Vote for your favorite Super Bowl 60 commercial on Ad Meter 2026
USA TODAY NFL reporters remember their favorite Super Bowl commercials as they prepare for Super Bowl 60 and vote at admeter.usatoday.com.
“We welcome you all to gather here in The Middle. The Middle has been a difficult place to get to lately… between the red and the blue. Between the servants and the citizens. We need The Middle. We just have to remember that the very soil we stand on is common ground. And we will get there. We will cross this divide. Our light has always found its way through the darkness.”
– Bruce Springsteen, “The Middle,” Jeep Super Bowl Commercial, February 7, 2021.
“Nuance is great, but sometimes you have to be harsh.” – Springsteen took the stage on January 30th at the “Concert of Solidarity and Resistance to Defend Minnesota!” benefiting Minnesotans killed by federal agents.
As Super Bowl 60 approaches Feb. 8, the gap between this year’s national secular holiday and Super Bowl 55 in 2021 seems to widen with each passing week.
You probably remember: Eleven months into a global pandemic that killed 500,000 Americans in its first year, unprecedented times still struggle to find a precedent. Eight months have passed since the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis, which sparked global protests.
And he was given a month’s reprieve from a group of unjust rioters who stormed the Capitol in an effort to overturn the election results.
Five years later, a lot has changed, but the similarities still remain.
President Donald Trump is back in the White House. The country is largely “divided” even though typical fault lines have become distorted under extreme conditions. Sharing the truth remains elusive as the news ecosystem takes new hits from industry conditions and aggressive misinformation.
But the Super Bowl remains one of America’s cultural markers. And if the game’s great asides, the 30- to 60-second commercials that entertain fans during breaks, are any indication, looking back at the lineup from five years ago and the ads airing on widescreen and mobile this year reflects a culture unwilling to accept many difficult realities at the expense of checking out mentally.
“We’re very divided in this country right now,” Charles R. Taylor, a marketing professor at Villanova School of Business and author of “Win the Advertising Game: Lessons from Super Bowl Advertising Champions,” told USA TODAY Sports. “This isn’t really new. But there seemed to be a period of calm. But what’s going on now is really dividing people.
“Advertisers that mention that sector are really running the risk of alienating a lot of consumers. That’s why I think we’re seeing one of two paths: a message of humanity and trying to help people, or an over-the-top escapist humor.”
Indeed, we’ll likely see the usual mix of celebrity mash-ups and cross-generational stars trying to influence brands. Sabrina Carpenter piles on Pringles, Jon Hamm, Scarlett Johansson and Bowen Yang hit back at the Ritz, and Matthew McConaughey, Bradley Cooper, Parker Posey and George Clooney take on a food delivery app that delivers lattes to your door if you’re so inclined.
“To some extent, I think advertising reflects the sentiment and mood of a country,” said Kim Whitler, a business professor at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business. “They’re a lens through which I understand the pop culture of the moment. Going back and seeing what’s going on is how I understand society.
“Is it perfect? No. But it reflects pop culture, media narratives and management coverage.”
Whitler analyzed 11 years of data from USA TODAY’s Ad Meter, tracking dozens of metrics related to content, tone, use of celebrities and emotional themes, among other things. Ads that lean heavily toward humor have steadily increased since the late 2010s, rising to 76% in 2020, during the Super Bowl, which aired just weeks before the pandemic began.
It is probably no coincidence that in 2022, a year after “Uncertain Times” was strongly reflected in both advertising and broadcasting, the humor spot reached a 91% audience rating.
And perhaps in the most lethargic way possible, it will lead us into a time when we have little choice but to play it safe.
United again? not that many
Springsteen’s message in 2021 wasn’t necessarily radical. Jeep’s ad centers around a chapel in Kansas, which is located right in the middle of the Lower 48 states.
“Everybody, come here and meet me in the middle,” he called out, a wailing guitar riff accompanying his tired, flat delivery.
The book ends with a little wish that certainly didn’t hold up in the years that followed.
“America Re-United States.”
This hopeful tone foresaw that when a vaccine becomes widely available in the coming months, a society that will be hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic will be ready to welcome it, if not end it. Rather, the coming months and years will likely see widespread skepticism, a prolonged endemic presence of the coronavirus, and a general rise in grievance culture.
Four years later, with President Trump back in office, the rioters jailed for their crimes on January 6th were pardoned, and Springsteen traveled to Minnesota last week to appear with former Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello at a benefit show following the murders of Renee Goode and Alex Preti by federal agents.
You could say that the middle one didn’t work out.
In times of trial, flying lemons
If that Super Bowl time capsule reflected the mood of society, as Whitler said, the 2021 commercial certainly captures the uncertainty that individuals, and by extension, brands, were feeling at the time.
