Annecy 2026: 10 takeaways – Oscar talk, anime, AI, big changes in studios

The 2026 edition of the Annecy Animation Festival was one for records. Badge holders reached 19,100, up from 7,100 certified participants in 2013, demonstrating dramatic growth in animation.

Meanwhile, on June 24, during Annecy, France suffered the brunt of one of the hottest days on record. Annecy is already one of the most physically demanding film/television events in Europe, split between screenings at Bonlieu, a chic theater near the fairytale old part, and a market and panel exhibition at the impressive Hotel Imperial, a 20-minute lakeside stroll.

At the end of this year’s event, GKids president Dave Jested joked, “Unless you’re complaining about the dangerously swamp heat, it’s impossible for two participants to completely overlap in anything.”

Marcel Jean, Annecy’s artistic director, said the unprecedented weather led to screening cancellations as ticket holders became wary of braving the scorching sun while lining up outside the festival grounds.

At the same time, the festival faced serious contradictions. That’s because the quality of movies and TV shows this year is better than ever, multiple sources claimed. However, the industry faces many of the same disruptive and seismic challenges as live-action entertainment.

Here are our takeaways and more from the powerful and memorable 2026 Annecy Animation Festival, which ran from June 21st to 28th.

Why Annecy has become Hollywood’s most important film festival in Europe

Cannes has its charm, and if you’re ready for a screening, you can get the best international films, including animation. But from an industry perspective, Annecy is in many ways a much bigger event, incorporating big swings in box office numbers and top-tier productions on TV and streaming services. Annecy opened June 21 with an early screening, if not the first, of Minions and the Monsters, the seventh film in the Despicable Me franchise, which became the highest-grossing film in history and took in $5.5 billion from movie theaters.

With Toy Story set for the year’s best opening with $578 million in 12 days through June 28, producers Disney and Pixar last Friday released sneak peeks from two of their biggest future premieres, Hexed and Gut. Netflix added Brad Bird and Ricky Gervais to clip previews of “Ray Gun” and “Alley Cats,” sent the “Ghostbusters: Night Shift” team, and Warner Bros. Animation/DC Studios and Cartoon Network Studios took home awards for most major news announcements at Annecy, led by the announcement of a trio of new WBA/DC projects.

Peter Girardi, Warner Bros. Animation’s executive vice president of alternative programming, thanked the audience Friday at the conclusion of the WBA Adult Animation Showcase, saying, “This is our fourth year in a row and it’s always a pleasure. You truly are the best audience in the world.” And it was true. Of the 19,100 badge holders, the majority of Annecy’s audience consists of fans, school students and animators. They are netizens, far more enthusiastic about the things they like, greeting announcements with uncontrollable cries of joy, but merciful about the things they don’t. Compare this to the Cannes critic class.

Animation of animation

“Oh, East is East, West is West, and the two shall never meet,” wrote Rudyard Kipling, a poet of the British Empire. Obviously, he couldn’t make it to Annecy this year.

One big trend stood out this year. It is the acceptance of Asia by the animation world. It was cut in different ways. The biggest and most commented on work-in-progress sneak peek at this year’s Annecy came from India: SS Rajamouli’s Baahubali: The Eternal War, an animated spin-off from his massive live-action series.

Additionally, anime’s audience continues to grow, especially among teenagers and the YA demo around the world. In Annecy’s biggest statistical release of the year, Netflix has confirmed that views of its animated shows have soared from 1 billion in 2023 to 1.5 billion in 2025 in Annecy’s must-see “Next on Netflix” showcase. “44% of our target audience of 18-45 year olds currently watch anime,” said Passion Paris MD Caroline Audebert, explaining the adaptation of the high-profile Korean webtoon. “Hero Killer” will be made into an anime.

Anime: Creator’s Choice

But animation is not just a matter of market economy. “Animation is both a commercial medium and a creator-driven medium, so there will always be exciting new films and filmmakers,” Gkids President Dave Gestedt told Variety. Creators around the world are embracing anime, or at least recognizing it as part of their creative mix, such as Singapore’s Erving Hung, director of Annecy’s top prize winner The Violinist, and Spain’s Raul Garcia, or France’s Jocelyn Charles, director of Annecy’s most awarded short film, God is Shy. Both titles have a rich feel of Miyazaki-style Japanese anime.

Building a US/Europe-Asia animation axis

That’s why American and European companies are increasingly getting into anime. This year at Annecy, this took place in more ways than one. DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation have announced their first animated series at Joint Studio Focus, Joker: Rough Riot. Crunchyroll has joined French top studio Xilam’s latest film, The Wolf, following the Oscar-nominated film I Lost My Body. At the Netflix Anime Showcase, the US streamer released teasers for “The One Piece,” the long-awaited seven-episode anime spinoff from the best-selling manga of all time, and a potential new gem, “Fool Night.” The Annecy competition included “We Are Aliens,” produced by Tokyo startup Nothing New and French animation giant Miyu Productions. Toei Animation has released a sneak peek of Monkey Quest, written by David N. Weiss (Shrek 2, The Smurfs) and directed with Stephanie Marr Stein (Kung Fu Panda 4). “The Japanese side brought the history, technology, and discipline of anime production. The American side brought story structure, character emotion, and a strong sense of global family entertainment,” producer Yoshi Ikezawa told Variety.

