# The 16 Greatest Voice Performances in Animated Movies

> Some of these actors vanish into the character; others are unmistakably themselves for ninety minutes. Both approaches produced classics.

*By YPB Team · Published August 23, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/the-16-greatest-voice-performances-in-animated-movies*

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## Current results (no votes yet)

1. **Tom Hanks as Woody** — score 1000/1000
   Toy Story's cowboy doll, played with a decency that keeps cracking under jealousy.
2. **Robin Williams as the Genie** — score 744/1000
   Aladdin's improvised, shape-shifting performance that changed how studios cast animation.
3. **Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Potts** — score 663/1000
   Beauty and the Beast's teapot, who also sings the title song.
4. **Jeremy Irons as Scar** — score 609/1000
   The Lion King's velvet-voiced usurper, bored and murderous in equal measure.
5. **Phil Harris as Baloo** — score 546/1000
   The Jungle Book's bear, sung and spoken in the same easy swing.
6. **Kathleen Turner as Jessica Rabbit** — score 546/1000
   Who Framed Roger Rabbit's femme fatale, drawn bad but voiced worse.
7. **Eddie Murphy as Donkey** — score 387/1000
   Shrek's motormouth sidekick, and the engine of the film's comic timing.
8. **Jack Black as Po** — score 387/1000
   Kung Fu Panda's fanboy hero, whose enthusiasm carries four films.
9. **Mel Blanc as Bugs Bunny** — score 387/1000
   The man of a thousand voices, and the template every voice actor since has worked from.
10. **Ellen DeGeneres as Dory** — score 284/1000
   Finding Nemo's short-term memory loss played for comedy and then for grief.
11. **James Earl Jones as Mufasa** — score 284/1000
   A voice that makes a cartoon lion sound like a head of state.
12. **Robby Benson as the Beast** — score 284/1000
   A performance that switches between a growl and a wounded boy mid-line.
13. **Tim Allen as Buzz Lightyear** — score 158/1000
   A space ranger who does not know he is a toy, played completely straight.
14. **Ed Asner as Carl Fredricksen** — score 158/1000
   Up's widower, whose grief is carried almost entirely in the grain of the voice.
15. **Patton Oswalt as Remy** — score 158/1000
   Ratatouille's rat chef, who narrates his own obsession with taste.
16. **Amy Poehler as Joy** — score 158/1000
   Inside Out's relentless optimism, which the film slowly takes apart.

Tags: movies, actors, animation, performances