The Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Direction is presented to the talented and great directors, who have been working for several years in different theatre mediums in India. The award is a part of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Theatre category. The prime body for performing arts in India, Sangeet Natak Akademi has been presenting the award since 1954, to honour the contributions made by the directors to the Indian theatre. Several eminent Indian theatre personalities have received the award so far. However, the first receiver of the award was Prithviraj Kapoor, who won it in the year 1956.
List of the winners of Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Direction in Theatre is given below:
| Year | Director |
| 1956 | Prithviraj Kapoor |
| 1957 | Jaishankar Bhojak `Sundari` |
| 1959 | Sombhu Mitra |
| 1961 | Kasambhai Nathubhai Mir |
| 1962 | Ebrahim Alkazi |
| 1964 | T.S. Rajamanikkam |
| 1969 | Habib Tanvir |
| 1970 | Adi Ferozeshah Marzban |
| 1971 | Satya Dev Dubey |
| 1972 | Shyamanand Jalan |
| 1973 | Ajitesh Bandopadhyay |
| 1974 | Damodar Kashinath Kenkre |
| 1975 | Vijaya Farokh Mehta |
| 1976 | B.V. Karanth |
| 1977 | Rajinder Nath |
| 1978 | Jabbar Patel |
| 1979 | B.M. Shah |
| 1980 | Rudra Prasad Sengupta |
| 1981 | R.S. Manohar |
| 1982 | Sheila Bhatia |
| 1983 | Kavalam Narayana Panikkar |
| 1985 | Heisnam Kanhailal |
| 1986 | Alyque Padamsee |
| 1987 | Tarun Roy, Ratan Thiyam |
| 1989 | Bibhash Chakraborty |
| 1990 | Geoffrey & Laura Kendal (Joint Award) |
| 1991 | Fritz Bennewitz |
| 1992 | Mohan Maharishi |
| 1993 | Kailash Pandya, Barry John |
| 1995 | M.K. Raina., Bansi Kaul |
| 1996 | Purushottam Darwhekar |
| 1997 | Bhanu Bharti |
| 1998 | Amal Allana, Dulal Roy, Usha Ganguly |
| 1999 | Balwant Thankur, Nadira Zahear Babbar, Prasanna |
| 2001 | Shanta Gandhi |
| 2002 | Arun Mukherjee, Satish Anand |
| 2003 | Devendra Raj Ankur, Neelam Mansingh Chowdhry |
| 2004 | Anuradha Kapoor, Arambam Lokendra Singh, Raj Besaria |
| 2007 | N.C. Thakur, Harimadhab Mukherjee |
| 2008 | S. Ramanujam |
| 2008 | Probir Guha |
| 2009 | Joy Michael |
| 2009 | Dinesh Thakur |