Back to a yearly cadence the New York Toy Fair returned this past week to the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center for four days of toy and collectible releases, reveals, and news across an entire range of toys including everything from dolls and outdoor play to collectibles and electronics. The 2026 event was in full force with over seven hundred participating companies and with buy-in from top brands the floor was packed with plenty of goodies to see. Toy Fair is also the perfect place to connect with fellow media in the industry as well as staff at companies to get a pulse on the latest and greatest product information.
As I continue to do when reporting on these events I’ve split up my coverage into a few articles and tryied to keep a general theme to each one. As normal I won’t go into too much of a preamble in each of the focused articles and will instead mostly dive right into the relevant companies.
Before the event officially started The Toy Association held their annual Toy of the Year (TOTY) Awards. To celebrate the winners (and nominees) the Toy Association had displays in the Crystal Palace of the Javits Center showcasing nominated or winning Toy of the Year (TOTY) products as well as featuring selected items from two other sections including a Hot for Holiday and Freshman Class. Since I’ve enjoyed covering it in the past I have decided to bring back the article again this year.
Look out for some of my other standard coverage of collectibles, board gamming, top brands and more to come soon.
Heading on!
Toy of the Year
The Toy of the Year awards are a big deal to a company attending the Toy Fair. The awards encompass many categories from Collectible of the Year, Creative Toy of the Year, Doll of the Year, Action Figure of the Year, and Grown-Up Toy of the year. While some categories are less relevant here there were some familiar faces and some interesting finds.
Specific callouts include two wins from LEGO for Construction Toy of the Year Jurassic World Dinosaur Fossils: Tyrannosaurus rex Setand Kidult Toy of the Year Game Boy, Action Figure of the Year Spin Master’s Primal Hatch, Collectible of the Year ZB Designs Wigglitz, Plush Toy of the Year Just Play’s Disney Stitch Ultimate Stitch Interactive Feature Plush, Game of the Year Exploding Kittens: The Board Game, Creative Toy of the Year Chompshop’s ChompSaw and BBC Studios License of the Year Bluey.
Freshman Class
The freshman class section focused on new attendees to the show. This includes everything from figures, games, art, collectibles, gag gifts, and even fidget toys. Standouts include a big push came from Kayoua brand who has made a huge push in the US market with their trading cards as well as Zombie Sailor’s Toysline of licensed action figures and toys, ImpressArt metal stamping customizable jewelry-making products, For All Mankind board game from Bad Cat Media, Czech Games Edition’sCodenames, Stickerbox’sStickerbox which allows you to print your imagination, and The SMASHPAD Electronic Fidget Toy.
Hot For Holiday Section
The Hot for Holiday section looks at this years trends for the holiday season and calls out thse products. Included this year are evergreen products from Ravensburger including the Disney Lorcana Winterspellchapter as well as their line of puzzles, Bitty Pop! Bitty Box from Funko, and a new LEGO game from Asmodee based on the Ninjago property Destiny’s Bounty Adventures.
