This is a list of films by year that have received an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

together with the other nominations for best documentary short film. Following the Academy's practice, the year listed for each film is the year of release: the awards are announced and presented early in the following year. Copies of every winning film (along with copies of most nominees) are held by the Academy Film Archive. Ten films are shortlisted before nominations are announced.

Rules and eligibility

Per the recent rules of the

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS, often pronounced ; also known as simply the Academy or the Motion Picture Academy) is a professional honorary organization with the stated goal of advancing the arts and sciences of motion ...

(AMPAS), a Short Subject Documentary is defined as a nonfiction motion picture "dealing creatively with cultural, artistic, historical, social, scientific, economic or other subjects". It may be photographed in actual occurrence, or may employ partial reenactment, stock footage, stills, animation, stop-motion or other techniques, as long as the emphasis is on fact, and not on fiction. It must have a run time of no more than 40 minutes and released during a special eligibility period which may vary from year to year, but generally begins the month of October of the prior year and ends in September of the award year. (This eligibility differs from most other Academy Award categories which only includes films released between January and December of the award year.) The documentary's release must also occur within two years of the film's completion, and there are also rules governing the formatting of audio and video used to produce and exhibit the picture. In addition, to be eligible the film must meet one of the following criteria: * complete a commercial showing of at least 7 days in either

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or anywhere in

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before being released to other non-theatrical venues such as DVD or TV; or * regardless of any public exhibition or nontheatrical release the film must have won a qualifying award at a competitive film festival, as specified by the Academy; or * win a Gold, Silver or Bronze Medal award in the Documentary category of the Academy's Student Academy Award Competition. The film must run daily for seven days, open to the public for paid admission, and must be advertised in one of the city's major circulars during its run, with screening times included. Additionally, the film must be shown at least once during every day of its qualifying run. Unlike the Best Documentary Feature award, whose rules mandate at least one screening starting between noon and 10 pm local time on each day of the qualifying run, there is no restriction on the start time of any screening. The film must have narration or dialogue primarily in English or with English subtitles, and must be the whole of an original work. Partial edits from larger works and episodes from serialized films are not eligible. Eligibility rules for prior years may have differed from these.

Nomination process

The Documentary Branch of the Academy first votes to select ten pictures for preliminary nomination, after which a second round of balloting is conducted to select the five documentary nominees. The entire Academy membership will then vote for one of these five for the Oscar. A maximum of two people involved with the production of the documentary may be nominated for the award, one of whom must be the film's credited director. One producer may also be nominated, but if more than one non-director producer is credited the Academy Documentary Branch will vet the producers to select the one they believe was most involved in the creation of the film.

Winners and nominees

1940s

1950s

1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

2000s

2010s

2020s

Multiple wins

Individuals with multiple wins

;3 wins * Charles Guggenheim ;2 wins * Malcolm Clarke *

Walt Disney Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...

* Bill Guttentag *

Robin Lehman Robin Lehman (born Robert Owen Lehman Jr.; December 3, 1936) is an American documentary filmmaker best known for his short films '' Don't'' (1974) and '' The End of the Game'' (1975), which received consecutive Academy Awards for Best Documenta ...

* Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy

Studios with multiple wins

;4 wins *

National Film Board of Canada The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; french: Office national du film du Canada (ONF)) is Canada's public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary fi ...

;3 wins * Walt Disney Productions

Individuals with multiple nominations

;9 nominations * Charles Guggenheim ;4 nominations * Karen Goodman * Freida Lee Mock ;3 nominations * George Casey *

* Bill Guttentag * Thomas Lennon * '' The March of Time'' * Herbert Morgan *

Steven Okazaki Steven Toll Okazaki (born March 12, 1952) is an American documentary filmmaker known for his raw, cinéma vérité-style documentaries that frequently show ordinary people dealing with extraordinary circumstances. He has received a Peabody Award ...

* DeWitt L. Sage Jr. * Terry Sanders *

Kirk Simon Kirk Simon (July 25, 1954 – April 14, 2018) was an American filmmaker, best known for his work on various documentaries. Career Simon received a nomination for an Academy Award four times, winning once. Simon produced three films nominated ...

* United States Office of War Information Overseas Motion Picture Bureau * Dick Young ;2 nominations * Ben Proudfoot *

Jon Alpert Jon Alpert (born c. December 13, 1948) is an American journalist and documentary filmmaker, known for his use of a cinéma vérité approach in his films. Life and career A native of Port Chester, New York, Jonathan B. Alpert is a 1970 gr ...

Lee R. Bobker Lee Robert Bobker (July 19, 1925 – December 28, 1999) was an American writer, film director and producer, primarily known for his documentary films.Wolfgang Saxon"Lee Robert Bobker, 74, Filmmaker Who Also Taught and Wrote About His Craft"''The Ne ...

British Ministry of Information The Ministry of Information (MOI), headed by the Minister of Information, was a United Kingdom government department created briefly at the end of the First World War and again during the Second World War. Located in Senate House at the Uni ...

* Patrick Carey * Malcolm Clarke * Skye Fitzgerald * Roland Hallé * John Healy *

Gordon Hollingshead Gordon Hollingshead (January 8, 1892 in Garfield, New Jersey – July 8, 1952 in Balboa Island, California) was an American film producer, associate producer and assistant director. Career Hollingshead began his career as an assistant di ...

* Bobby Houston * Daniel Junge * Steve Kalafer * Julian Krainin * Dan Krauss *

* Alec Lorimore * James R. Messenger * Greg MacGillivray * Mafilm Studio * Matthew O'Neill * Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy * Robert Richter *

RKO Radio RKO General, Inc. (previously General Teleradio, RKO Teleradio Pictures, and RKO Teleradio) was, from 1952 through 1991, the main holding company for the noncore businesses of the General Tire and Rubber Company and, after General Tire's reorganiz ...

Eric Simonson Eric Simonson (born June 27, 1960 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin) is an American writer and director in theatre, film and opera. He is a member of Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, and the author of plays '' Lombardi'', ''Fake'', ''Honest'', '' Magic ...

* Truman Talley * Francis Thompson *

United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through c ...

* Vivienne Verdon-Roe * Cynthia Wade *

Donald Wrye Donald Wrye (September 24, 1934 – May 15, 2015) was an American director, screenwriter and producer. He is best known for directing the 1978 film ''Ice Castles''. He died on May 15, 2015, at his home in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Filmography * ...

* Gerardine Wurzburg * Ruby Yang