‘Dancing With the Stars’: 3rd Season 35 Cast Member Revealed

It’s official: Dancing With the Stars is returning for Season 35! ABC confirmed the news at Hulu’s Get Real event on April 22. Just a few weeks later, the network shared more information about the show’s schedule, and also gave an update on the cast.

Even though Season 35 won’t premiere for several months, we learned of the first two stars hitting the ballroom in April, and a third cast member was confirmed at the Disney Upfronts on May 12.

Meanwhile, in 2025, Season 34 featured the return of Tom Bergeron as a guest judge, and he urged ABC to “bring back the results show” in 2026 because “the show is setting record ratings again.” (Dancing With the Stars used to air two nights a week, with voting lines open overnight, as opposed to one night where voting happens in real-time throughout the episode, which is the current format.)

Is the network taking Bergeron’s advice? Scroll down for more on that, to find out who’s in the cast, and more.

When will Dancing With the Stars Season 35 premiere?

A premiere date has not been revealed yet, but ABC confirmed that it will be back in fall 2026. The show generally returns in mid-September, so we can predict a September 2026 premiere. ABC confirmed on May 12 that DWTS will be on Tuesday nights from 8/7 to 10/9c this fall.

For the past three seasons, DWTS has been airing on Tuesday nights, although it used to be a Monday night program, and aired on Mondays and Tuesdays when there was still a results show. Since ABC’s programming slate only has one night of DWTS, the results show is not returning for Season 35, despite Bergeron’s plea.

Before 2019, Dancing With the Stars aired two seasons a year (one in the spring and one in the fall), but starting with Season 28, there’s only been one season a year.

Who is in the Dancing With the Stars Season 35 cast?

The first two cast members are Summer House star Ciara Miller and The Traitors/Love Island alum Maura Higgins. Less than a month after news of their casting was confirmed, it was revealed that Jackson Olson, an internet personality and baseball player for the Savannah Bananas, is joining the cast.

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Higgins and Miller had breakout years in 2025, so it’s only fitting that they continue their reality show tenure. “I know it’s going to be so, so hard, but because I really want to do it I’m going to put my all into it. I’m just so excited. I just want to get going now, to be honest,” Higgins said.

Janet Taub, Planet Photo

The rest of the cast and their professional partners will be revealed on the September 2 episode of Good Morning America.

Who are the Dancing With the Stars Season 35 judges?

Carrie Ann Inaba, Derek Hough, and Bruno Tonioli have all been on the panel since Season 29 and are back as judges. Tonioli and Inaba have judged every season of DWTS since it began in 2005, while Hough joined toward the end of Len Goodman‘s tenure (the third OG judge died in April 2023).

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Generally, the permanent judges’ panel only has three people on it, although there was a two-season overlap with Goodman and Hough. Derek’s sister Julianne Hough was also a judge for five seasons, four of which also had four judges. There are often guest judges brought in throughout the season as well, but those aren’t usually announced until the week before their appearances.

Dancing With the Stars, Season 34, Fall 2026, Tuesdays, 8/7c, ABC

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