The 22 Black Actors who have won Academy Awards (Oscars)
1939 Hattie McDaniel for Gone With the Wind
Best Supporting Actress
1963 Sidney Poitier for Lilies of the Field
Best Actor
1982 Louis Gossett, Jr. for An Officer and a Gentlemen
Best Supporting Actor
1989 Denzel Washington for Glory
Best Supporting Actor
1990 Whoopi Goldberg for Ghost
Best Supporting Actress
1996 Cuba Gooding, Jr. for Jerry Maguire
Best Supporting Actor
2001 Denzel Washington for Training Day
Best Actor
2001 Halle Berry for Monster’s Ball
Best Actress
2004 Jamie Foxx for Ray
Best Actor
2004 Morgan Freeman for Million Dollar Baby
Best Supporting Actor
2006 Forest Whitaker for The Last King of Scotland
Best Actor
2006 Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls
Best Supporting Actress
2009 Mo’Nique for Precious
Best Supporting Actress
2011 Octavia Spencer for The Help
Best Supporting Actress
2013 Lupita Nyong’o for 12 Years a Slave
Best Supporting Actress
2016 Mahershala Ali for Moonlight
Best Supporting Actor
2016 Viola Davis for Fences
Best Supporting Actress
2018 Mahershala Ali for Green Book
Best Supporting Actor
2018 Regina King for If Beale Street Could Talk
Best Supporting Actress
2020 Daniel Kaluuya for Judas and the Black Messiah
Best Supporting Actor
2021 Will Smith for King Richard
Best Actor
2021 Ariana DeBose for West Side Story
Best Supporting Actress
Besides the 22 Black actors who have won Academy Awards (some nominated more than once), the following Black performers have been nominated as actors.
1948 Ethel Waters for Pinky
1954 Dorothy Dandridge for Carmen Jones
1958 Sidney Poitier for The Defiant Ones
1959 Juanita Moore for Imitation of Life
1967 Beah Richards for Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
1969 Rupert Crosse for The Reivers
1970 James Earl Jones for The Great White Hope
1972 Paul Winfield for Sounder
1972 Cicely Tyson for Sounder
1972 Diana Ross for Lady Sings the Blues
1974 Diahann Carroll for Claudine
1981 Howard Rollins for Ragtime
1983 Alfre Woodard for Cross Creek
1984 Adolph Caesar for A Soldier’s Story
1984 Morgan Freeman for Street Smart
1985 Whoopi Goldberg for The Color Purple
1985 Oprah Winfrey for The Color Purple
1985 Margaret Avery for The Color Purple
1986 Dexter Gordon for Round Midnight
1987 Denzel Washington for Cry Freedom
1989 Morgan Freeman for Driving Miss Daisy
1992 Jaye Davidson for The Crying Game
1992 Denzel Washington for Malcolm X
1993 Laurence Fishburne for What’s Love Got to Do With It
1993 Angela Bassett for What’s Love Got to Do With It
1994 Morgan Freeman for The Shawshank Redemption
1994 Samuel L. Jackson for Pulp Fiction
1996 Marianne Jean-Baptiste for Secrets & Lies
1999 Denzel Washington for The Hurricane
1999 Michael Clarke Duncan for The Green Mile
2001 Will Smith for Ali
2002 Queen Latifah for Chicago
2003 Djimon Hounsou for In America
2004 Don Cheadle for Hotel Rwanda
2004 Jamie Foxx for Collateral
2004 Sophie Okonedo for Hotel Rwanda
2005 Terrence Howard for Hustle & Flow
2006 Eddie Murphy for Dreamgirls
2006 Will Smith for The Pursuit of Happiness
2006 Djimon Hounsou for Blood Diamond
2007 Ruby Dee for American Gangster
2008 Viola Davis for Doubt
2008 Taraji Henson for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
2009 Gabourey Sidibe for Precious
2009 Morgan Freeman for Invictus
2011 Viola Davis for The Help
2012 Denzel Washington for Flight
2012 Quvenzhane’ Wallis for Beasts of the Southern Wild
2013 Barkhad Abdi for Captain Phillips
2013 Chiwetel Ejiofor for 12 Years a Slave
2016 Denzel Washington for Fences
2016 Ruth Negga for Loving
2016 Naomie Harris for Moonlight
2016 Octavia Spencer for Hidden Figures
2017 Denzel Washington for Roman J. Israel, Esq.
2017 Daniel Kaluuya for Get Out
2017 Octavia Spencer for The Shape of the Water
2017 Mary J. Blige for Mudbound
2019 Cynthia Erivo for Harriet
2020 Chadwick Boseman for Ma Rainey's Black Bottom
2020 Viola Davis for Ma Rainey's Black Bottom
2020 Andra Day for The United States vs. Billie Holliday
2020 Lakeith Stanfield for Judas and the Black Messiah
2020 Leslie Odom Jr. for One Night in Miami
2021 Denzel Washington for The Tragedy of Macbeth
2021 Aunjanue Ellis for King Richard