The Caribbean Music Awards are leaving Brooklyn for Port of Spain. Caribbean Elite Group, the organisation behind the event, announced on July 28 that the fourth annual ceremony will take place on September 19 at the National Academy for the Performing Arts in Trinidad & Tobago, as part of a weekend programme running September 18–20. Billboard

The move is also an expansion. What was a single-night awards show is now the Caribbean Music Awards Elite Weekend Experience — a three-day event built around the ceremony itself. The first three editions were held at the Kings Theatre in Brooklyn, New York.

Hosting duties fall to a pairing that bridges the region's music and comedy worlds. Trinidadian soca artist Nailah Blackman will co-host alongside comedian Majah Hype, who returns for his fourth consecutive year in the role. The nominees, announced on June 10, span more than 40 categories across reggae, soca and dancehall, with over 250 names in contention.

Trinidadian artist Lady Lava leads the field with nine nominations across seven categories. Close behind are Machel Montano, V'ghn and Ayetian, each with seven nods. The full nominee list and event details are published through caribmusicawards.com and caribbeanelite.com, along with Caribbean Elite Group's social media channels.

For an awards show that spent its first three years in a 3,500-seat Brooklyn landmark, relocating to Trinidad & Tobago places the ceremony in the region whose music it celebrates. Port of Spain is the capital of soca and a central city in Caribbean music history, and the National Academy for the Performing Arts sits along the city's waterfront promenade. The format shift to a full weekend gives Caribbean Elite Group room to programme events beyond the trophy handouts — though the organisation has not yet detailed what those additional days will contain.

What is confirmed is the scale of the ballot. Over 250 nominees across more than 40 categories is a wide field, and the genre spread — reggae, soca and dancehall — covers the three styles that have driven Caribbean music's international reach. Lady Lava's nine nominations make her the most-recognised single artist on the 2026 list, with Montano, a veteran soca performer with decades of carnival-season releases behind him, among those chasing her total.