Viewership of the Super Bowl keeps climbing, but the 49ers still can’t get an extra point.

The NFL said a league-commissioned custom survey by Nielsen determined that the Super Bowl on February 11 reached 210 million viewers across broadcast, streaming and digital properties. 

The 210 million is up 6% from the result of a similar study a year ago. It is also up 4% from the 202 million unique viewers Nielsen’s syndicated ratings service came up with. It's also an eye-popping two-thirds of the country.

The custom survey also determined that the average minute audience was about 143 million viewers, up from the 123.7 million reported by Nielsen on February 13 and 123.4 million reported by CBS on February 12. Nielsen rival iSpot calculated on February 12 that 126,6 million were watching.

“The Super Bowl is singular across the television and media landscape not only in its unparalleled viewership, but because it is largely watched in group settings," said Paul Ballew, chief data and analytics officer of the NFL. “With that in mind, additional measurement is needed in order to have a complete picture of the total viewership of this special event and the results of this custom survey with Nielsen illustrate the true magnitude of the Super Bowl."

Part of the custom survey involved looking at 5,267 households to determine the size of viewing groups and to determine if those groups are larger than Nielsen’s estimate. The survey was conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago.

Changes in the way out-of-home viewing is measured and added to total viewership have pushed the ratings of sports higher. For the Super Bowl, a lot of people seem to be watching in other people's homes.

“Nielsen understands the nuance of the Super Bowl, which historically has drawn the largest television audience of the year and includes unparalleled viewership from large groups of people, both in and out of homes," said Deirdre Thomas, chief product officer at Nielsen. “We are proud that the NFL partners with Nielsen to provide the best possible measurement of their programming, for the Super Bowl and throughout the season. Additionally, we're excited about the expansion of our National Out-Of-Home panel, which we announced earlier this month, because it will enhance our ability to provide the most complete picture of the audience, especially for major events like the Super Bowl.”

In the Super Bowl, the Kansas City Chiefs won in overtime after a blocked extra point enabled the Chiefs to tie the game in the fourth quarter.

An estimated 123.7 million viewers tuned into the Super Bowl, up 7.4% from last year, making it the largest TV audience ever, Nielsen said Tuesday.

The Nielsen stats include viewing on traditional and Spanish-language TV, digital viewing, out of home and viewing on MVPD and vMVPDs, Paramount Plus and digital properties owned by CBS Sports, Univision and the NFL, including NFL Plus.

Nielsen said 120.3 million viewers watched the game on CBS. Another 2.3 million watched in Spanish on Univision and 1.2 million chose to watch the Slime-friendly kids-geared telecast on Nickelodeon and Nick at Nite.

Yesterday, based on Nielsen fast national numbers and data from Adobe Analytics, CBS said 123.4 million people watched the Super Bowl.

Nielsen rival iSpot.tv pegged the Super Bowl audience at 126.6 million viewers. 

The Kansas City Chiefs’ overtime win over the San Francisco 49ers had a household rating of 34.5 and a combined share of 83%

“We are excited to work with the NFL, CBS, Paramount Plus, Nickelodeon and Univision to capture the full breadth of audience engagement for this record breaking Super Bowl,” Nielsen CEO Karthik Rao said. “No matter how or where viewers watch the game — at home with family and friends, at a bar or streaming —Nielsen has the advanced measurement capabilities to capture the audience for the biggest TV event of the year.”

Paramount added that Paramount Plus’ live stream of the Super Bowl was a big factor in making the game the most-streamed Super Bowl in history.

The Super Bowl’s average minute audience was up 52% from a year ago, Paramount said, citing data from Adobe Analytics and channel partner data.

Streaming engagement was at an all time high with 2.64 billion minutes of the game consumed. The previous record was 1.48 billion minutes from Super Bowl LVII. 

Super Bowl Sunday was the biggest day ever for Paramount Plus and the biggest live event on the service since its launch in terms of active subscriber households and hours consumed. 

CBS said its coverage of the Super Bowl was the most watched telecast in history, with total audience delivery of up 7% to 123.4 million average viewers across all platforms, based on fast national figures from Nielsen and data from Adobe Analytics.

About 202.4 million viewers watched all or part of the Kansas City Chiefs’ January 11 overtime win over the San Francisco 49ers, up 10% from last year.

Also Read: Super Bowl Overtime Was Money Time for CBS

There were 120 million viewers on CBS, the largest audience ever for a single network, the broadcaster said.

Paramount Plus also had a record-setting audience, establishing a record for the most-streamed Super Bowl in history. CBS did not say how many people streamed the game.

Earlier, Nielsen rival iSpot.tv reported that 126.6 million people watched the Super Bowl, up 10.9% from last year.

Final Nielsen numbers are expected Tuesday. 

The Super Bowl drew 126.642 million viewers on television, up 10.9% from last year, according to measurement company iSpot.tv.

