Fuerza Regida tops a historic night at the Billboard Latin Music Awards

Fuerza Regida, the Mexican regional act that has spent the past two years rewriting the commercial rules of música mexicana, won eight trophies at the 33rd Billboard Latin Music Awards on Thursday night, more than any other act at a ceremony that also inducted Rosalía into the show's Hall of Fame and, for the first time in its history, let fans decide a major category by popular vote.

The ceremony, broadcast live from the James L. Knight Center in Miami on Telemundo and Peacock, closed out Billboard Latin Music Week, four days of industry panels, showcases and fan events that Billboard and its broadcast partner, Telemundo, have staged in Miami since 2019. Unlike fan-voted shows such as the Latin American Music Awards, the Billboard Latin Music Awards are determined almost entirely by chart performance — sales, streaming and radio airplay tracked over a 52-week period — which made Thursday's new Fan Favorite Artist category, decided purely by online voting at Telemundo.com, a notable departure for the franchise.

A night measured in trophies and tribute

Fuerza Regida's eight wins included Hot Latin Songs Streaming Song of the Year and Latin Global 200 Song of the Year for "Marlboro Rojo," along with the Billboard Vanguard Award recognizing the group's commercial breakout over the past year. Bad Bunny, who did not attend, still finished the night with seven awards built on his chart dominance over the eligibility period. Karol G, Peso Pluma and Romeo Santos each collected four trophies apiece, according to Telemundo's official recap of the show.

Peso Pluma shared top billing on several of his wins with collaborator Tito Double P: their joint album "Dinastía" took Top Latin Album of the Year and Top Regional Mexican Album of the Year, and their duet "daño" won Hot Latin Songs Vocal Collaboration of the Year. Rosalía's "LUX" was named Top Latin Pop Album of the Year, and she also won Latin Pop Artist of the Year, Solo, giving the Spanish singer two competitive trophies on top of the night's marquee honor.

• Fuerza Regida: eight awards, including the Billboard Vanguard Award and two "Marlboro Rojo" song trophies
• Bad Bunny: seven awards despite not appearing at the ceremony
• Karol G, Peso Pluma and Romeo Santos: four awards each
• Peso Pluma and Tito Double P's "Dinastía": Top Latin Album of the Year

Honors that spanned five decades of Latin music

The special-honors segment of the show, set weeks in advance, carried much of the night's emotional weight. Rosalía received the Billboard Hall of Fame Award, the ceremony's highest individual honor, months after Telemundo and Billboard had already named her Woman of the Year at a separate April event. Panamanian singer, actor and former presidential candidate Rubén Blades received the Billboard Icon Award, an honor previously given to Maná, Chayanne, Ivy Queen and Laura Pausini, recognizing a recording career that stretches back more than five decades and includes the salsa landmark "Siembra." Mexican pop veteran Cristian Castro received the Billboard Lifetime Achievement Award for a career spanning more than 30 years, and the reunited duo Wisin & Yandel won Latin Rhythm Artist of the Year, Duo or Group.

The show's most overtly sentimental set piece was a tribute marking ten years since the death of the Mexican singer-songwriter Juan Gabriel, performed by Carlos Rivera and Pablo Alborán with Jessi Uribe, Paola Jara and Yahritza y Su Esencia — one of sixteen live performances that organizers had billed in advance as featuring several world and television premieres, including a salsa reunion pairing Víctor Manuelle with Elvis Crespo and a reggaetón-era reunion of Wisin with Ivy Queen.

A fan vote breaks with chart-only tradition

The Fan Favorite Artist category, in which Karol G beat out Fuerza Regida, Peso Pluma, Prince Royce and Tito Double P, was the first award in the show's history decided by public balloting rather than Billboard's chart data, with voting open online through roughly an hour before Thursday's broadcast began. Telemundo and Billboard had framed the category, announced over the summer, as a way to let audiences participate directly in a show that otherwise functions as an extension of Billboard's trade charts rather than a popularity contest. The ceremony's hosts, telenovela actress Carmen Villalobos and broadcaster Javier Poza, had been billed in Telemundo's own announcement of the broadcast as presiding over what the network called "the longest-running and most prestigious awards show in Latin music," a franchise now in its 33rd edition that predates the Latin Grammys, which first aired in 2000.

For an industry still absorbing the commercial rise of música mexicana acts like Fuerza Regida and Peso Pluma alongside established global stars such as Bad Bunny and Rosalía, Thursday's results doubled as a market snapshot: regional Mexican and urbano acts dominated the volume categories built on streaming and airplay data, while legacy figures such as Blades and Castro were recognized for cultural standing built over decades rather than for any single chart run.

What comes next

The Miami ceremony effectively opens a six-week stretch of major Latin music honors. The 27th Latin Grammy Awards are scheduled for November 12 in Las Vegas, where, according to the Recording Academy's own published list of nominees, both Rosalía and Karol G are already among the leading contenders with seven nominations apiece. The Latin Recording Academy has separately named Puerto Rican reggaetón pioneer Daddy Yankee as that show's 2026 Person of the Year, to be honored at a private gala two days before the televised ceremony. Billboard has not yet said whether Thursday's full winners list, including the outcome of marquee categories such as Artist of the Year that were still being finalized as the broadcast ended, will be amended once final chart data is certified, a routine step in past years. For now, Thursday's ceremony leaves música mexicana's commercial grip on the Latin charts, and Rosalía's elevation into the format's hall of fame, as the two storylines carrying into the Latin Grammys next month.