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- Kendrick Lamar now holds the record for most rap Grammy wins (27).
- The artist swept every rap category at the 2026 Grammy Awards.
- Lamar surpassed Jay-Z’s previous record of 25 total career wins.
- Major 2026 wins include “Luther” for Record of the Year and GNX.
- He is now the fifth most awarded artist in Grammy history.
With more Grammy wins than Jay-Z (25), Kendrick Lamar now holds the record for most Grammy wins (27) by a rapper in history.
The 38-year-old Compton-born artist swept every rap category at the 2026 Grammy Awards, including Best Rap Album (GNX), Best Rap Song (tv off), Best Melodic Rap Performance (luther), Best Rap Performance (Chains & Whips) with Clipse, and Record Of The Year (luther). He did so barely a decade after he won his first career Grammys for Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song for “I” in 2015.
Now, Lamar chases the likes of Beyoncé (35) and Quincy Jones (28), who occupy two of the top four positions for wins alongside Sir Georg Solti (31) and Chick Corea (29). He’s one or two albums away from a top spot, assuming Beyoncé doesn’t drop another heater (no pressure, K-dot). Here we’re taking a retrospective look at Lamar’s Grammy career, including his biggest wins and disappointments, and we’re also determining exactly how these awards are decided.
Kendrick Lamar Grammy Wins
With 66 nominations and 27 wins, Kendrick Lamar sits alongside Alison Krauss and John Williams in the fifth spot for most wins in Grammy history. Here’s a list of every Grammy award Kendrick Lamar has won:
- 68th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2026)
- Record Of The Year: “Luther” (Kendrick Lamar & SZA)
- Best Rap Album: GNX
- Best Rap Song: “TV OFF” (Kendrick Lamar featuring Lefty Gunplay)
- Best Melodic Rap Performance: “Luther” (Kendrick Lamar & SZA)
- Best Rap Performance: “Chains & Whips” (Clipse featuring Kendrick Lamar)
- 67th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2025)
- Record Of The Year: “Not Like Us”
- Song Of The Year: “Not Like Us”
- Best Rap Performance: “Not Like Us”
- Best Rap Song: “Not Like Us”
- Best Music Video: “Not Like Us”
- 65th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2023)
- Best Rap Album: Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers
- Best Rap Performance: “The Heart Part 5”
- Best Rap Song: “The Heart Part 5”
- 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2022)
- Best Rap Performance: “Family Ties” (Baby Keem Featuring Kendrick Lamar)
- 61st Annual GRAMMY Awards (2019)
- Best Rap Performance: “King’s Dead” (Kendrick Lamar, Jay Rock, Future & James Blake)
- 60th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2018)
- Best Rap Album: DAMN.
- Best Rap Performance: “HUMBLE.”
- Best Rap Song: “HUMBLE.”
- Best Music Video: “HUMBLE.”
- Best Rap/Sung Performance: “LOYALTY.” (Kendrick Lamar Featuring Rihanna)
- 58th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2016)
- Best Rap Album: To Pimp A Butterfly
- Best Rap Performance: “Alright”
- Best Rap Song: “Alright”
- Best Music Video: “Bad Blood” (Taylor Swift Featuring Kendrick Lamar)
- Best Rap/Sung Collaboration: “These Walls” (Kendrick Lamar Featuring Bilal, Anna Wise & Thundercat)
- 57th Annual GRAMMY Awards (2015)
- Best Rap Performance: “i”
- Best Rap Song: “i”
How the Grammy Awards are Decided
As you might imagine, choosing a Grammy winner is a rigorous process.
Similar to a job application, the Recording Academy members and record companies enter recordings and music videos released during the eligibility year. This year, the period was August 31, 2024, to August 30, 2025, which is why Taylor Swift wasn’t at this year’s awards (‘The Life of a Showgirl’ was released on October 3, 2025).
Once the recordings are submitted, experts review the entries to ensure eligibility and proper category placement without making artistic judgments.
Ballots are then cast by the voting members (more than 350 of them, including Performers, Songwriters, producers, engineers, instrumentalists, and other creative professionals) in their areas of expertise to determine the five finalists in each category. If you’re looking at craft categories, final nominations are determined by committees of peers actively working in that field. Those members then cast a second round of ballots on the nominees to determine the winners in the General Field and their specific genre fields.
Finally, the results are tabulated by a third-party firm (Deloitte), and the winners are announced at the Grammy Awards ceremonies.
It Could Have Been Grammy Win 28
Kendrick Lamar’s strike rate at the Grammys is the stuff of legend. Not only is he the first artist in history to be nominated for the Album of the Year Grammy for five consecutive albums, but he’s managed 27 wins from 66 nominations. The most impressive part is, it could have been more.
Fans will never forget the 2014 Grammys when Kendrick Lamar was nominated for seven awards and won zero.
Most famously, Kendrick, Drake, JAY-Z, and Kanye all lost to Macklemore for Rap Album of the Year, and Macklemore sent a text message (pictured above) to K-Dot apologising for winning the award.
Kendrick never took his foot off the gas, and the Grammys learned from their mistakes. Could Kendrick surpass Beyonce for number one all-time with 36 wins? It seems like a very real possibility.
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