From traitors to troubled teens: All the winners at this year’s BAFTA TV Awards
Celebrating the best of brilliant British TV
The TV BAFTAs are the awards equivalent of a tequila shot arriving at the tail end of the evening – a surprise but welcome turn of events. Whilst all eyes were on the Film BAFTAs back in February, its red-carpeted, just-as-starry sister show kicked off on Sunday night, celebrating the best of the old gogglebox.
It was a night of record breakers, too, with the hit Netflix show Adolescence winning four awards, taking the title for the most wins at the BAFTA TV Awards ceremony in a single year. The series, which was released in March 2025 has been doing the rounds when it comes to awards, winning three Astra Awards, four Critics Choice Awards, four Golden Globes, two National Television Awards, nine Emmys, and plenty more. It scooped up best limited series, whilst three of its cast members – Stephen Graham, Owen Cooper, and Christine Tremarco – were given awards for their performances. Graham was named best leading actor for his role as Cooper’s on-screen dad, making it his first BAFTA win after seven previous nominations.
Mary Berry was the recipient of this year’s lifetime achievement honour, the BAFTA fellowship, aged 91, proving what a legend she is. And fellow national treasure Martin Lewis was awarded the honorary Special Award.
The Celebrity Traitors took home two awards, as did Last One Laughing. The former won best reality programme, which isn’t entirely surprising given it was last year’s most-watched programme with over 15 million viewers. Last One Laughing was named best entertainment programme, beating out the likes of The Graham Norton Show, Would I Lie To You, and Michael McIntyre’s Big Show. Bob Mortimer secured the Bafta for best entertainment performance thanks to his deadpan tomfoolery in the show.
Narges Rashidi won the best leading actress award for her role as Nazanin Rashidi in BBC One’s real-life drama Prisoner 951. She dedicated her speech to the British-Iranian woman who was imprisoned in Tehran for six years, and her family, saying: "Your resilience, your dignity, your love through impossible circumstances have moved us all… Your courage will stay with me for the rest of my life. This is for you."
Meanwhile, the award for best drama went to ITV’s Code of Silence, starring Rose Ayling Ellis, which follows the actress as Alison Brooks, a deaf woman who helps the police with her lip-reading skills.
Steve Coogan won best actor in a comedy for How Are You? It’s Alan, saying he will “keep on” making people laugh until he dies. Underrated comedy Here We Go finally had its moment in the spotlight, with Katherine Parkinson clinching the Bafta for best comedy actress for her role as Rachel in the show, beating out Amandaland starts Lucy Punch, Philippa Dunne, Jennifer Saunders, as well as Diane Morgan, and Rosie Jones.
It wasn’t the cliched Bridesmaid, not the Bride situation for Amandaland, which luckily saw success elsewhere, winning the BAFTA for best scripted comedy, four years after its main show Motherland won the same award.
The current affairs prize went to Gaza: Doctors Under Attack, which ran a forensic investigation into Israeli military attacks on hospitals in Gaza. Ben de Pear, the founder of Basement Films behind the documentary, said they “would not be censored” in his speech, after the documentary was initially dropped by the BBC, and ended up being picked up by Channel 4 instead.
Netflix documentary Grenfell: Uncovered won best single documentary. In other categories, EastEnders was named best soap, Scam Interceptors won best daytime show, and Go Back To Where You Came From picked up the factual entertainment prize.
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