Hoda Kotb Tearfully Signs Off as Today Co-Anchor: 'From the Bottom of My Heart, Thank You'

Hoda Kotb is printed from Today show one last time.

On Friday, January 10, the 60-year-old journalist said goodbye to the anchor position in the NBC news program after 17 years.

“I can’t even articulate it because I’m a mess most of the time, but I just want to say thank you,” Kotb said through tears after the daytime program aired a video tribute to her career. “Carson [Daly]you are like the secret sauce on this show, man. The show doesn’t hum without you. Like, you have a thing and you brought it. You bring it every day.”

The mom of two continued to yell at her co-hosts. “Al, you’re my first friend here, the first person I’ve met,” she told Al Roker. “When I got sick, you were the first person to walk into the room and tell me I was going to be fine.”

Hoda Kotb in the show “Danas” on Friday, April 12, 2024.

Nathan Congleton/NBC/Getty

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Next, Kotb turned her attention to Savannah Guthrie, whom she called “my person.”

“Who’s showing up to everybody? This girl,” Kotb said. “When your brother died, it was this girl. When I was going through the stuff with Hope, it was this girl. She’s in the room. She’s always in the room and I love you.”

She closed by pumping up her replacement, Craig Melvin. “Craig, I mean, I’m so happy for you,” Kotb said. “You deserve this. You own this. And come Monday at 7:00 am, I’ll be dead asleep. But you’re going to be amazing. You’re going to bring it home! Craig, you’re going to be so good. You and Savannah are going to be magical.”

Hoda Kotb on the ‘Today’ show in NYC on October 17, 2024.

Nathan Congleton/NBC/Getty

Afterward, Kotb’s co-hosts brought a host of guests to see her off, including Maria Shriver and Simone Biles, who called Kotb her “Olympic mom” and said she hoped to see the TV star in Los Angeles for the 2028 Games.

“I hope we’re together in LA, whatever that means,” Biles, 27, said. “Whatever that means for both of us.”

Simone Biles (R) surprises Hoda Kotb on the ‘Today’ show on January 10, 2024 in New York.

NBC

Kotb replied: “Simon, however you end up in LA and whatever you do, I’ll be there with you. I love you.”

Kermit also came to Kotb’s last day and sang “Rainbow Connection” for Kotb, her daughters Haley, 8, and Hope, 5, and her Today colleagues. Kotb said she played the song when she “came in” to work on her last day.

“Hoda, you really make the day as beautiful as a rainbow,” said Kermit.

Kermit the Frog joins Hoda Kotb and her daughters Hope and Hayley at the ‘Today’ sow in New York. January 10, 2024

NBC

After that, Kotb headed to Today Plaza for her last farewell.

“Can I just say a quick thank you?” Kotb said. “Can I just say thank you to every single person that came here? I read your cards. I got your bracelets. I got the scarves you crocheted. I read the texts. I got everything. So I just want to say from the bottom of my heart, thank you for coming out, for being here and for everything you’ve done.”

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Kotb announced in September that she plans to leave her role at Today after almost two decades.

“As I write this, my heart is all over the map,” the reporter wrote in a letter to NBC’s morning show staff, shared Thursday, Sept. 26. “I know I’m making the right decision, but it’s a painful one. And you’re all the reason two things can be right at the same time, and I feel that deeply and it’s time for me to leave the show.”

Explaining her reasoning, Kotb added in part: “My television career no longer made sense, a new decade of my life is upon us, and now my daughters and my mom need and deserve more of my time. I will miss you all desperately, but I am ready and excited.”

Hoda Kotb welcomes the New Year with her daughters Haley and Hope.

Hoda Kotb/Instagram

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However, Creating space podcast host shared that she plans to remain part of the team at NBC. She told PEOPLE in October that those details were still “being worked out.”

“It will include some specials, a podcast and maybe the Olympics, things like that,” she said at the time. “It’s going to be like that kind of thing. So it’s going to be specials and all that stuff. And I think every month or so I’m going to come back to Today show and do a little something in this space, which I think will be fun.”

In a cover story for PEOPLE in October, Kotb opened up about leaving the Today show after enduring a year of personal turmoil — including her daughter Hope, 5, having a sudden medical crisis in February 2023. (Kotb declined to share the specific illness due to privacy concerns.)

Hoda Kotb attends the 27th Annual Webby Awards on May 15, 2023 in New York City.

Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images

After years of juggling work and being a mother to Hope and her older sister Haley, Kotb admitted it was time for a change. “There’s a guilt you carry because you can’t be 100% at work and 100% at home. Something has to give if you want excellence. If you want to excel at work, you have to give something at home. And if you want to be excellent at home, I mean excellentand do all things, something has to give at work. It cannot be equal,” she explained.

Another factor in her decision was personal reflection that came with celebrating her 60th birthday in August.

“I was kind of thinking, wondering, thinking about what I would like this next part of my life to look like when I turn 60,” she told PEOPLE. “And I like adventure, I like new beginnings. I’m an outgoing person, not an inbound person, and I was wondering, what does that look like for me?”

Hoda Kotb opens the story about her Today Show Exit: ‘I knew in my heart, this is it’

As for what’s next for the longtime TV host, she teased a new project that’s in the “beginnings.”

“It’s a whole health situation, and it just made me shine because of the things I’ve been working on and working on myself,” she told PEOPLE. “I learned to do a bunch of different things with breathing and whatnot through friends, through Jenna [Bush Hager]through Maria [Shriver]through all these different people, and I like that.”

The TV personality added that it’s “still in the early stages” of getting “a really good wellness app and doing wellness retreats and things like that.”

While Kotb says goodbye to Today show, Melvin, 45, will step in as her replacement, starting Monday, January 13.

From left: Craig Melvin and Hoda Kotb on the ‘Today’ show on Monday, September 16, 2019.

Nathan Congleton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal/Getty

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Kotb celebrated the news of Melvin’s new role, telling him on air, “You’re made for this job.”

“You’re literally made for this job. You’re so good,” she added. “You have everything this job needs. You are the right person for it.”

The Today the show airs weekdays on NBC beginning at 7 a.m. ET.

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