A tight game and a legion of Taylor Swift fans helped swell the total.

iSpot’s preliminary total includes viewers on linear, out-of-home and streaming. Nielsen's estimate of TV viewing has not been released yet. Last year, Nielsen pegged the big-game audience at 115.1 million, which was below iSpot's 118.2 million count.

The average second-by-second households audience on linear and streaming, across CBS, Univision, Nickelodeon and Paramount Plus was 50.5 million households.

CBS drew an average second audience  of 121.9 million. CBS accounted for 36% of all TV ad impressions on Sunday, per iSpot.

Nickelodeon’s audience was 1.75 million people, Univision had 2.9 million people. iSpot estimates that 25.9 million people watched out-of-home.

Viewership peaked at 8.38 p.m., just before the halftime show starring Usher.

The CBS telecast featured 81 spots from 65 advertisers, up from 59 spots and 51 advertisers a year ago.

The most seen commercial on CBS was Etsy’s France spot, which aired at 8:23 p.m. ET.

Among the millions of Americans who watched the Super Bowl, 34% watched via streaming, according to research and analytics company TVision.

Last year, 28% of viewers streamed the big game, TVision said.

The figures show how viewers are shifting away from traditional broadcast and cable to streaming, even for the biggest sports events.

Last year's game, according to Nielsen's final count, tallied 115.1 million total viewers. iSpot.TV pegged the figure at more than 118 million. 

TVision also measured how much attention viewers were paying when Taylor Swift popped up on the screen to root for her boyfriend, Kansas City tight end Travis Kelce.

The attention index for female viewers when Swift was on screen was 126, compared to 117 when she wasn’t on the screen.

Among men, attention rose to 128 when Swift was on screen, up from 119 without Taylor.

The Super Bowl ad that best kept viewers’ eyes on the screen during the Super Bowl was for T-Mobile. 

Other top attention-getting ads were for Dunkin, Hellman’s, Uber Eats and Door Dash. 

Paramount Plus delivered the least lag time between the what was happening on the field Sunday in Las Vegas during Super Bowl LVIII and what streamers actually saw on their screen, with latency averaging 42.73 seconds, according to research company Phenix, which annually tracks streaming performance for the big game. 

Fubo TV, which was working off CBS' exclusive live feed of the game, registered the worst score, averaging 86.75 seconds. 

Notably, every streamer that also presented the game last year saw an increase in lag time. Here's how last year's performances stacked up. 

“This is the fifth year we’ve conducted our Super Bowl latency study, and unfortunately nothing has changed -- the industry has yet to catch up with consumer demand to provide a real-time experience," said Roy Reichbach, CEO of Phenix, in a statement. 

Phenix didn't go into specifics as to why scores deteriorated this year. The company did say that broadcast delays were worse Sunday relative to other recent Super Bowls. 

"For today’s consumers, live sporting events are riddled with spoilers, especially as we continue to see this new ‘scroll and watch’ habit, getting notifications straight to our phones via apps and social media," Reichbach added. "For one of the most highly anticipated sporting and cultural moments, and in a world where artificial intelligence is taking reign, there should be no excuse as to why broadcasters aren’t able to stream the game as it is happening on the field in real-time. A solution exists, and the people want it.” -  

Cox Media Group and DirecTV said they agreed to a new multiyear carriage agreement, ending two-week blackout just before the Super Bowl began Sunday evening.

Cox owns two CBS affiliates that aired the game, KIRO Seattle and WHIO Toledo, Ohio.

The companies said they were working to restore the stations as soon as possible to DirecTV on satellite, U-verse TV and DirecTV Stream.

Restoring the Seattle and Toledo stations were a priority.

“DirecTV and CMG greatly appreciate the patience of their subscribers and viewers,” the companies said in a statement.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

“We will continue to work with broadcasters like CMG, as well as any other programmers, to align the price our customers pay with the value they can expect to receive,” DirecTV said.

The blackout affected 12 CMG stations. 

Charter Communications ran a commercial for its Spectrum home internet product during the Super Bowl in some Charter markets.

It was Charter's first Super Bowl spot since 2016.

The markets include Kansas City, the home of the Chiefs, which has been generating big ratings.

Also Read: Why Wait for Kickoff? See Some Hot Super Bowl Commercials Here

The humorous spot, called Holes, touts Spectrum Internet’s speed and reliability. By contrast, wireless broadband from carriers like T-Mobile can be interfered with by walls, the spot claims, so the T-Mobile subscriber has decided to smash holes in the wall to ensure a good connection.

“Turns out the walls were getting in the way,” the dad in the spot says.

Spectrum Internet offers speeds up to 1 Gbps everywhere the company operates--even through walls, the company says.

The commercial was created by agency Something Different.

The Super Bowl on Sunday will draw more than 100 million viewers and many of them will be tuning in to see the commercials.

