Super bowl ads 2026: what worked & where to test from here

With ad spots going for up to $10 million for Super Bowl LX, the pressure was on for brands to make their 30 seconds count.  

From AI tools to kitchen appliances to prebiotic soda, each ad found its own way to speak to the current moment.

Some ads hit, some left more to be desired. Ad spots this pricey aren’t wise to gamble on; so we've been thinking about where they can go from here with in-feed testing. Big spend can and should have an even bigger payoff. Social listening is an efficient way to quickly optimize the next step or to course correct. With that, we’re going to unpack some of the most beloved and most bewildering ads from this year's Super Bowl from a testing in the wild perspective.

Levi’s & Pepsi: Playing with icons 

Both the Pepsi ad and the Levi’s ad featured iconic imagery that audiences would associate with their brand – or in Pepsi’s case, their competitors.

Both ads tapped into a certain cheekiness (Levi’s especially, wink) to evoke a feel-good sense that these brands are self-aware, and they see themselves as audiences see them.

Pepsi used the polar bear mascot typically associated with Coca-Cola to poke fun at cultural touchstones – they even referenced that Coldplay concert snafoo from earlier last year, turning it on its head by having the polar bears raise their Pepsi cans in pride.

Similarly, Levi’s used a mix of hyper-recognizable imagery from music and movies (like the Bruce Springsteen album cover) as well as familiar, everyday moments. All shot from the back, showing the iconic Levi’s red tab and pocket stitching, audiences saw themselves just as much in the Hollywood-style shots as the civilian ones.

In the context of some other denim ads that dropped in the last 12 months, like American Eagle’s “Good Jeans” ad that fell flat with the majority of their target market, Levi’s brings us a more relevant perspective on their identity – in quite the literal sense.

What they could test:

• Pepsi – What’s keeping Coca-Cola loyalists from trying something new? Based on the success of this ad, how else can Pepsi continue to ride the Coke VS Pepsi identity crisis messaging?
• Levi’s – What does Levi's American identity look like now? Will younger Gen-Z and incoming Gen Alpha consumers connect with this messaging?

Bosch & Anthropic: Humor & familiar faces 

Both Bosch and Anthropic leaned into original jokes and aspirational messaging to drive product benefits home.

Bosch’s play on words (“boss” and “Bosch”) and celeb chef Guy Fieri features him as a toned-down brunette version of himself who transforms back into his signature frosted tip self upon using Bosch appliances and tools. The theme, which is "The More You Bosch, The More You Feel Like A Bosch,” speaks to the emotional appeal and familiarity of millennials who have the spending power to be in the market for premium appliances, and are highly likely to remember the “like a boss” meme, as well as Fieri and the Flavortown franchise.

Similarly, Anthropic promoted its chatbot Claude with a humorous play on AI exchanges in a real-life context, spotlighting how their competitors will soon be featuring ads in their responses, whereas Claude won’t be. This stand-out feature is represented in an awkwardly funny, unhelpful exchange between a personal trainer character representing the unnatural speaking cadence of ad-driving chatbot alternatives and a trainee hoping to get six-pack abs fast.

Audiences are likely to see themselves and competitors in this ad; with ChatGPT being the most popular chatbot in the world,the flattering tone and cadence of the trainer’s voice is familiar to most viewers, and almost unmistakably AI-generated. They’re not only calling out the benefit of their product as being ad-free, but suggesting that Claude doesn’t perform in the same pre-fabricated way.

What they could test:

• Bosch – What more specific technical product differentiators make consumers feel “like a Bosch”? As Gen-Z gets more spending power, how will they pivot messaging to speak more to that demographic?
• Anthropic – Are users interested in why and how Claude isn’t going to be pushing ads? What else makes Claude the superior choice in AI chatbots?

Coinbase & Ai.com: Room for improvement 

Both Coinbase and Ai.com had ads that were met with a mix of confusion and disappointment.

Critics said that the ads were unclear about what either platform does, and they relied too much on recognizable outside content without explaining anything about their product or what it can be used for. To make matters worse, Ai.com was unprepared for the amount of site traffic this ad would generate, so the site crashed soon after airing, leaving potential customers and dollars on the table, with an audience even more confused and left without answers as to what that multi-million dollar ad was all about.

What they could test:

• Coinbase – What messaging would resonate with people who are new to or skeptical of cryptocurrency?
• Ai.com – What’s the most important differentiator of their AI in particular? Who is it most useful for?

While not all Super Bowl ads can be a slam dunk (wink, again), they sparked a lot of conversation–particularly around the AI arms race.

There’s a lot hanging in the balance, and advertising will become even more important as people, companies, and brands start to choose and pay for their preferred AI software.

For more traditional products and services, leveraging cultural iconography was a common theme. With newer technologies rolling out at such a rapid pace, audiences seemed pleased to be grounded in nostalgia and relatable humor.

Every ad gives us insights to test from. Winning brands will continue to build off the learnings of campaigns and messaging that came before. With in-feed testing, authentic, real-world behavior becomes the context that your most important research is based on. Tap into your key markets faster and without bias, so spending big doesn’t have to mean betting big.

Whether you’re already planning to be part of next year’s Super Bowl ad lineup, looking to build off your last campaign, or are forging an original brand identity from scratch, book a call with our team today to see what in the wild testing and social listening can do for you.