BAFTA unveils the categories, voting rules and eligibility for the 2025 EE BAFTA Film Awards

BAFTA has confirmed the categories, eligibility, voting rules and timeline for the 2025 EE BAFTA Film Awards, with key changes including a new Children’s and Family Film category, a voting update to the Animation category, and an eligibility update to the British Short Animation category.

Entries open on 2 August, kicking off the countdown to one of the most anticipated nights in the global film calendar. Earlier this year, three million people tuned into watch the ceremony on BBC One, alongside over 20 million video views across BAFTA’s social platforms, with Oppenheimer, Poor Things, The Zone of Interest and The Holdovers leading the wins.

BAFTA reviews all aspects of the EE BAFTA Film Awards annually with BAFTA’s Film Committee and film sector peers. The guiding principles are to celebrate creative excellence, level the playing field, provide a fair and robust process, encourage positive change, and evolve alongside the ever-changing industry landscape.

The 78th edition of the awards will take place on 16 February 2025. Several updates have been introduced. This year’s rulebook includes a new Children’s and Family Film award, a new points system to strengthen eligibility into the Outstanding British Film category, and expanded theatrical requirements for Best Film, alongside evolving the 120+ interventions implemented as part of the 2020 BAFTA Review on the basis of four years’ worth of membership, BAFTA View and voting data.

The full EE BAFTA Film Awards rulebook for 2025 can be found here:

https://awards.bafta.org/entry

Four years ago, we rolled out the most comprehensive set of Awards interventions in BAFTA’s history to level the playing field for talented creatives working in the screen arts. We’ve seen the impact of those changes in the four years of entry and voting data since – from more BAFTA voters watching more films than ever before to more women directors being nominated in the last four years than in BAFTA’s 77-year history. And our membership is now more diverse and better represents the talented people in our industry. There is still a long way to go. The mission we set out in the 2020 BAFTA Review continues to be at the heart of our annual rules, eligibility updates and membership advocacy – so that our Awards remain relevant, that they encourage positive industry change, and continue to champion and celebrate the very best in film making.

Sara Putt, Chair of BAFTA

Four years of data from BAFTA View, voting and our membership shows us a wider range of films are being considered from a broader range of perspectives, resulting in a greater variety of talent and films nominated and winning across the board. This meant that the time was right to review categories where juries have played a significant role in recent years. This is a refreshed rulebook that champions our world-class cinema sector, bolsters our support of the children’s media industry, and creative excellence in British filmmaking. All while continuing to put levelling the playing field at the heart of all we do, because we know it’s still not a fair race from the start. We continue to passionately champion the principle that creative excellence exists in myriad forms. So, whether the work is a blockbuster or a small indie, a debut or a doc, an animation or a film not in the English language – it’s a privilege to help shine a light on these many, magical forms of filmmaking. We can’t wait to see what’s entered.

Anna Higgs, Film Committee Chair of BAFTA