LOS ANGELES — General Hospital extended its grip on daytime television's top honor, winning outstanding drama series at the 53rd annual Daytime Emmy Awards for a sixth consecutive year, while a freshman soap delivered the ceremony's breakthrough story.
The ABC sudser beat out Days of Our Lives, The Young and the Restless and newcomer Beyond the Gates for the drama series prize at Friday night's ceremony at the Hollywood Palladium, streamed on YouTube. General Hospital entered the night with 13 nominations and won three other awards. The show's Genie Francis also received the ceremony's lifetime achievement honor.
The night's bigger story belonged to Beyond the Gates, the CBS soap created by Michele Val Jean that debuted on February 24, 2025 — just late enough to have missed last year's eligibility window. Set in one of the wealthiest majority-Black counties in the United States, the show is the first daytime drama to feature a predominantly Black cast since Generations went off the air in 1989. It walked into its first eligible ceremony with 13 nominations and walked out with four wins, including lead actress for Tamara Tunie and the prize for outstanding younger performer for Ambyr Michelle.
Tunie, a soap veteran who previously appeared on As the World Turns and Days of Our Lives, had never won a Daytime Emmy before Friday. Accepting the award, she thanked the performers who made her career possible.
This is the best welcome back to daytime ever. There are a host of Black actresses who paved the way for me and I feel them as I stand here tonight, beginning with Cicely Tyson, the first Black woman to appear on the daytime TV show The Guiding Light.
Tamara Tunie, Beyond the Gates
Beyond the Gates also won for lighting direction and for hairstyling and makeup, and has already been renewed through the 2027–28 season by CBS Studios and NAACP Venture.
Best actor in a daytime drama went to The Bold and the Beautiful's Scott Clifton. His co-star Heather Tom, also nominated for lead actress, had been chasing a record seventh trophy that would have made her the most-honored actress in daytime history; the award went to Tunie instead. The Young and the Restless led all series with 18 nominations but converted only three wins, two of them in the supporting categories, where Roger Howarth took best supporting actor and Beth Maitland best supporting actress.
A Streaming-Era Talk Field
The outstanding talk series award went to The Kelly Clarkson Show in its final year of eligibility — the NBCUniversal Syndication Studios production is winding down — giving it five trophies on the night, the most of any program. Clarkson herself did not attend and did not win the separate award for talk-show host; that prize went to Sherri Shepherd, whose own eponymous talk show was canceled after four seasons.
Other winners spanned categories far beyond soap opera and daytime talk. Tracee Ellis Ross won outstanding travel and adventure program for Solo Traveling, Keke Palmer was honored as an executive producer of Glam Through the Ages, and Ina Garten's Food Network series Be My Guest won for outstanding culinary host, with its companion show named best culinary instructional series.
A Political Note From the Stage
Midway through the ceremony, National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences chair Terry O'Reilly used his remarks to draw a line between the awards show and the 2026 midterm elections, days away. Invoking a congressman jailed in 1798 for criticizing the president in print, O'Reilly argued that press freedom has historically depended on public vigilance rather than the courts alone.
The free press in 1800 was not saved by a court. It was saved by citizens who were engaged and informed. ... Let's stand together to resist those who would seek comfort in a quieter media.
Terry O'Reilly, NATAS chair
The Hollywood Reporter won its first Daytime Emmy on the night, for its Off Script roundtable series in the outstanding arts and popular culture program category, while sister publication IndieWire won best editing for a daytime studio program.