star power

Guillermo del Toro attended the opening ceremony in Annecy. Ricky Gervais was in Annecy to talk about Netflix’s Alley Cats. “I hope you like cats. And swearing,” he joked. Director and Leica President Travis Knight personally introduced “Wildwood” at the festival, revealing through a clip that this is Leica’s most ambitious project to date. King of the Hill creator Mike Judge and indie stop-motion legends Stephen and Timothy Key were awarded the Annecy Honorary Crystal. Annecy’s animation community doesn’t really embrace the idea that voice actors are the main characters in animation. For them, it’s the writers, directors and animators. And they treat them like rock stars.

oscar talk

Even if the film is discovered at Cannes, Annecy could help shape the perception of the Oscar nominee. In 2024, Gintz Zilbarodis’ “Flow” won three Crystal Awards, cementing its early buzz in the awards race. At this year’s Annecy, films from Laika’s Wildwood to Netflix’s Ray Gun and DreamWorks’ The Forgotten Island were talked about as contenders in the Oscar race, along with Cannes indie darlings Iron Boy, In Waves and Tangles. But this year was “a particularly exceptional year for both Annecy’s feature and short selections, with the animated feature Oscar race shaping up as one of the most intense lineups in recent memory,” said Animation Awards campaign specialist Benoît Berthe Siward. Variety magazine featured three short film nominees for the Annecy Awards. “God is Shy,” Don Hertzfeld’s “Paper Trail,” and Anna Mantsalis’ “Please.” Another might be “Cartoon Physics,” by Oscar-nominated duo Lou Kwahata and Max Porter (“Negative Space”). This is a lovely stop-motion vision of a mother’s attempts to protect her four-year-old daughter during her first encounter with death.

“Original is not a bad word”

Broadly speaking, the global animation industry divides its output two ways between commercial IP and low-budget independent productions. As for the former, Annecy’s Hollywood studio insisted it was not giving up on the original IP. At the first Studio Focus last Monday, directed by Warner Bros. Pictures Animation president Bill Damaschke, “Hazbin Hotel” creator Vivian Medrano made waves with her feature debut, “Prehistoria.” Netflix is ​​clearly betting on both its established IPs, which impressed at Annecy, Ghostbusters: Night Shift and Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory, and originals like Ray Gun. “When I started in this business, ‘original’ was a good word,” Brad Bird recalled to Variety in Annecy. “Now people say ‘untested’ as if ‘original’ is a bad word, but it’s not. ‘Original’ is exciting. There may be some risks, but that’s where the most interesting things are.”

AI’s latest bust up

But the most talked-about film at Annecy this year was Dans Macabre, an animated short by respected veteran animator Hisko Halsing (Andan), a surefire non-Oscar contender. Before Annecy, Halsing went public in great detail about the use of generative AI software to imitate his paintings in the creation of “Dans Macabre.” Audience members at the Annecy screening wore “Let’s Stop Generative AI” stickers. Just before the screening, some people left and others started booing the short film.

Annecy Artistic Director Marcel Jean responded energetically to the protests. “While we understand the concerns raised by the potential use of artificial intelligence within the industry, as well as concerns surrounding intellectual property and employment, we cannot condone a witch hunt that targets the work of artists who transparently explore the possibilities of these new tools.”At least in the animation industry, the AI ​​stigma doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.

Fighting back against the market crisis

Ten years ago, Annecy was buzzing with studios and major independent companies looking for animators. By this year, such activities had all but disappeared. At the Mifa market in Annecy, several students and junior animators could be seen wandering around the venue holding handmade placards that read “Looking for work.” “When it comes to recruitment, the studio currently monitors talent year-round across markets,” Mifa head Veronique Ancrenaz explained to Variety.

“Faults in the industry are starting to show this year, and changes will be required to build a more sustainable business,” said one distributor. “The difficulty in selling films overseas is primarily due to changing demand and uncertainty from TV and streamer channels, especially in the US.” That applies to television as well, with French TV shows making more money selling to Belgium than the United States, according to the latest figures from French export group UniFrance.

Companies are fighting back, of course, often pooling large tax breaks and other soft money into co-producers’ countries or offices of the same company, as in the case of Passion Paris and Passion London. France offers a 40% rebate on VFX spending, so this is actually an option you should take seriously. However, it doesn’t solve how movies are seen in theaters.

Annecy’s animation paradise opens

Annecy was once the animation capital of the world for seven days a year. Now, I aim to wear that mantle year-round. On June 19th, the Cité du Cinéma d’Animation in Annecy opened with a screening room, artist accommodation, special areas for training courses and cultural events, exhibition space, a bookstore and a gift shop. One of the first exhibitions featured “Wildwood” by Leica and Travis Knight. The cité attracted a large number of tourists for the first few days. “We are extremely proud that, during these difficult times, we have shown the world the true power of culture and what France can achieve when cultural institutions, politics and people work together to build a creative, arts-led hub for the future of animation,” said Michael Marin, CEO of CITIA, organizer of the Annecy Festival and Mifa.