Ryan Seacrest will be ringing in the new year on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve‘ special with help from a few familiar faces — including Julianne Hough and Rita Ora.
ABC announced on Monday, November 24, that Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve With Ryan Seacrest 2026 is returning with Seacrest, 50, and Ora, 34, hosting from New York City. They will be joined by Chance the Rapper in Chicago while Rob Gronkowski and Hough, 37, cohost from Las Vegas.
This marks Hough’s debut as a cohost on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, but her history with Seacrest dates back to 2010. The pair dated for three years before calling it quits in 2013.
After their split, Hough reflected on how being at different points in their careers affected their relationship.
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“The rug was swept up from underneath me, and I was just flying and I was experiencing things that I didn’t even know existed,” she shared on Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast in August 2024. “I had this insecurity that I was like, ‘I don’t ever want anybody to think that I’m with him for this reason.’”
Hough ultimately started to second guess herself in the relationship. “And so I then started playing smaller,” she added. “I know that that was his experience in past situations and stuff, and so I again overcompensated, [I] was malleable to fit into exactly what somebody needed me to be for them to be happy.”
Following her split from Seacrest, Hough found love with Brooks Laich. They tied the knot in 2017 after four years of dating. Rumors swirled that their marriage was on the rocks in early 2020 when they spent time apart during the COVID pandemic.
“We have lovingly and carefully taken the time we have needed to arrive at our decision to separate,” the pair said in a joint statement in May 2020, announcing their breakup. “We share an abundance of love and respect for one another and will continue to lead with our hearts from that place. We kindly request your compassion and respect for our privacy moving forward.”
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Us Weekly confirmed that the duo’s divorce was finalized in June 2022. Hough has since discussed how difficult the experience was for her.
“It wasn’t right. That can be a hard thing to fully accept,” she said on “Armchair Expert” about her marriage. “I feel like our relationship and our marriage was exactly right, and the end of it is right too. We both have regrets that it didn’t work out, because I don’t think we had the maturity to come together. He was contracting while I was expanding. We just couldn’t find each other in that.”
Hough later acknowledged that the public might have misconceptions about her — starting with her career.
“I think because I do so many different things, I’m a bit confusing,” she shared on Watch What Happens Live in August 2024. “People are like, ‘What does she do, does she dance, is she a singer, is she an actor, what does she do?’ But I think I’m a storyteller. And I think by nature, everything that I do is storytelling whether it’s through my body or through my voice or through my acting.”
Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve With Ryan Seacrest 2026 airs on ABC December 31 at 8:00 p.m. ET.