Nine of the 57 ads in the 2021 lineup reflect a sense of civic responsibility and awareness, and five of them are at least loosely tied to the ongoing pandemic. Perhaps some people felt it was vaguely anachronistic at the time of the broadcast, and felt that April 2020, for example, was more appropriate than spring, when a society with widespread vaccinations was once again on the rise.
The NFL’s “As One” spot features a hologram of Vince Lombardi and an emotional speech dubbed over images of the pandemic, including tearful health care workers and lost food on porches, before cutting to a live shot of Raymond James Stadium in Tampa. There, Kansas City Chiefs players will be masked on the sideline, as will fans in socially distanced pods.
Anheuser-Busch takes a lighter route with two spots, indirectly acknowledging The Thing We’re Going Through with Budweiser’s “Let’s Have A Beer.” Bud Light takes a more cynical and badass approach with “Last Year’s Lemons.”
But Bass Pro Shops urges you to get outside, doubling down on haunting piano and strings, evoking the phrase people were burnt out by April 2020: “In these difficult times, we need nature more than ever.”
It’s no wonder that the following year, nearly 9 out of 10 took a big turn toward comedy.
“In hindsight, it’s easy to minimize that,” Whitler says. “The summer of protests, the murder of George Floyd, people were stuck in their homes. How important is watching sports to the American spirit? All of that was shut down. There was no release of the pressure valve.
“If you ignore all that and create something that’s light and fluffy and ridiculous, I don’t think that’s reflective of this country at the time.”
The ad also appears to feature a greater commitment to multiculturalism and representation, key themes that emerged after the summer protests of 2020.
The 2021 Ad Meter winner is Rocket Mortgage’s “Certain Is Better” ad featuring a Black family buying a home and Tracy Morgan highlighting the importance of certainty.
Squarespace (website development), Logitech (creators led by Lil Nas
The nominal increase in representation may have planted the seeds for a major DEI backlash that would culminate in Trump’s reelection and subsequent executive orders. Suddenly, the concept of the “annihilation” of white people in advertising brought oxygen to the online space.
And in less than a year, the composition of white actors in commercials has “revised,” rising from 65% to 72%, according to Forbes.
apolitical impossibility
So what does the gaming landscape look like in 2026?
It’s a world where satire is increasingly difficult to achieve.
Five years ago, Will Ferrell, Kenan Thompson, and Awkwafina launched an invasion of Norway on GM’s behalf against Norway’s dominance in electric vehicles.
Innocent little Norway? Cheerful!
Yes, about that.
In the days and weeks after President Trump expressed disappointment at not winning the Nobel Peace Prize, imposed 10% tariffs on allies such as Norway, and called for control of Greenland, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gare Stoer said this week at the Oslo Security Conference that “the U.S. “What we experienced two weeks ago, where the United States used tariffs against an ally as a political tool to force a view to pass, and the United States used tariffs against an ally as a political tool to take land from another part of the alliance, shows how things are changing.”
“The world order has not collapsed. Completely.”
All of this comes at a time when brands are apolitical and aiming for increasingly difficult challenges.
“Brands are in a no-win situation because taking a political position one way or another only puts them in a bind,” Villanova’s Davis said, noting that Bud Light, Cracker Barrel and Nike have all faced sales declines due to potentially controversial campaigns and rebrands.
“The opposite is true. What would Tesla’s stock price have been like if[Elon]Musk had stayed away from politics? They’ve reduced the size of the universe that buys the brand. And that’s never a good idea.”
Still, it’s nearly impossible to avoid politics, even if the message is in the flag. Anheuser-Busch’s Super Bowl menu leans heavily into both patriotisms (Happy 250)th,America! ) and your own 150th Anniversary. This spot leans heavily on Clydesdales and bald eagles (the Colbert Show 2000s intro would be proud), with Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Free Bird providing the soundtrack.
Pretty apolitical – as long as you can separate modern Skynyrd’s political leanings from the scene.
Even dogs aren’t safe. Ring touts its cameras’ ability to track lost pets and donates the monitoring equipment to animal shelters across the country. But that warm-and-fuzzy demeanor comes at the same time that a partnership with security technology company Flock could significantly enhance law enforcement’s use of its customers’ images.
So far, there is no evidence that Ring data is being used in Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids or other actions by DHS agencies. However, the narrow degree of separation makes watching a simple dog commercial a little unnerving.
In that sense, not much has changed in five years in the last 250 years.th The American version would create a fun mirror of reactions.
“It’s going to be interesting to see. It’s a combination of commemoration and recognition about the president,” Whitler said. “The answer is complex and depends on the decision makers and the brands they represent.
“You would like it to be simple. The reality is that different groups and generations view America differently.”
