Filmfare Award for Best Music Director
The Filmfare Best Music Album Award is given by the Filmfare magazine as part of its annual Filmfare Awards for Hindi films, to the best composer/arranger of a soundtrack. This category was first presented in 1954. Naushad Ali was the first recipient of this award for his song "Tu Ganga Ki Mauj" from the film Baiju Bawra. For the first two years, it was awarded to the composer for a particular song and not the entire album. From 1956 onwards, awards in this category have been given for the entire soundtrack. From 2017, the name of this was category changed from best music direction to music album.
Superlatives
| Category | Name | Superlative | Notes |
| Most Awards | A. R. Rahman | 10 awards | Awards resulted from 15 nominations |
| Most Nominations | Laxmikant Pyarelal | 25 nominations | Nominations resulted in 7 awards |
| Most Nominations In 10 Years | Pritam | 14 nominations | Nominations resulted in 3 awards |
| Most Nominations without a Win | Jatin Lalit | 11 nominations | – |
| Filmfare Special Award | Anu Malik | For Refugee |
- A. R. Rahman leads the winners with 10 Best Music Director Filmfare awards, followed by the music director duo of Shankar Jaikishan, who have 9. Laxmikant Pyarelal have the most nominations with 25, followed by Shankar Jaikishan with 20, and R. D. Burman with 17.
- Shankar Jaikishan holds the record for the highest number of consecutive nominations, having been nominated for the award every year from 1959 till 1967, winning the award four times.
- Laxmikant Pyarelal and A. R. Rahman have the distinction of winning the award four times in a row between 1978 and 1981 and between 2007 and 2010, respectively. Those who have won the award thrice in a row are Shankar Jaikishan and Nadeem Shravan. Also, there have been three instances when a music director were nominated thrice in the same year – Bappi Lahiri in 1985, Laxmikant Pyarelal in 1986 and A. R. Rahman in 2009.
- Pritam received six consecutive nominations between 2013 and 2018, and won in 2013, 2017 and 2018.
- Usha Khanna and Sneha Khanwalkar are the only two women to have ever been nominated for this award for their work in the 1983 film Souten and 2012 film Gangs of Wasseypur respectively. Parampara Thakur was nominated and won the award for her work in 'Kabir Singh' in 2020, becoming the first women to win this award.
- Jatin Lalit has never won this award after getting 11 nominations from followed by Vishal Shekhar who have not won this award after getting 10 nominations from. Anu Malik has got a special award in 2001 for the film Refugee.
Most wins
Multiple nominees
Multiple music directors have received multiple Best Music Director nominations.| Artist | Number of Nominations | Wins |
| Laxmikant-Pyarelal | 25 | 7 |
| Shankar Jaikishan | 20 | 9 |
| R. D. Burman | 17 | 3 |
| Pritam | 17 | 3 |
| A. R. Rahman | 15 | 10 |
| Anu Malik | 14 | 3 |
| Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy | 13 | 3 |
| Nadeem-Shravan | 10 | 4 |
| Rajesh Roshan | 10 | 2 |
| Vishal-Shekhar | 10 | 0 |
Winners and nominees
In the list below, the winner of the award for each year is shown first, followed by the other nominees. The films are listed by the years when the award was presented. The announcing of nominations became regular after 1956.| Indicates the winner |
1950s
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
2000s
2010s
2020s
| Year | Photos of winners | Music Director | Film |
| 2020 | NA | Zoya Akhtar, Ankur Tewari | Gully Boy |
| 2020 | NA | Amaal Malik, Mithoon, Vishal Mishra, Sachet–Parampara, Akhil Sachdeva | Kabir Singh |
| 2020 | NA | Arko Pravo Mukherjee, Tanishk Bagchi, Jasbir Jassi, Chirantan Bhatt, Gurmoh, Jasleen Royal | Kesari |
| 2020 | NA | Pritam | Kalank |
| 2020 | NA | Vishal-Shekhar | Bharat |