The Seattle Seahawks beat the New England Patriots 29-13 on Sunday (Feb. 8), but for a lot of the room the main event was the commercial breaks, and this year they looked a lot like a pop-music playlist. Rolling Stone’s roundup of the night’s spots has Charli xcx, Sabrina Carpenter, KATSEYE, 50 Cent, Benson Boone and the Backstreet Boys, all selling something. (The halftime show, with Bad Bunny and Lady Gaga, is its own story.)
Charli xcx teamed up with the soda brand Poppi and Rachel Sennott for a spot that goofed on “vibes, vibes and vibes,” with the strobe visuals she uses in her recent work. Rolling Stone’s verdict is that she is brilliant at having it both ways, since she has built her recent career on skewering selling out:
Then again, is there anything more brat than saying one thing and doing another?
Rolling Stone, Rolling Stone
Carpenter starred in a Pringles spot as a woman who builds the “perfect man” from chips, per the HarrisX ad study, and Rolling Stone adds that the brand changed its famous tagline to “Once you pop, the pop don’t stop.” Benson Boone and Ben Stiller played an Eighties singing duo in a Spike Jonze-directed Instacart ad. The Backstreet Boys appeared twice, once in a T-Mobile ad and again in a Coinbase karaoke spot, which was so realistic, Rolling Stone says, that viewers thought a feed had been crossed. KATSEYE joined a Jake From State Farm sing-along set to Bon Jovi.
What viewers actually liked
Nearly 138 million Americans tuned in to Super Bowl LX, the most-watched moment in U.S. television history, according to a HarrisX release published on Feb. 12. In the company’s poll of more than 9,700 adults, the most popular spot was Lay’s “Last Harvest,” a multigenerational story of a farm passing from father to daughter, which scored 93.2 out of 100. Ring, Pepsi, Google and a Blue Square Alliance Against Hate spot filled the rest of the top five. HarrisX’s CEO read the result as a lesson in restraint:
The strongest Super Bowl ads this year weren’t trying to do the most — they were trying to connect,
Dritan Nesho, HarrisX, via Marketing Dive
Gen Z disagreed. Lay’s placed fourth among that group, while Pringles’ “Pringleleo” with Carpenter scored 94.8 among Gen Z viewers despite finishing 22nd overall. Rolling Stone was struck that the Lay’s spot was directed by Taika Waititi, who it expected to make something kookier.
The AI ad bowl
Artificial intelligence was the other theme. HarrisX found the best AI spots, Ring’s lost-pet feature and Google’s “New Home,” won by centering clear human uses, while five of the seven lowest-performing ads were AI-focused, from OpenAI, Anthropic, ai.com, Salesforce and Genspark. Rolling Stone’s verdict on the OpenAI spot was blunt: a commercial for AI in which everything on screen is analog. The critics’ favorite was Xfinity’s Jurassic Park reunion, with Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum getting the park working again.
Rolling Stone called the Dunkin’ Good Will Hunting parody, with a baker’s dozen of throwback sitcom stars, one of the most memorable of the night, and Whiskey Riff’s top pick. A 30-second spot reportedly cost around $8 million, so the real winner of the night might be whoever got people talking about it. The other big spectacle of the week was the Olympics’ opening ceremony, and our February guide has the rest of the month.
- Game
- Seattle Seahawks 29, New England Patriots 13
- Audience
- Nearly 138 million U.S. viewers (HarrisX)
- Top-rated ad
- Lay’s “Last Harvest,” 93.2 on the HarrisX Ad Index
- Gen Z’s pick
- Pringles “Pringleleo” with Sabrina Carpenter, 94.8
Sources
Added to the High Grailed archive on October 12, 2026.
