This article has multiple issues. Please helpimprove it or discuss these issues on thetalk page.(Learn how and when to remove these messages) This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Star Awards" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(April 2023) (Learn how and when to remove this message) This articlepossibly containsoriginal research. Pleaseimprove it byverifying the claims made and addinginline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed.(April 2023) (Learn how and when to remove this message) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Star Awards 红星大奖
Current:Star Awards 2024
Awarded for	Excellence in Chinese Language entertainment inSingapore
Country	Singapore
Presented by	Mediacorp
First award	February 26, 1994; 31 years ago (1994-02-26)
Television/radio coverage
Network	Mediacorp Channel 8 Mediacorp Channel U meWATCH YouTube

Star Awards (Chinese: 红星大奖) are awards for artistic and technical merit whereMediacorp recognises entertainers under their employment for outstanding performances of the year.^[1]

The awards are given annually in a ceremony. The various category winners are awarded a trophy, with initial designs featuring various star shapes. The star was subsequently removed and the trophy is designed as an S-shaped column, depicting the star.

The first Star Awards presentation was held on 26 February 1994, took place at the Caldecott Broadcast Centre, Mediacorp TV Theatre with an audience of about 500 people. There have no other pre-show and post-awards ceremony held in that year. Winners were announced during the presentation of the ceremony, the ceremony also presented a popularity contest, withLi Nanxing,Chew Chor Meng andZoe Tay winning the Most Popular Actor and Actress award, respectively. The firstBest Drama Serial was only awarded during the third Awards in 1996 toTofu Street for an outstanding overall performance.^[2] The nominees are determined by a team of judges employed by Mediacorp and winners are selected by a majority vote from the entire judging panel.Chew Chor Meng,Li Nanxing,Terence Cao, Sean Say, Desmond Sim,Chen Liping,Chen Xiuhuan,Pan Lingling,Aileen Tan, andZoe Tay received the award as the 10 Most Popular Artistes, with five awards given to male and female artistes; these artistes were awarded by popularity among the television audience based from the public via telephone and SMS text voting. Since 1997, the number of recipients for each category were expanded to ten.

• Fann Wong was the firstBest Actress recipient for her role in "Chronicle of Life,"(Chinese: 缘尽今生) marking her as the inaugural awardee since the award's introduction in 1995.

• Li Nanxing received an award for his performance in "Wounded Tracks," (Chinese: 伤城记) honoring his outstanding leading role, whileZhu Xiufeng was recognized for her supporting role in the drama "Chronicle of Life,"(Chinese: 缘尽今生).

• Special Achievement Award, given between 1995 and 2003, honored artistes for their significant contributions, later revived in2018 withMarcus Chin as the recipient.

• The recent award in 2022 and 2023 ends with theBest Actor andActress award, but recent ceremonies' last award would be Top 10 Most Popular Male or Female Artistes award, a popularity contest open for all nominatedMediacorp Artistes.¹

• Variety categories were introduced in the1998 ceremony, expanding eligibility to include variety programs and their artistes.

• All-Time Favourite Artiste replaced theSpecial Achievement Award in2004 ceremony, honoring artistes who won the Top 10 Most Popular Male or Female Artiste awards ten times.

• Ceremonies were held annually in April to celebrate television talents from the previous year, with changes in scheduling over the years.

• 2010 ceremony introduced new awards likeFavourite Male Character andFemale Characters and theRocket Award, focusing on artistes' contributions and improvement.

• 20th Star Awards ceremony in 2014 introduced theSocial Media Award andThe Most Popular Regional Artiste Award. 2014 saw revisions in award category quotas, affecting the presentation of certain awards likeBest News Presenter andBest Newcomer.

• 2015 ceremonies marked the last time they were held at the Caldecott Broadcast Centre before moving to theMediacorp campus. During Show 1 of the presentation,Jeanette Aw emerged as a major winner, securing victories across the majority of categories that night.^[3]

• 2016 ceremony saw changes in award presentation and the last occurrence of online Favourite award categories and the first cremeony which introduced theBest Evergreen Artiste Award. A new category, 'Best Programme Host', was created with a merger of two hosting awards (Best Variety Show Host and Best Info-Ed Programme Host) due to a similar presentation style in both the variety and info-ed programmes, as well as similar eligibility criteria. Regrettably, the technical categories moves to backstage during the proceedings of the year 2016. Consequently, these significant aspects of the event were omitted from the broadcast, limiting the recognition and appreciation of the technical excellence displayed by the nominees and winners in their respective fields.

