Fierce Competition Pushes Back The Oscars For 2021-2022

Ever conscious about declining ratings, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has announced later air dates for the 2021 and 2022 Oscars telecast to avoid major events.

In an official press release on Tuesday, the Academy set Feb. 28, 2021, and Feb. 27, 2022, as airdates for the 93rd and 94th Academy Awards telecasts, respectively. These will follow an experiment with an earlier timeslot, with the 2020 show set to air on Feb. 9.

The Academy’s release explained that the timing of other major event broadcasts and holidays are behind the decision. Specifically cited are the Super Bowl broadcasts and the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, which will air from Feb. 4 to Feb. 20. While mentioned in the release, no specific national holidays were cited.

While these events have made the Academy briefly suspend its experiment with earlier telecasts, they have not completely abandoned it yet. “The Academy and ABC continue to evaluate dates for future years,” the official release explained.

In recent years, the Oscars have struggled with ratings as viewing habits and the film landscape in general changed dramatically around them. From the 86th to the 90th edition, the awards telecast tumbled in the ratings year after year, going from 43.74 million viewers in 2014 to 26.5 million in 2018, an all-time low. Things improved slightly in 2019 as the Academy tested a new, host-less format, ticking up to 29.6 million viewers. It remains to be seen, however, if this improvement was to do with any format changes, so the Academy and ABC will almost certainly continue to tinker with the shows in the coming years.