither of those was a full VMAs-scale production, so this is the real comeback.

MTV hasn't said what she'll actually perform. Given the nominations are built around Confessions II, expect something off that record, though nobody's ruling out a callback to the catalogue that made her the most decorated artist in VMAs history.

Fan voting for 13 categories stays open through September 25, with Best New Artist voting continuing live during the broadcast. MTV says more performers and presenters get announced in the run-up to the 27th. Whether Madonna brings surprise guests of her own, the way she did in 2003, is the question everyone's going to be asking right up until the lights go down in LA.