2026 Festival Wraps After 11 Days, 115 Films & 173 Screenings

Hot Docs wrapped its 2026 edition last night following an 11-day Festival that brought to Toronto cinema screens 115 of the finest documentaries from Canada and around the world, sharing the most pressing stories of our time with full houses of local film-loving audiences and showcasing global filmmaking talent from a total of 51 countries. The 33rd Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival featured 173 screenings on five screens, with 162 filmmaker and guest Q&As, including four extended discussions with filmmakers and special guests as part of the Big Ideas series, and three days of Hot Docs Industry programming including the return of the Hot Docs Forum. 

"The conversations our entire team have had with Festival attendees over the past 11 days have made it abundantly clear that Hot Docs is back," said Diana Sanchez, Executive Director, Hot Docs. "We close out the 2026 edition of Hot Docs feeling incredibly proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish this year, and privileged to be able to present such a powerful lineup of films and to host close to 1000 filmmakers, delegates and industry professionals, as well as tens of thousands of audience members in cinemas for a shared film-going experience. Together, our community came out to enthusiastically support documentary filmmaking and global storytelling in a meaningful way, engaging in deep discussion and gaining a greater understanding of the world we share together."

The Hot Docs Rogers Audience Award for Best Canadian Documentary, which recognizes the top Canadian feature as determined by audience poll with a cash prize of $50,000, was announced last night at a free encore screening at Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema. Nekai Walks (D: Rico King | P: David Mcilvride | Canada | 2026 | 90 min), received the prize, courtesy of Rogers. At 16, Nekai Foster was shot while walking home in Toronto’s Jane and Finch neighbourhood. His journey of survival and recovery—defying all medical odds as he relearns to walk—exposes how gun violence shapes bodies, families and communities. 

With $67,000 total awarded at the Hot Docs Awards Presentation on Friday, May 1; $48,000 in pitch prizes awarded following the close of this year’s Hot Docs Forum on Wednesday, April 29; and $50,000 awarded yesterday as part of the Hot Docs Rogers Audience Award for Best Canadian Documentary, this year the Festival awarded a total of $165,000 in support of documentary filmmakers. 

Hot Docs Audience Awards are determined by votes submitted by Festival audiences. At the close of the Festival, it was determined that American Doctor (D: Poh Si Teng | P: Poh Si Teng, Kirstine Barfod, Reem Haddad | USA, Palestine, Denmark, Malaysia, Qatar | 2026 | 93 min) placed first in the overall audience poll and won the Hot Docs Audience Award.  

The top short film, winning the Audience Award for Short Documentary, was Sanyi the Rooster (D: Lotte Salomons | P: Kes Raven, Raphael Hogers, Nova Nagel | Netherlands | 2025 | 20 min). 

The 20 documentaries in the audience poll are: 

1. American Doctor (D: Poh Si Teng | P: Poh Si Teng, Kirstine Barfod, Reem Haddad | USA, Palestine, Denmark, Malaysia, Qatar | 2026 | 93 min) 

2. Steal This Story, Please! (D: Carl Deal, Tia Lessin | P: Carl Deal, Tia Lessin, Karen Ranucci, Diana Cohn, Caren Spruch | USA | 2026 | 102 min) 

3. A Fox Under a Pink Moon (D: Mehrdad Oskouei, Soraya Akhalaghi | P: Mehrdad Oskouei | Iran, Denmark, France | 2026 | 77 min) 

4. 32 Meters (D: Morteza Atabaki | P: Morteza Atabaki, Murat Ones | Turkey, Iran, Qatar | 2025 | 83 min) 

5. Nekai Walks (D: Rico King | P: David Mcilvride | Canada | 2026 | 90 min) 

6. Antidiva: The Carole Pope Confessions (D: Michelle Mama | P: Allison Grace, Bill Taylor | Canada | 2025 | 89 min) 

7. Black Zombie (D: Maya Annik Bedward | P: Maya Annik Bedward, Kate Fraser, Hannah Donegan | Canada | 2026 | 90 min) 

8. The Ballad of Judas Priest (D: Tom Morello, Sam Dunn | P: Sam Dunn, Scot McFadyen | USA | 2026 | 98 min) 

9. The Seoul Guardians (D: Chul Young Cho, Shin Wan Kim, Jong Woo Kim | P: Sona Jo, Shin Wan Kim | South Korea | 2026 | 71 min) 

10. When a Witness Recants (D: Dawn Porter | P: Dawn Porter, Jennifer Oko, Miriam Weintraub | 2026 | USA | 117 min) 

11. Traces (D: Alisa Kovalenko, Marysia Nikitiuk | P: Olha Bregman, Natalia Libet, Violetta Kamińska, Izabela Wójcik, Dariusz Jabłoński | Ukraine, Poland | 2026 | 82 min) 

12. Sanyi the Rooster (D: Lotte Salomons | P: Kes Raven, Raphael Hogers, Nova Nagel | Netherlands | 2025 | 20 min) 

13. təm kʷaθ nan Namesake (D: Evan Adams, Eileen Francis | P: Peg Campbell | Canada | 2026 | 76 min) 

14. Code of Misconduct (D: Sébastien Trahan | P: Annie Bourdeau | Canada | 2026 | 88 min) 

15. Aanikoobijigan [ancestor/great-grandparent/great-grandchild] (D: Adam Khalil, Zachary Khalil | P: Steve Holmgren, Grace Remington, Jacque Clark | USA, Denmark | 2026 | 81 min) 

16. Ceremony (D: Banchi Hanuse | P: Banchi Hanuse | Canada | 2026 | 84 min) 

17. Birds of War (D: Janay Boulos, Abd Alkader Habak | P: Sonja Henrici, Janay Boulos, Abd Alkader Habak | UK, Syria, Lebanon | 2026 | 85 min) 

18. Baby Jackfruit Baby Guava (D: Nhật Quang Nông | P: Trang Đào Thị Minh, Sarah Kang, Heejung Oh | Vietnam, South Korea, Switzerland | 2026 | 105 min) 

19. To Hold a Mountain (D: Biljana Tutorov, Petar Glomazić | P: Biljana Tutorov, Petar Glomazić, Quentin Laurent, Rok Biček | Serbia, France, Slovenia, Montenegro, Croatia | 2026 | 105 min) 

20. Stories for Sandro (D: Giacomo Boeri | P: Giacomo Boeri, Domenico Procacci | Italy | 2025 | 81 min) 

The above titles join previously announced Hot Docs Docs for Schools Student Choice Award winner Nekai Walks (D: Rico King | P: David Mcilvride | Canada | 2026 | 90 min) to make up the full list of awards chosen by Hot Docs audiences as part of the 2026 Festival. 

Hot Docs 2026 welcomed 954 delegates from 47 countries to participate in the Hot Docs Industry Conference & Market, which featured three days of professional programming, two days of live project pitching as part of the Hot Docs Forum, 300 Hot Docs Deal Maker meetings with 70 decision makers across 31 projects, and several networking opportunities.