Sherman Alexie has won over fifty awards, honors, and certificates over the course of his career. Some of his most notable include:
- 1992: National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship
- The New York Times Book Review Notable book of the Year for The Business of Fancydancing
- Granta Magazine: Twenty Best American Novelists Under the Age of 40
- New York Times Notable Book for Indian Killer
- 1999: The New Yorker: 20 Writers for the 21st Century
- 2007: National Book Award prize for Young People's literature for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
- 2010: Native Writers' Circle of the Americas Lifetime Achievement Award
