10 actors guaranteed to win an Oscar before they die
Winning an Academy Award is the highest accolade an actor can achieve. For the best part of 100 years, the Oscars have recognised excellence in cinema and rewarded the very best of the best with a shiny gold statue. Well, in theory at least.
As it stands, none of these ten actors have had their names called to the stage for a win. However, that will change one day.
Some have established themselves at such a young age, they basically have the rest of their lives left to win the big one, with a bevvy of stellar work already under their belts. Others have been nominated so many times that it would be criminal for the Academy to not finally put them out of their misery.
As for the rest? They’re just really, really good and should positively be rewarded for their efforts and versatility.
10 actors who will definitely win an Oscar:
Florence Pugh
Florence Pugh is the greatest. There’s no empirical evidence to support that claim, but she just is. In a few short years, the Englishwoman has gone from a total unknown to one of the most versatile stars Hollywood has to offer.
Despite only being 29, Pugh has already cropped up at the Oscars a few times. She’s only been nominated once personally, for ‘Best Supporting Actress’ for Little Women, but her presence has been felt through movies like Dune: Part Two and Oppenheimer. With so much on her CV already, and so much time left to do more, Oscar success is a dead cert.
Timothée Chalamet
From the moment Timothée Chalamet and his floppy hair swanned his way onscreen in Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me By Your Name, his destiny was set in stone. His performance as a heartbroken young man embroiled in a holiday romance blew everyone away and scored him his first Oscar nomination for ‘Best Actor’. It also changed the way people viewed peaches forever, but let’s not discuss that.
Chalamet himself has made it very clear that he wants to be one of the greats. This combination of ambition, talent, prominence, and industry support is a potent mixture, and the Academy must be chomping at the bit to reward this popular youngster.
Saoirse Ronan
When Saoirse Ronan was nominated for ‘Best Actress’ in 2019, she became the second-youngest person in history to be recognised four times by The Academy, the youngest being Jennifer Lawrence, who won in 2013. However, it’s the Irishwoman we’re focusing on.
Ronan is so good, it’s actually a crime she hasn’t been nominated more. Many were surprised she wasn’t acknowledged again for her work in The Outrun in 2024. This is another case of an immensely talented performer with decades of time ahead of her. Basically, it’s a slam dunk waiting to happen sooner rather than later.
Amy Adams
Ask someone on the street if Amy Adams has won an Oscar, and they’ll say “yes”, and they’d be shockingly wrong. She’s come closer than most, picking up six nominations, standing her best chance in 2013, when she was recognised for her outstanding performance in The Master. Sadly, Anne Hathaway had other ideas.
Adams is insanely talented and long overdue for a statuette. She currently occupies a similar spot to Leonardo DiCaprio did back in the day, but he did eventually overcome his Oscars’ curse. Fingers crossed his Catch Me If You Can castmate can one day do the same.
Edward Norton
Similar to Adams, it feels like Edward Norton already has an Oscar. He deserved one for his outstanding turn as a reformed neo-Nazi in Tony Kaye’s American History X, but came up against Robert Benigni in Life is Beautiful and lost.
Norton is not only a tremendous talent, but he tends to favour the sort of movies that get Oscar attention. He was nominated again as recently as 2025 for A Complete Unknown, so it’s clear he knows what he’s doing, and is precisely the sort of veteran performer The Academy loves to recognise.
Bryan Cranston
The only problem with giving Bryan Cranston an Oscar is that he probably doesn’t have anywhere to put it. For his work on Breaking Bad, the star won six Emmys, two Golden Globes, and three SAG Awards. Luckily, he’s made enough dough to afford a new trophy cabinet.
Cranston has only scored one Oscar nomination thus far, ‘Best Actor’ for Trumbo in 2016, and is getting on in years. Still, it doesn’t sit right that someone who has won so many other gongs should miss out on the biggest one. All it would take is one dynamite role, and The Academy would have no choice.
Bradley Cooper
You might know that Bradley Cooper has been nominated for a few acting Oscars, five to be precise, but did you know he’s also been nominated in three other categories? Alongside both screenplay categories, he’s been up for three ‘Best Picture’ prizes, owing to his position as a producer.
A writer, a director, an actor, and a producer, Cooper has many strings to his bow, and he has already notched up plenty of Academy attention. If only there were an Oscar for ‘Most Handsome Man’, he’d have won that years ago.
Greta Gerwig (director/writer)
Bradley Cooper had his first two movies nominated for ‘Best Picture’. Greta Gerwig had her first three movies nominated for ‘Best Picture’. In total, her films have been recognised 19 times, and the technical term for that is ‘not too shabby’.
Gerwig is surely destined to be a ‘Best Director’ one day, if not a winner of one of the screenplay gongs. Hey, she could still pick up an acting award! Basically, she can do anything, and it’s only a matter of time before she makes this happen.
Colman Domingo
For years and years, Colman Domingo has toiled away, honing his craft and being one of the best-kept secrets in the acting world. Now, there is nothing secret about him. He is nothing short of a generational talent, one of the most compelling and convincing actors of his time.
As it stands, Domingo has racked up two Oscar nominations, one for Rustin and one for Sing Sing. Considering the host of high-profile projects he is attached to, from biopics of Michael Jackson and Nat King Cole to a Steven Spielberg movie, ultimate glory will surely be his.
Emily Blunt
Even though her career started way back in 2001, Emily Blunt only received her first Oscar nod in 2024. This was for Oppenehimer, in which she played the wife of the titular character. Why is she here then? Because of her potential.
Now that Blunt has been nominated once and seems settled in that prestigious sector of Hollywood, the floodgates are surely open. She could win as early as 2026, as she’s involved in the Dwayne Johnson redemption project by one half of the Safdies, The Smashing Machine. It’s not a case of ‘if’, but ‘when’.
