The first
Emmy Award ceremony took place on January 25, 1949. The first daytime-themed Emmy Awards were given out at the
Primetime Emmy Awards ceremony in 1972, when
The Doctors and
General Hospital were nominated for
Outstanding Achievement in a Daytime Drama. That year,
The Doctors won the first Best Show Daytime Emmy. In addition, the award for Outstanding Achievement by an Individual in a Daytime Drama was given to
Mary Fickett from
All My Children. A previous category "Outstanding Achievement in Daytime Programming" was added once in 1968 with individuals like
Days of Our Lives star
Macdonald Carey nominated. Due to voting rules of the time, judges could opt to either award one or no Emmy, and in the end they decided that no one nominated was deserving of the golden statuette. This snub outraged then-
Another World writer
Agnes Nixon, causing her to write in
The New York Times, "...after viewing the recent fiasco of the Emmy awards, it may well be considered a mark of distinction to have been ignored by this group." Longtime
General Hospital star
John Beradino became a leading voice to have daytime talent honored with special recognition for their work. The first separate awards show made just for daytime programming was broadcast in 1974 from the
Channel Gardens at
Rockefeller Center in New York. The hosts that year were
Barbara Walters and
Peter Marshall. For years, the gala was held in New York, usually at nearby
Radio City Music Hall, with occasional broadcasts from
Madison Square Garden. In 2006, the Daytime Emmys was moved to the
Kodak Theatre in
Los Angeles, the first time they had ever been held outside of New York. The Kodak Theatre also hosted the 2007 and 2008 ceremonies, before it was moved again in 2009 to the
Orpheum Theatre across town. In 2010 and 2011, the Daytime Emmys were instead held in
Las Vegas. From 2012 onward, the Daytime Emmys have been held at various venues in Los Angeles, never to return again to New York (most likely as a reflection of the current state of American daytime dramas, where all New York-produced network soap operas have since been cancelled, and the ones left on the air are being recorded in Los Angeles). In 2007, child voice actress Danica Lee, the voice for Ming-Ming in
Wonder Pets! became the first Asian nominee overall in Daytime Emmy history while
Eric Bauza became the first adult Asian nominee in Daytime Emmy history. Due to the relatively small talent pool in daytime television, it has become common for the same people to be nominated repeatedly. The most infamous of these is
All My Children star
Susan Lucci, whose name became synonymous with being nominated for an award and never winning, after having been nominated 18 times without receiving an award before finally winning a Daytime Emmy for Best Actress in 1999. In 2003, in response to heavy criticism of
bloc voting in favor of shows with the largest casts, an additional voting round was added to all the drama acting categories. Known as the "pre-nominations", one or two actors from each show is selected to then move on and be considered for the primary nominations for the awards. With the rise of
cable television in the 1980s, cable programs first became eligible for the Daytime Emmys in 1989. In 2013, in response to
All My Children being moved from broadcast to
streaming television, NATAS began accepting nominations to web-only series. The
Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS) also began accepting original online-only streaming television programs in 2013. In October 2019, as part of several initiatives regarding gender identity, the NATAS decided to replace both the younger actor and actress in a drama categories with a single gender-neutral one for 2020. The
47th Daytime Emmy Awards were postponed to June 26, 2020, due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, with the traditional in-person ceremony being replaced by a television special featuring remote appearances, and the announcement of winners in leading categories. In December 2021, the ATAS and NATAS announced major realignments to the Emmy Awards, accounting for the growth of
streaming services by aligning their categories and the ceremonies' scopes around factors such as the themes and frequency of such programming, rather than dayparts. This resulted in most dramas (besides soap operas) now falling exclusively under the scope of the Primetime Emmy Awards, and categories for children's television being spun out into the newly established
Children's and Family Emmy Awards. NATAS has periodically awarded the Chairman's Crystal Pillar Award, for special achievement in daytime television, including a 2011 award for
Oprah Winfrey and her
eponymous syndicated talk show. In 2021, the Crystal Pillar was awarded to 16 daytime television professionals who "envisioned and implemented procedures that made safe production of media possible during the COVID pandemic" as part of the
48th Daytime Creative Arts Emmy Awards. In January 2025, NATAS president Adam Sharp stated that beginning with the 52nd ceremony, the Daytime Emmy Awards would move from its previous May/June scheduling to October, switching places with the
News and Documentary Emmy Awards to highlight the "timely nature" of news and documentary content. ==Rules==