The Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards, also known as the KCAs or Kids' Choice, is an American annual awards ceremony show produced by Nickelodeon. Usually held on a Saturday night in March or early April, the show honors the year's biggest in television, film, music, and sports as voted by viewers worldwide of Nickelodeon networks. Winners receive a hollow orange blimp figurine, a logo outline for much of the network's 1984–2009 era, which also functions as a kaleidoscope.

The show features numerous celebrity guests and musical acts, including live acts. It has also been known to cover people with the network's trademark green slime: since 2002, slime stunts have been incorporated into the show. The animated series SpongeBob SquarePants has won the most KCA awards, with twenty-two overall through the series' run. Individually, Selena Gomez won the most trophies (with 13), followed by Adam Sandler (with 12), Will Smith, Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande (each with 11), and Justin Bieber (with 9). Whoopi Goldberg is the only person to have won a Kids' Choice Award alongside the prevailing "EGOT" combination of an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony. Rosie O'Donnell has hosted the show eight times, followed by Jack Black (three times), as well as Candace Cameron, Whitney Houston, and John Cena (twice each).

Alan Goodman, Albie Hecht, and Fred Seibert created the awards show after Nickelodeon produced a segment called The Big Ballot for the movie review show Rated K: For Kids by Kids in 1987, named for the ballots kids voted with. To vote, the viewers would send in ballots and then before the show, the ballots would be counted and the winners would tape a "thank you" video that would be shown during the program. Goodman, Hecht, and Seibert felt that the network needed a bigger, more exciting platform.

Hecht selected the awards logo from a series of network designs created by original logo designers Tom Corey and Scott Nash (Corey McPherson Nash, Boston), overseen by Goodman and Seibert (Fred/Alan, Inc., New York). The award was configured into the current blimp shape/kaleidoscope in 1990. The only change to the award since then has been a change to the embossed logotype on the side of the trophy for 2010 to fit the network's new logo typeface.

As the Internet came into widespread use, the voting finally moved from a combination of 900 number telephone voting and filling paper ballots that were either mailed or completed at Pizza Hut locations, to being conducted exclusively on the network's website, and included text messaging by 2007. During the early years of Internet voting, there were several issues, including the digital equivalent of ballot stuffing and adult voting. As a result, a new system was put into place where one vote per Nick.com account is allowed (although it is probable adults still cast votes via the texting option, which is connected to a phone number only instead of a screen name, by creating an account with a false age, or by having their children vote for a chosen subject instead). In 2010, an iPhone application and mobile browser voting were also added.

The 2009 Kids' Choice Awards featured a new award called "The Big Green Help Award" which goes to the celebrity who goes above and beyond to help the Earth. The inaugural award was presented to Leonardo DiCaprio. For the 2010 awards, "The Big Green Help" award was renamed "The Big Help" award, with First Lady Michelle Obama winning the first award under the rename.

Unlike traditional awards shows, the Kids' Choice Awards uses other items to announce an award winner instead of a traditional envelope. The show sometimes uses balloons, T-shirts, models, giant letters, stickers, and even a foot.

Voting became available for Canadian people in time for the 2010 ceremony, owing to the inauguration of Nickelodeon's Canadian service in November 2009.