Ariana Grande Unlikely to Win VMA Video of the Year for "hate that i made you love me"

Taylor Swift arrives at the 2026 VMAs with nine nominations, including Video of the Year for "The Fate of Ophelia," and reports covering the nominee field describe her as the strongest favorite in that category. Madonna's "Confessions II, The Film" is widely cited as the next most likely winner, with Ariana Grande's "hate that i made you love me" mentioned as a further step behind in expert assessments of the race. That ordering matters because Video of the Year at the VMAs is decided by public voting, and reports note fans could cast ballots up to ten times per day per category through the Friday before the show. Grande does have real strength this cycle: she is tied with Sabrina Carpenter for the second-most nominations behind Swift, with seven nods overall. But nomination volume alone does not translate into wins in this specific category, where Swift and Madonna are the names repeatedly flagged as the ones to beat. Grande has history in this race, having taken Video of the Year and Best Long Form Video honors previously, so voters clearly like her work. Still, with Swift and Madonna dominating expert predictions for this year's field, Grande winning again looks like the less likely outcome. The thing to watch is whether late voting momentum shifts meaningfully away from Swift before ballots close.