Right now, Callum Turner is the favorite to be the next James Bond according to Kalshi's prediction market on it. Other possible actors include Jacob Elordi, Tom Francis, Harris Dickinson, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with the announcement potentially just weeks away.
It's been over five years since Daniel Craig's final bow in No Time To Die, and Bond 26 still doesn't have its lead. With a mid-2026 announcement window coming into view, the race has never felt this close, and Kalshi's prediction market is reflecting exactly that.
Over five years. That's how long the tuxedo has sat unclaimed since Craig's swan song in No Time to Die.
Bond 26 now has a director in Denis Villeneuve, a writer in Steven Knight, and producers in Amy Pascal and David Heyman. Amazon MGM holds the keys to the franchise after the historic Eon handover from Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson.
The one thing it still doesn't have is a new James Bond.
This isn't just a casting announcement in the conventional sense. Amazon's first crack at 007 is a full franchise reset, with a new timeline, a younger actor, and a clear mandate to build something that runs for decades. Whoever gets the role will carry one of cinema's most valuable properties into a new era.
The next Bond debate has been running for five years and counting, and those who want their opinion to mean something beyond a Reddit thread have been trading it on Kalshi.
Kalshi is a CFTC-regulated prediction market that lets you trade on real-world outcomes across politics, sports, and entertainment, and the Bond casting market has been one of its highest-volume non-sports events since it launched.
Read on to see who is most likely to be cast as the next James Bond, including the strongest cases for and against each frontrunner, and how to trade it before the news breaks.
Who is Most Likely To Be the Next James Bond?
As of mid-May 2026, Kalshi's market puts Callum Turner as the most likely next James Bond at a 39% chance. After that, there is a large group of actors in the 5% to 19% range who could also be cast.
Below you can see the odds for the next James Bond as of May 19, 2026. Check the chart above for the most current favorites.
| Actor | Probability | Nationality | Known for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Callum Turner | 39% | British | Masters of the Air, Fantastic Beasts |
| Jacob Elordi | 19% | Australian | Saltburn, Euphoria, Wuthering Heights |
| Tom Francis | 15% | British | Sunset Boulevard, & Juliet |
| Harris Dickinson | 9% | British | Triangle of Sadness, The Iron Claw |
| Aaron Taylor-Johnson | 8% | British | Kick-Ass, Bullet Train, 28 Years Later |
| Josh O'Connor | 8% | British | The Crown, Challengers |
| Henry Cavill | 6% | British | Superman, Mission: Impossible, The Witcher |
| Idris Elba | 6% | British | Luther, The Wire, Beast |
| Jack Lowden | 6% | British | Slow Horses, Dunkirk |
| Jonathan Bailey | 5% | British | Bridgerton, Wicked, Fellow Travelers |
| Tom Holland | 5% | British | Spider-Man franchise, Cherry |
Callum Turner has held the frontrunner position continuously since November 2025, but has recently dropped from a peak of a 69% chance in December to just 39% now in May. The market is more fluid right now than at any point in the past six months.
Callum Turner is Most Likely To Be the Next James Bond
Turner has held the top spot on Kalshi's next James Bond market from November through today. While he has dropped some, he is still the front-runner.
Turner is British, 34, and fits the Ian Fleming physical description better than almost anyone else in the race. He proved with Masters of the Air that he can anchor something of real scale.
At the Berlin Film Festival, when asked directly about Bond rumors, he said: “You're right, it's very early for that question. I'm not going to comment on it.” That's not a denial, and Kalshi traders are giving him the best chance at taking on the role next.
Why Aaron Taylor-Johnson Is Back in the Conversation?
Taylor-Johnson had been fading from the top of the market for months before a single cryptic comment at the 28 Years Later London premiere sent him rocketing back into the three-way tie.
Asked by Deadline about upcoming projects, he deflected, saying, “I can't talk about it,” before being ushered away by his publicist. Five words. The market reacted immediately.
Taylor-Johnson has been here before. Back in 2024, multiple outlets reported him as a near-certainty for the role, with some going as far as claiming he had already accepted it. None of it was ever confirmed, his odds drifted, and the market moved on. Now he's back.
The credentials are hard to argue with. British, 34, and physically built for the role, Taylor-Johnson has spent the last decade proving he can disappear into wildly different characters.
From the anarchic energy of Kick-Ass to the cold menace of Nocturnal Animals to his current run in 28 Years Later, the range is there. That kind of chameleonic quality is exactly what the Bond casting process has always gravitated toward.
The asterisk on his candidacy is that he's been down this road before. The range is real, the physicality is real, the cultural moment is real, but traders are buying the intrigue, not the ink on a contract, and those are two very different things.
Jacob Elordi's Case, and Why the Market Keeps Coming Back to Him
Elordi has spent most of 2026 as the market's most volatile contract, surging to 43% on a February rumor that he'd been offered the role outright, dropping sharply when that went unconfirmed, and now sitting back in the three-way tie.
The February spike is instructive. Reports surfaced that he'd been offered the role. He went from 15 cents to 43 cents in a matter of days, then gave most of it back when Amazon denied there was any official offer. This market moves fast on insider reporting, and Elordi is the name insiders keep attaching to.
The Variety shortlist is the strongest signal in his favor. Their recent report named Amazon's preferred candidates as Elordi, Harris Dickinson, and Tom Holland, with the studio skewing toward British actors under 30.
