How Many Emmys Have 'Game of Thrones,' 'The Simpsons,' 'Friends' and Other Iconic TV Shows Won?

How many Emmy's has "Game of Thrones" won?
Peter Dinklage, winner of the outstanding supporting actor in a drama series award for "Game of Thrones," in the Emmys press room on September 20, 2015. Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images

TV fanatics were freaking out when Game of Thrones was nowhere to be found on the 2017 Emmy Awards nominations list. Considered one of the best shows on TV, Thrones has landed a nomination every single year since it first debuted in April 2011.

However, it wasn't that GoT was snubbed by the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. The series simply missed the eligibility period for the awards since its Season 7 premiere date came after the Emmys' May 20 cutoff date.

Despite the critical consensus surrounding the show, GoT doesn't have the highest number of Emmys or nominations in the award show's history.

So what show holds the title for most Emmys? Spoiler alert: Favorites like Friends, with 62 nominations and six wins, and Breaking Bad, with 58 nominations and 16 wins, don't even come close to the top 10.

Check out the list of the 10 biggest Emmy winners below:

Time to watch some Modern Family pic.twitter.com/ILeIm10ldx

— Ciara🌸 (@xCiaraBethany) September 12, 2017

Modern Family: The hilarious ABC sitcom, which will premiere its ninth season on September 27, just two weeks after the Emmys show airs, has been nominated for the award 80 times—three of which were for categories featured in this year's Emmys. Since its debut in 2009, the series has racked up 22 awards.

ER: One of the longest-running medical dramas, the NBC series has scored 23 wins and 124 nominations since it premiered back in 1994.

The West Wing: With an all-star cast including Martin Sheen, Allison Janney, John Spencer and Richard Schiff, it's not hard to understand why the NBC political drama scored 26 Emmys, including four consecutive wins for outstanding drama series. During its time on the air (1999-2006), the show was nominated for an Emmy 95 times.

Hill Street Blues: The cop series aired on NBC from 1981 to 1987, which seems like a very short amount of time for the series to rack up 98 Emmy nominations, 28 of which it won.

Cheers: During the classic NBC sitcom's 11-year run, it was nominated for outstanding comedy series every year. The cast, including Ted Danson, Rhea Perlman, George Wendt, Woody Harrelson, Kirstie Alley, Kelsey Grammer and John Ratzenberger, was at the top of the Emmy leaderboard from 1982 to 1993. In total, Cheers was nominated for 117 Emmys and won 28.

honestly if you've never seen the mary tyler moore show you're really missing out

— -ˏˋmaddieˊˎ- (@jaanefonda) September 1, 2017

The Mary Tyler Moore Show: Funny girl Mary Tyler Moore's sitcom on CBS was one of the first of its kind when it first debuted in 1970. It followed the life and times of a 30-something, single working woman. The originality and hilarity of the series landed the show 67 Emmy nominations and 29 awards, four of which Moore individually claimed for her acting.

The Simpsons: Is there any cartoon that has lasted as long as The Simpsons has? Better yet, is there any cartoon that has landed as many Emmy Awards as The Simpsons? Nope. Since its 1989 creation, the Fox show has been nominated for 86 Emmys, including one nomination for a 2017 award. The series has won a total of 32 awards, including 10 for outstanding animated program, which is the most any cartoon has ever received in Emmys history.

Game of Thrones: Although GoT has the most consecutive wins of all shows, it hasn't won the most awards. So far—there's still one season of the HBO series left before it's gone—the drama series has been nominated for 106 Emmys and won 35 overall.

Frasier: After all his great work on Cheers, Kelsey Grammer and the cast and crew on the NBC spinoff series Frasier landed a total of 108 nominations and 37 wins. During its 1993 to 2004 run, it won the outstanding comedy series award five times.

Saturday Night Live: Perhaps the greatest sketch comedy series of all time, SNL has been nominated for 199 Emmys—not including the 22 nominations it received for its 42nd season. So far, the show has won 44 awards.

Uncommon Knowledge

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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

About the writer


Michigan native, Janice Williams is a graduate of Oakland University where she studied journalism and communication. Upon relocating to New ... Read more

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