• At the2017 ceremony, online voting categories were also streamlined, by putting more emphasis placed on the Top 10 Most Popular Artiste awards, while the Favourite Male and Female Character, and Favourite Onscreen Couple awards, as well asSocial Media Award were dropped due to the change. Due to the switch in measuring television viewership, the Top Rated Variety Programme and Top Rated Drama Serial awards were also suspended.

• The2018 ceremony saw revamps towards the Top 10 Popularity Awards, whereas a poll of 1,000 people representing a wide demographic across Singapore's population, were conducted independently by an accredited market research company, will be used to shortlist the nominations. The results of the poll weighed 50% towards the combined total, while the other 50% comes from the public vote (with 50% weighed on telepoll and online votes each). Eligibility criteria for performance and popularity categories were also revised, opening up to non-Mediacorp artistes; eligible artistes were now required to lead a role in a programme or play as a supporting role/assistant host in at least three eligible programmes or at least 30 episodes out of all eligible programmes, whichever applicable. Best Evergreen Artiste were also accessed on veteran artistes based on a full calendar year, as opposed to a single programme.^[4]

• The2019 ceremony, coinciding the silver jubilee of the ceremony on 14 April 2019, introduced two categories to featureminiseries, which were the Best Short-form Drama Serial and Best Short-form Variety Programme.

• The2021 ceremony, initially announced to be held on 26 April 2020 and announced that the event is postponed to the second half of 2020 due to the ongoingCOVID-19 pandemic, making it the first ceremony in 13 years since the revision of the eligibility period in 2008 where the ceremony would not be held on the month of April;^[5] On 7 August 2020, the ceremony was pushed to 18 April 2021 and expanding the eligibility to include 2020 programs, resulting in the increase of nominations for most of the award categories, from the traditional five to seven.^[6] The ceremony also introduces radio awards coinciding the 85th anniversary of radio broadcasting in Singapore. For the first time since 2014, the award ceremony was announced to be held outside studios, located on theJewel Changi Airport andTerminal 4.^3[7]

• The2022 ceremony brought back the popularity awards that were discontinued during the earlier awards. They were introduced asMyPick! Awards and the awards were presented in the backstage livestream instead of the Main ceremony.

• The2023 ceremony saw introductions of theMost Popular Rising Star award and revamps towards the Top 10 Popularity Awards. Nominees are no longer shortlisted into the Top 40 nominees, instead they are eligible as long as they have acted in a Lead role or main host in an eligible programme or a Supporting role or episodic host in 3 eligible programme/30 episodes in total across all eligible programme, while having more than 5 years of professional screen acting and/or screen/audio hosting experience before the award ceremony, Most Popular Rising Star have similar requirements, but they can be nominated with being a Supporting role or episodic host in a single eligible programme, while having 5 or less years of professional screen acting and/or screen/audio hosting (excluding cameo appearances/experiences before turning 18 years of age), and being 18 years and above to be nominated.^[8]

• Star Awards 2024 marks the removal of theBest Evergreen Artiste Award byMediacorp, and believes that artistic excellence transcends age. As a result, Veteran artistes are now valued based on their contributions across various acting and program categories in the nominations. Additionally,Mediacorp introduced a new category during this year's awards ceremony: "Best Audio Personality," aimed at recognizing outstanding hosts in the audio industry. This initiative aims to provide greater opportunities for DJs and audio presenters to participate and be acknowledged for their contributions.^[9]

Since 1995, the signature theme tune titled "Linking the World", composed byChristopher Evans.^[10][11] It was subsequently modified to have different renditions of the same tune for subsequent ceremonies.

Since 2019, the original theme tune was re-composed as "Starlight" 《星光》, with a new rendition and lyrics. This new rendition was used as the opener for the ceremony since 2021.

Since its establishment in 1994, the Star Awards trophy has undergone four different designs:

• 1994: The trophy featured a transparent column topped with a silver, multi-faceted star.
• 1995 to 1997: The trophy consisted of a column topped with a gold star.
• 1998 to 1999: The trophy took on a conical shape with a large star.
• 2000 to present: Designed in Shanghai, each trophy weighs 4 kilograms and is valued at $1000. Its design is formed by the crystalline shape of the letter "S," which, when viewed from another angle, resembles the letter "A," forming the abbreviation for "Star Awards." The trophy's color varies each year (green, purple, gold, brown, blue, etc.).

Here is a complete list of Mediacorp Star Awards ceremonies.

The latest ceremony,29th Star Awards ceremony, held on April 21, 2024.

