The Super Bowl adverts are just as competitive as the game on the field. Here’s this year’s best
Feb 11, 2025, updated Feb 11, 2025
Super Bowl LIX was another epic clash on the field as the Philadelphia Eagles downed the Kansas City Chiefs 40-22, but the battle wasn’t just on the field – it was between the brands vying for consumer attention.
The biggest advertising names came out to play, not just with massive creative ideas but with an all-star lineup of celebrities making cameos in big-budget, high-stakes commercials.
For decades, the Super Bowl has been the launching pad for some of the most iconic global advertising campaigns.
Think back to Apple’s legendary 1984 commercial directed by Ridley Scott, which introduced the Macintosh computer to the world in a groundbreaking cinematic ad. The advert only ever aired at the Super Bowl and as they say the rest is history.
More recently, brands like Old Spice have leveraged the event’s cultural weight to revamp their image and drive viral success.
Big budgets, big opportunities, and equally big risks—so why do companies put so much behind Super Bowl ads?
Eyeballs and amplification
The first and most obvious reason is sheer audience size. With over 120 million viewers tuning in, the Super Bowl remains one of the most-watched television events of the year.
But beyond live viewership, the real magic happens in what comes next. The amplification effect – where punters (excuse the pun) share, comment and dissect the ads across social media and news platforms, potentially giving brands an incredible return on investment.
For many NFL fans watching, the commercials are as much a Super Bowl tradition as the game itself.
Water-cooler moments happen on and offline, sparking memes, trending hashtags and in some cases, even shaping cultural conversations.
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A successful Super Bowl ad doesn’t just create brand awareness; it has the potential to fuel a long-lasting consumer movement.
High stakes at play
FOX, the US broadcaster for this year’s Super Bowl, has reportedly been selling 30-second ad slots for $US8million ($12.8 milion), that’s $426,666 per second.
The stakes are massive. Not just securing prime placement but crafting a creative commercial that delivers on impact, entertainment and brand recall.
Advertand a blend of humour, emotion and spectacle designed to grab attention and be remembered.
This year is no exception. Matthew McConaughey, Meg Ryan, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt, David Beckham, Matt Damon and Greta Gerwig are just a few celebs featured.
Let’s take a look at this year’s standout commercials.
Uber Eats rewrites football history
Uber Eats went all-in with a star-packed ad featuring Matthew McConaughey pitching his perspective on the history of NFL and the theory that football was invented to sell food.
The commercial ends with McConaughy suggesting that Caesar’s Superdome in New Orleans, where this year’s game was played, was clearly named after the salad.
The ad, created by Australian-owned company, Special, is beautifully written and produced. and with cameos from the likes of Kevin Bacon, Martha Stewart and Greta Gerwig it takes the cake for this year’s best Super Bowl ad.
Stella Artois’ The other David
For the past couple of weeks, brewing company Stella Artois has been running a Super Bowl teaser featuring David Beckham’s fictional parents who reveal he has a twin brother living in America – “the other David”.
The ads pose the question at the end of the commercial “Who is the Other David?”
On game day all is revealed when Beckham travels to the US to meet his twin brother Dave, AKA Matt Damon.
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The ad is designed to set up Stella’s year-long campaign For moments worth more which sees Beckham revealing to Dave he’s a world-famous soccer player.
Dave asks Beckham: “So how famous are you? Like Matt Damon famous?”. Beckham replies “maybe, Ben Affleck famous”.
When Sally met Hellman’s
In a remake of the famous “I’ll have what she’s having” Katz deli scene in the movie When Harry Met Sally, Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal reunite over a sandwich.
Unfortunately, the sandwich isn’t doing it for Meg until she adds a whopping dollop of Hellman’s mayonnaise.
Upon taking a bite of the sandwich, she is overcome by the taste – you know what happens next.
For more celeb appeal, Sydney Sweeney delivers the line “I’ll have what she’s having” and the commercial ends with a pack shot of the Mayonnaise and the line “It Hits The Spot”.
Squarespace returns to the spotlight
After a short hiatus from the Super Bowl stage, website-building platform Squarespace made its return to halftime with an ad starring Irish actor Barry Keoghan.
Titled A tale as old as websites is set in a bygone Ireland era with Keoghan delivering laptops to businesses like they were newspapers and not so subtly suggesting their business would be better if it was online.
Directed by Australia’s very own Steve Rogers, it’s a unique spin on selling the brand but thank goodness for subtitles.
Meta’s star-studded Ray-Ban moment
Tech giant Meta has combined star power with humour for its latest Ray-Ban smart glasses ad featuring Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt and Kris Jenner.
The commercial opens in an opulent home, where Pratt uses the glasses’ Meta AI voice integration ‘Hey Meta’ to inquire about an unusual art piece—a banana duct-taped to the wall.
The glasses inform him that it’s Comedian by Maurizio Cattelan valued at $6.2 million.
Chaos ensues when Hemsworth eats the banana leading to a frantic attempt to replace it – only to be interrupted by an unimpressed Kris Jenner.
With disappointing sales of first-generation Meta Ray Bans, the use of stars such as Hemsworth is definitely an attempt to create broader audience appeal.
Super Bowl LIX has once again proven that when it comes to advertising it’s not just how much money is spent because all the advertisers have spent millions.
The MVP is the one that made us laugh, cry, or say “did you see that?” long after full time, and for me that’s Uber Eats.