The Guardian's Marina Hyde and World of Reel both placed Elordi in “pole position” as of May 6-7, citing alleged meetings with producers and a potential 2026 screen test.
The one thing working against him has nothing to do with talent or profile. He's Australian, and Amazon has reportedly shown a strong preference for British actors. George Lazenby is the only non-British Bond in the franchise's history, and nothing in the current reporting suggests Amazon is looking to add a second.
At 28, Oscar-nominated for Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein, and currently in cinemas with Wuthering Heights, the profile is undeniably compelling. The insider chatter is hard to dismiss.
Henry Cavill, Harris Dickinson, and the Rest of the Field
The third leg of the three-way tie is Henry Cavill, who has been in this conversation since before Daniel Craig was cast and keeps resurfacing despite the market's lean toward younger options.
Henry Cavill
Cavill was reportedly screen-tested for Bond before Craig got the role in 2005. He's been in the conversation ever since, which says something about the durability of his candidacy and something else about how long this franchise takes to move.
At 42, he's the age counterargument made flesh. Amazon has telegraphed a preference for someone who can carry the franchise for over a decade, and that math gets harder the older the actor.
If Amazon pivots from the “young franchise reset” direction, Cavill is the immediate beneficiary. Until then, he's a sentimental pick trading at a fair discount.
Harris Dickinson
Dickinson appears on the Variety shortlist alongside Elordi and Holland, which is the most credible insider signal available right now. Triangle of Sadness and The Iron Claw established his range. British, 28, fits the age profile Amazon is hunting for.
He has less name recognition than the frontrunners, but the insider signal is hard to ignore at his current price.
Josh O'Connor and Tom Holland
O'Connor briefly hit 22% in February before fading. The Crown gave him credibility and range, but he's physically slight for the action demands Bond has always required.
Holland is on the Variety shortlist, but his association with Spider-Man is a genuine concern. Whether audiences can separate him from that franchise remains an open question. Both are trading in the single digits and are worth monitoring, but not trading at current prices.
What Bond Casting History Tells Us About How This Plays Out
Amazon's casting process for Bond 26 is structurally different from any previous transition, which makes historical precedent useful but imperfect.
Under Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson, casting decisions were famously secretive and slow. Amy Pascal and David Heyman operate differently, and Amazon has commercial incentives to move with more urgency. The new producer setup changes the timeline calculus.
The historical cycles are worth knowing. Craig was confirmed in October 2005, roughly two years after Brosnan's final film. We're already four years out from No Time To Die. The window has been open longer than usual.
The Brosnan precedent is a useful hedge against overconfidence. He was widely expected to get the role after Timothy Dalton left in 1989 but didn't land it until 1994. Five years of “almost confirmed” reports, and all of them were wrong.
One thing worth knowing before you put any money down is that Kalshi cites Variety specifically as its resolution source for this market. A confirmed report from Variety naming the actor could be enough to settle contracts before Amazon ever schedules a press conference.
The deal is usually signed weeks before the actor steps on stage.
Amazon's stated direction adds one more filter to apply to every name in contention. Younger, British-skewing, and a full timeline reset that doesn't follow Craig's continuity. Bond 26 introduces a new 007 from scratch.
When Will the Next James Bond Be Announced?
Amazon MGM's Courtenay Valenti confirmed at CinemaCon in April 2026 that no casting decision has been made, which keeps the announcement timeline genuinely open.
Deadline's Justin Kroll has pointed to mid-2026 as a realistic window for a casting announcement, which would align with pre-production timetables if the 2028 release target holds.
Filming is expected at Bray Studios, which Amazon MGM acquired in 2024 after Pinewood was locked up by Disney through 2029.
It's worth casting an eye over Polymarket's take on the same question. Its largest contract, “No Bond chosen” at 65%, reflects real uncertainty about the announcement timeline rather than any conviction about who gets the role.
The two markets aren't contradicting each other. Kalshi is pricing individual actors; Polymarket is pricing the announcement window itself.
Until Variety breaks the confirmed name, the market remains live. Stay on top of trade publications if you're in the market. That's where this resolves first.
How Do You Trade the Next James Bond Market on Kalshi?
The James Bond casting market on Kalshi is one of the most active entertainment markets on the platform right now, and with a mid-2026 announcement window closing in, there isn't much runway left. Our Kalshi review has the full platform breakdown if you're new to it.
Each contract pays $1 if it resolves in your favor, and you buy in at the current implied probability. A three-way tie makes the math more interesting than a lopsided market. There's genuine upside on multiple names if you think the crowd is getting one of them wrong.
One thing worth knowing before you put any money down is that Kalshi cites Variety specifically as its resolution source. A confirmed trade report naming the actor could be enough to settle contracts before Amazon ever schedules a press conference, so keep your eye on Variety and Deadline rather than waiting for an official reveal.
Getting your position in before the news breaks takes less than five minutes. Create a Kalshi account, search the James Bond market, select your actor, set your contract size, and confirm.
The main risk to stay on top of is the timing question. Polymarket's “No Bond chosen” contract sitting at 65% signals that a delay into 2027 is a real possibility, and if Amazon pushes the timeline, the Kalshi market structure may shift accordingly.
If you'd rather trade the announcement window itself rather than back a specific actor, Polymarket runs its own version of this market and is worth a look for exactly that angle.