In 1994, the first Star Awards were presented at the Caldecott Broadcast Centre, Mediacorp TV Theatre and the following year until 2015; however, seven ceremonies were held outside the studios: in 1996, the venue ofStar Awards changed to World Trade Centre, Harbour Pavilion and was hosted by Guo Liang and Yvette Tsui. In 2006, the ceremony was held atSt James Power Station, nearVivoCity andSentosa. Between 2010 and 2014, the ceremony was also held outside location while the show was split into two, with the first show held at Caldecott Hill, while the second show was held atResorts World Sentosa (2010 and 2011),Marina Bay Sands (2012 and 2013) andSuntec City (2014).

In 2016, the awards had since held at the new Mediacorp Campus, MES Theatre @ Mediacorp, and it became the presentation's current venue with incredibly spacious interior and stunning architectural designs, the 1,500-seater performance venue features tiered seating in its stalls and two circle levels, including removable seats at the lower stall and additional audience sitting space at the orchestra pit for people with special needs. However, two other ceremonies that are held outside the studios, making the tradition of holding the ceremonies outside the studios being brought back after a 9 year hiatus and 5 years after the new theatre was opened. The 2021 was held inJewel Changi Airport andChangi Airport Terminal 4 while the 2023 ceremony was held inMarina Bay Sands for the third time, after 10 years.

Lists of Mediacorp Star Awards Venues:

• 1994–1995: Mediacorp TV Theatre
• 1996:World Trade Centre, Singapore
• 1997–1999: MediaCorp Caldecott Broadcast Centre
• 2000–2005, 2007, 2009: MediaCorp TV Theatre
• 2006:St James Power Station, Powerhouse
• 2010–2014 (Show 1): MediaCorp TV Theatre
• 2010–2011 (Show 2):Resorts World Sentosa, Compass Ballroom
• 2012 (Show 2):Marina Bay Sands, Sands Ballroom
• 2013 (Show 2):Marina Bay Sands, MasterCard Theatres
• 2014 (Show 2):Suntec City,Suntec Singapore Convention & Exhibition Centre
• 2015: MediaCorp Caldecott Broadcast Centre
• 2016–2019, 2022, 2024: MES Theatre @ Mediacorp
• 2021:Jewel Changi Airport, Changi Terminal 4 (due to COVID-19 restrictions)
• 2023:Marina Bay Sands, MasterCard Theatres

TheStar Awards were traditionally held in end of the year or December until2009, when Mediacorp rescheduled the ceremony to April to align with the full calendar-year eligibility period from January 1 to December 31. This change was primarily influenced by the overwhelming success of "The Little Nyonya" (2008), ensuring that productions from the preceding year were appropriately recognized within the awards cycle.

In2010, the format of the awards underwent further restructuring with the introduction oftwo separate ceremonies to better acknowledge various aspects of the television industry. The format of theStar Awards underwent further restructuring with the introduction of two separate televised ceremonies to better acknowledge various aspects of the television industry. "Star Awards Show 1" was established to honor technical achievements, production teams, and backstage contributions, while "Star Awards Show 2" remained the primary televised event, focusing on major performance categories, live entertainment, and the presentation of the most prestigious accolades. This change allowed for a more comprehensive recognition of both on-screen talents and industry professionals working behind the scenes, ensuring that all contributors to Singapore’s television landscape received due recognition. This change allowed for a more comprehensive recognition of both on-screen talents and industry professionals working behind the scenes.

In 2025, Mediacorp revised the ceremony’s schedule to accommodate the release of the second part of "The Little Nyonya, Emerald Hill", reinforcing the significant influence of major productions on Singapore’s premier television awards. This adjustment continues to ensure that the awards remain relevant and reflective of industry milestones while maintaining the integrity of the eligibility period.

When citing each Star Awards ceremony, the convention may either refer to the year of its eligibility period (i.e., the calendar year in which the television programs were broadcast) or the year in which the ceremony was held.

The following individuals have hosted the Star Awards ceremony.

Multiple hosts (Show 2 & Main Ceremony)

The following individuals have hosted (or co-hosted) the Star Awards ceremony on the same year in which the individual was also a nominee.

TheMediacorp Star Awards, established in1994, is one of Singapore’s most prestigious television awards, celebrating excellence in the local entertainment industry. Initially held in December, the ceremony was rescheduled to April in2009 to align with the full calendar-year eligibility period and to accommodate the overwhelming success of "The Little Nyonya" (2008).

