See Liam Payne’s Moving Tribute at 2025 BRIT Awards (VIDEO)

Late One Direction member Liam Payne got a posthumous tribute at the 2025 BRIT Awards on Saturday, March 1, three and a half months after his death.

Host Jack Whitehall introduced the video package, saying, “It is now time to take a moment to remember a very special person who meant so much to so many of the people in this room and to millions of you around the world. Last October, we woke to the devastating news that Liam Payne had tragically passed away.”

Whitehall continued: “He achieved so much in the short time that he was on this earth and was not only a supremely gifted musician but an incredibly kind soul who touched the lives of everyone he came into contact with. We have so many amazing memories of Liam here at the BRITs, so tonight we celebrate his legacy and look back and remember the remarkable Liam Payne.”

Then came a two-minute montage with childhood photos, family videos, and footage from the singer’s time in the spotlight — including his global tours with One Direction and a meet-and-greet with Queen Elizabeth II — to the tune of Payne’s verse from the One Direction song “Little Things.”

Jeff Spicer/Getty Images for ABA

Payne died on October 16, 2024, at age 31, after falling from a hotel balcony in Buenos Aires, Argentina. In a press release shared last month, a local prosecutor’s office said Payne had “alcohol concentrations of up to 2.7 grams per liter” and “cocaine metabolites, methylecgonine, benzoylecgomine, cocaethylene, and the medication sertraline” in his system at the time of his death, per People.

As Whitehall mentioned, the late boy-bander singer was no stranger to the BRIT Awards. With One Direction, Payne won seven trophies at the British Phonographic Industry’s annual awards show and was nominated for five others. In his solo career, he got three more BRIT Award nominations, two for the song “Strip That Down” and one for “For You.” Payne was also a recipient of multiple BMI London Awards, a BMI Pop Award, a Global Award, and a Teen Choice Award as a solo artist.

Following Saturday’s montage, fellow One Direction member Louis Tomlinson wrote on X, “Thank you @BRITs. Beautiful tribute. Miss you always, brother.”