The Super Bowl has long been the stage on which advertisers compete for the spotlight to showcase their most creative, ingenious, and attention-grabbing ads.
This year, the 2025 Super Bowl commercials were no different, with ads that were nearly as gripping as the game itself. We’ve highlighted the best and worst Super Bowl Ads plus what they did right (and wrong) when it comes to advertising.
The Best Super Bowl Ads
The best Super Bowl LIX ads are the ones that turn into a cultural phenomenon. Many viewers watch the game specifically to see their favorite ad.
Over the years, a number of campaign ads have spawned their own memes, from Bud Light to the Kool-Aid Man, catapulting brands like General Motors and Apple into lifelong fandom. Whether you’re selling coffee or clothes, Super Bowl LIX was the place to be, and these brands earned a top spot for being among the most memorable this past Sunday.
Uber Eats: "A Century of Cravings"
Nostalgia was a big theme for this year’s Super Bowl Ads, with marketers going all out with a star-studded cast of celebrities and plenty of money to bring their vision to life.
Uber Eats was no different. The ad, featuring Matthew McConaughey, Kevin Bacon, Martha Steward, and Charli XCX, connected the two things Super Bowl parties are made for: football history and food! By bringing together food cravings and football, Uber Eats knew they had a captivating play the moment the ad went live.
Dunkin: "The Bean Method"
Not to be outdone, Dunkin’s ad, featuring Ben Affleck, Casey Affleck, and Jeremy Strong, used method acting to create a sincere, powerful, and expressive performance that captivated the stadium and viewers at home alike.
Who can forget the image of Strong submerged in coffee beans? This commercial will be fresh in our minds for quite some time, and for Dunkin, that’s a good thing!
Did you know DunKing 2 is an actual movie?
Mountain Dew: "Seal as a Seal"
Do the song lyrics from “Kiss from a Rose” say “gray” or “grave”? While the jury is still out on what the song is actually saying, this commercial made Seal’s famous record even more memorable by turning him into an actual Seal.
Only Mountain Dew’s Baja Blast could pull off such a transformation, together with Seal’s powerful vocals and a variety of eye-catching ads as memorable as the game itself. It was silly, it was fun, it was quirky: all things that Mountain Dew embraces wholeheartedly.
Instacart: "We're Here"
Another Super Bowl win for the nostalgia category, Instacart brought out all the famous mascots for its Super Bowl commercial. From Chester Cheetah to the Kool-Aid man, to Mr. Clean and the Green Giant, you’d be forgiven for trying to spot which mascots you recognized instead of paying attention to the commercial itself.
By incorporating all of these famous brands, Instacart reminded viewers that they can get all the brands they love, delivered to their door.
The Worst Super Bowl Ads
Along with the winners in Super Bowl ads, there is always that handful of ads that leave you scratching your head, wondering how they ever got out of the storyboard phase.
Although these ads will be talked about on YouTube for months to come, it likely won’t be in a good way.
Hellmann's: "When Sally Met Hellmann's"
Creating an ad for the Super Bowl that’s a throwback to nostalgia doesn’t always mean a guaranteed winner. During the game, Hellmann’s showcased “When Sally Met Hellmann’s”, a recreation of the iconic diner scene in “When Harry Met Sally”.
Instead of evoking warm memories of togetherness and a moment shared, the ad was widely criticized for its forced attempt to create nostalgia where there was none. The moral of the story: If you have to try too hard to get people to like it, it’s probably going to flop.
Stella Artois: "David & Dave: The Other David"
Along with other Super Bowl ads that tried too hard to create a match with their audience is Stella Artois, which featured Matt Damon as the American twin brother of David Beckham.
Beyond viewers rolling their eyes, the idea didn’t land and the execution felt rushed and tired, back to the advertising drawing board.
Pringles: "The Call of the Mustaches"
Pringles’ Super Bowl ads over the years have truly been a mixed bag (kind of like their potato chip flavors!) The 2024 ad of Chris Pratt as “Mr. P”, the brand’s mustachioed mascot, encouraged viewers to share their sightings of the character, building up valuable UGC (User-Generated Content) for the company.
That ad was a hit but this year’s Super Bowl LIX was something of a miss. The ad itself featured Adam Brody, Nick Offerman, James Harden, and Andy Reid and was a parody of the 1960s Batman TV theme.
To be sure, it was playful and quirky, but nothing about it would ever make the many viewers watching the game think “Pringles”.
WeatherTech: "Whatever Comes Your Way"
WeatherTech is not a name that’s synonymous with Super Bowl commercials, so they can be forgiven for getting this one wrong.
They approached it in much the same way as a company that makes weatherproofing materials would with any old ad.
Unfortunately, that also meant that the ad was unoriginal, it lacked creativity or anything memorable about it, and as a result, it didn’t leave a lasting impression on its viewers.
What We Can Learn from the Good and the Bad of Super Bowl Commercials
Super Bowl ads in 2025 have become just as much of a cultural phenomenon as the game itself, and Super Bowl LIX was no different.
Even if you just ordinarily watch the game for those tantalizing moments between each commercial break, this year’s crop of ads were both daring and disingenuous, bold and boring.
The good news is that analyzing Super Bowl ads can give you some great insights into marketing strategies and how they work.
If you’ve watched some or all of these ads, you see the power of humor and nostalgia at work.
At the same time, you also see the risks of playing it too safe, as Weathertech did. You can see how having a cast of celebrities can be a powerful tool, but only if the match has a clear purpose and doesn’t end up like Matt Damon and Stella Artois.
There’s also the undercurrent to watch what you say and how you say it. Although this year’s ads were prudent about sidestepping controversy, back in 2018, the Dodge Ram Super Bowl ad was heavily criticized for using a Martin Luther King Jr. speech to sell trucks.
Brands should always stay true to their values particularly so if they have a Super Bowl spot, when a majority of the country’s eyes will be on them.
Last but not least is the plague of overcomplication. Unfortunately for creatives and ad writers, users don’t stay glued to a brand all hours of the day trying to come up with something quirky or original.
That means throwing in a message that’s muddled and mixed can do more harm than good. What about a 1960s Batman theme song parody that screams “Pringles” to you?
The bottom line is that, like with every year, there were Super Bowl Ad winners and losers. Let’s hope that the winners can savor their time in the spotlight, while the losers come away with important (albeit) expensive lessons learned. Sometimes the simplest ads do the best job, even when you’re in front of millions.
And – of course – Congratulations to the Philadephia Eagles on winning the Super Bowl Championship Game.
