Reuters Events is delighted to reveal our 2026 list of Trailblazing Women, a collection of inspiring, influential and impactful women we have collated to celebrate International Women’s Day. 

We've whittled down more than 11,000 nominations to a collection of women from across the global economy, selected after a comprehensive nominations and judging process. We considered each nominee’s professional track record, influence, social impact and leadership in selecting our final list. 

The theme for this year’s International Women’s Day is #GivetoGain – a call to encourage a mindset of generosity and collaboration, emphasizing the power of reciprocity and support. 

You can view all of this year's nominees below. Congratulations to this year's finalists! 

In naming our list of 2026 Trailblazing Women, we sought nominations of individuals who have excelled in four key areas:

• Professional Track Record & Achievement: What have they achieved in their careers and industries to date? 

• Influence: How have they affected change in their organizations/industries? 

• Social Impact: What have they done to better the people, communities and industries they operate in? 
• Leadership: How have they demonstrated leadership capabilities within their organization/industry?

We sought evidence in each of these factors, with a particular emphasis placed on achievements within the past year.   

An open nominations process was run throughout December, with nominations accepted via an online portal.  

This pool of nominations was assessed individually against each of our four key criteria by an internal team. Additional weighting was given to nominations from underrepresented communities and/or industry sub-sectors.   

Efforts were made to ensure that we received nominations from as broad and representative a pool of stakeholders as possible, and our final list of Trailblazing Women has been assembled to reflect fair representation ethnically, geographically, per industry and from across the political spectrum where necessary.   

All individuals nominated in our list of Trailblazers have given their consent to be named in this list.