The Weeknd was the top winner at the Billboard Music Awards, which were presented in the L.A. Live complex in Los Angeles on Sunday, May 23, 2021. The pop and R&B star won 10 awards, which more than doubled his career total of BBMAs.
He had won nine awards prior to this year.
With his 19 awards, The Weeknd is now in fifth place on the all-time BBMA winners list, behind Drake (29), Taylor Swift (25), Justin Bieber (21) and Garth Brooks (20).
The Weeknd’s megahit “Blinding Lights” took top Hot 100 song. It’s just the third non-collab single to win in this category since the show resumed in 2011. The first two were Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite” (2011) and Meghan Trainor’s “All About That Bass” (2015).
Aside from The Weeknd, Pop Smoke also won five awards, including top Billboard 200 album for Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon.
This is the fourth time in the past five years that a hip-hop album has won that award. (The sole exception was Billie Eilish’s When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? last year.) Pop Smoke, who died in February 2020, also won top new artist. He’s the first artist to win that award posthumously.
BTS won four awards, bringing their BBMA total to date to an impressive nine. They won top duo/group for the second time in three years. BTS also took top social artist for the fifth consecutive year. The group is just one year behind Bieber’s six-year hold on the award from 2011-16.
Bad Bunny won four awards, including top Latin artist for the second year in a row. He’s the fourth artist to win back-to-back awards in that category since the BBMAs resumed in 2011. The first three were Shakira, Romeo Santos and Ozuna. Bad Bunny swept the artist, album and song awards in Latin. That was the only genre outside of R&B where one artist swept all three of those awards. (The Weeknd swept in R&B.)
Gabby Barrett won three awards, including top country song for her solo version of “I Hope” and top collaboration for her collab version of the song, which featured Charlie Puth.
Drake won two awards: top streaming artist and a special award for artist of the decade.
Swift won two awards: top female artist and top Billboard 200 artist, each for the fourth time. That’s a new record for the most wins in both of those categories.
Lady Gaga won two awards: top dance/electronic artist and top dance/electronic album — each for the first time in nine years. She won in those categories in 2011 and 2012, before going on to make her mark in many other worlds, including traditional pop and film acting.
Kanye West won two awards, including top gospel artist for the second year in a row. West has won six of his 11 BBMAs in gospel or Christian categories. West and Travis Scott shared the award for top gospel song, “Wash Us in the Blood.” That’s Scott’s first BBMA.
Carrie Underwood’s My Gift won top Christian album. This is Underwood’s 12th BBMA.
Fifteen years ago, her debut album, Some Hearts, won both album of the year and country album of the year. Underwood won her first BBMA in a Christian category six years ago when “Something in the Water” took top Christian song.
Machine Gun Kelly won two awards, including top rock artist. MGK is just the second solo artist to win in that category since the show resumed in 2011. Hozier won in 2015.
Morgan Wallen won three awards, including top country artist and top country album, awards won the last two years by Luke Combs. Wallen wasn’t part of the show, a consequence of his caught-on-video use of the N-word earlier this year.