The2007 ceremony introduced the first-ever double ceremony, with one segment paying tribute to the 25th Anniversary of Singapore television, followed by the regular awards presentation. In2010, the awards format changed significantly, splitting the event into two separate televised ceremonies, with "Show 1" recognizing technical and production achievements, and "Show 2" featuring major performance categories and live entertainment. This format continued until 2015, with both events airing a week apart.

In2016, the technical awards were moved to an off-site non-televised presentation, while the main ceremony was split into two distinct shows, focusing separately on variety/info-ed categories and drama categories. For the first time, the Top 10 Artistes awards were divided between Show 1 (Female Artistes) and Show 2 (Male Artistes).^[12][13][14]

By 2017, the awards reverted to a single-show format, eliminating the post-show party. In 2018, the traditional three-episode prelude was also discontinued.

Following the 2005 merger betweenMediacorp and SPH MediaWorks, the awards expanded to include nominees fromChannel U. Onlinelive streaming was introduced viaxinmsn (2010–2014) andToggle (2013–2019), though initially restricted to Singapore-based audiences. From2019 onwards, theStar Awards were made globally accessible viaYouTube, broadening its international reach.

• Best Drama Serial
• Best Entertainment Programme
• Best Infotainment Programme
• Best Short-form Drama Serial
• Best Short-form Variety Programme
• Best Radio Programme

• Best Actor
• Best Actress
• Best Supporting Actor
• Best Supporting Actress
• Best Theme Song
• Best Programme Host
• Best Audio Personality

• Special Achievement Award
• All-Time Favourite Artiste

• Best Rising Star
• Top 10 Most Popular Male Artistes
• Top 10 Most Popular Female Artistes
• Most Hated Villain
• Favourite Onscreen Couple (Drama)

Technical Awards
As of 2018, only four technical awards were presented during off-site ceremony.

• Best Screenplay
• Best Variety Producer
• Best Director
• Best Variety Research Writer

One-time Awards

• 40th Anniversary Evergreen Achievement Award (Awarded only in 2003)
• Talented Artiste Award 多才多艺红星奖 (Awarded only in 2004)
• Honorary TV Award (Awarded only in 2013)
• Perfect Combo (Awarded only in 2022)
• Most Attention Seeking New-Gen Host (Awarded only in 2022)

Technical Awards
Note: All the categories were introduced in 1998 (unless otherwise stated), and these awards were presented outside broadcast except for 2010–2015, where it was presented on one show.

A number of awards have either suspended or retired throughout the years, including some that have been replaced by similar award categories in other areas of recognition:

Suspended Awards

As of 2025:^[15]

Star Awards had been nominated for 16 times since theBest Variety Special category was introduced in 1998 (with the exceptions for five shows, the award was not presented in years 2000 and 2018; while the ceremony were not nominated in years 1999, 2001 and 2006). As of 2021, eight shows, out of the total 22 ceremonies since 1997 were won, with their first win in2007 which was awarded for the2006's ceremony. Other categories forStar Awards, which were nominated or won, were also reflected in the table:

• List of Asian television awards
• Asian Television Awards- another Television Award Ceremony which recognizes Asian television.
• TVB Anniversary Awards- an Award Ceremony inHong Kong which was inspired by theStar Awards ceremony and was first held on 19 November 1997.
• Primetime Emmy Awards- another Television Award Ceremony fromUnited States.

^1 The last 2 awards atStar Awards 2022 were the Best Actor and Best Actress Awards instead of the Top 10 Awards.^[16]
^2 Previously, technical category awards (e.g. Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Variety Show Producer, etc.), newscaster and current affairs awards and, for a time, the Young Talent Award (for child actors) were held separately at a gala dinner (or afternoon conference) due to time constraints and results and clips from the event would be shown either during the ceremony, or live-streaming before the ceremony. Between 2010 and 2015, and again in 2017, those technical awards were presented in Show 1 (or during the three prelude episodes, in 2017), while the Show 2 presented the main awards. Since 2016 (with the exception for 2017), the format was reverted with the technical category awards presented at an off-site ceremony.
^3 In accordance to thesocial distancing measures, the ceremony is conductedclosed-doors, and international celebrities communicate viateleconference due totravel restrictions.^[17]

• "Star Awards 2001 Back to the Past: Past Winners (1994-2000)". Mediacorp TV. Archived fromthe original on 17 December 2001.

• Star Awards
• Awards established in 1994
• 1994 establishments in Singapore
• Mediacorp
• Television awards

• CS1 Chinese-language sources (zh)
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles needing additional references from April 2023
• All articles needing additional references
• Articles that may contain original research from April 2023
• All articles that may contain original research
• Articles with multiple maintenance issues
• Use dmy dates from April 2018