Advertisers spend about $7 million for 30 seconds during the game and the pour all the star power and creativity they can into the commercials, which turn out to be some of the most memorable of the year.

More and more, companies forking over millions to run Super Bowl ads run campaigns before the game to promote the ads and after, to keep them in consumers mind.

For those of you who can’t wait for kickoff, here is a selection of the ads that will appear during the big game.

BMW

BMW is returning to the Super Bowl with a 60-second commercial for its 5 Seres, including the electric BWMi5. The spot features actor Christopher Walken, who encounters a bunch of people “Talkin’ like Walken,” including Ashley Park and Usher.

Drumstick

Drumstick, the ice-cream treat, is in the Super Bowl for the first time with a 30-second spot featuring comic Eric André and a tiny character named Dr. Umstick, who responds when a flight attendant asks, “Is there a doctor on the plane?”

Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen

The first Super Bowl commercial for Popeyes features the omnipresent Ken Jeong and the chicken chain’s new wings. In the 60-second spot, Jeong froze himself 52 years ago, waiting for the best wings to be created, and is unfrozen now, to encounter Popeyes wings and other modern miracles.

Michelob Ultra

Lionel Messi stars in a spot for Michelob Ultra. The soccer star dribbles through a crowd of players on a beach while waiting for a beer. Jason Sudeikis and Dan Marino are also on hand as MIchelob Ultra makes its ninth appearance in the big game.

Kawasaki

Kawasaki is coming to the Super Bowl for the first time to promote its new Ridge off-road vehicle in a spot that shows people (and animals) sprouting mullets. The hair style is a metaphor for the Ridge, which is business in the front, party in the back, according to the spot.

Doritos

Doritos is pushing the spicy Doritos Dinamita in a spot featuring Jenna Ortega alongside characters named Dina and Mita. The campaign will continue to air after the game and Dina and Mita will be taking over TikTok, crashing videos from some of the platform's biggest creators.

Paramount Plus

Paramount Plus, the streaming sibling to CBS which is airing the Super Bowl, has a spot in the big game featuring Star Trek star Patrick Stewart. Sir Patrick shares the screen with animated characters who could play a role on the gridiron.

Ally

To help viewers picture what they want to save for, a spot for Ally features a 30-foot bucket, into which major purchases are dropped.

P.S.: You’ll only see this spot if you’re streaming the game on Paramount Plus. Ally says advertising on streaming only during the Super Bowl was a smart way for it to save money.

Bud Light

In this spot a genie emerges from a bottle of Bud Light granting wishes; Those wishes summon NFL Hall of Famer Peyton Manning, UFC head Dana White and singer Post Malone for an easy night out. For Malone, this is an encore after appearing in Bud Light’s Super Bowl spot last year.

M&M’s

M&M’s Super Bowl commercial introduces the Almost Champions Ring of Comfort, which is awarded to people who never won an official championship ring. The spot
shows how the ring is made with diamonds made from compressed M&M’s peanut butter. Featured in the ad are Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino, who lost in his one Super Bowl appearance to Joe Montana, and Scarlett Johansson, who almost won an Oscar.

The Super Bowl is not just a big moment for television. With the big game approaching YouTube has a few new tricks in its playbook for advertisers to engage its millions of viewers.

YouTube is offering First Position Moments, which ensure that a brand’s ad is the first one seen when audiences watch the platform at the times most relevant to its business.

Also: Why Wait For Kickoff? See Some Hot Super Bowl Commercials Here 

Advertisers can also employ Content Takeover to get a high share of voice of channels like New Heights, hosted by NFL stars Travis and Jason Kelce, or halftime show star Usher’s online content.

YouTube said is evolving its Content Takeover package to offer more inventory and faster speed to market.

“Millions are turning to YouTube to keep up with the Super Bowl — whether they’re watching the ads, the fan content, or the Big Game itself. YouTube’s high-impact sponsorship opportunities let brands get in front of both the relevant content and audiences during these massive pop-culture moments,” Kristen O’Hara, VP, agency and brand solutions at YouTube, said in a blog post.

YouTube said that Booking.com recently ran a successful campaign using First Position Moments. 

Booking.com wanted to take advantage of travel surges during the holiday season and amplified its ad — which is highly ranked on YouTube’s Adblitz site featuring Super Bowl Ads — through First Position Moments to deepen brand association and be top-of-mind for consumers during their vacation search. 

As a result, Booking.com saw a 21% relative lift in ad recall–more than 6% above its benchmark, according to the blog post.

Another advertiser,  IHG Hotels & Resorts, wanted to maximize awareness with luxury travelers and took advantage of both the First Position Moment project as well as a Takeover next to NFL and Formula One racing content.

The campaign delivered unique reach over linear TV and drove lifts in IHG brands for ad recall and brand awareness that achieved two times the YouTube benchmark, according to the blog post.

“YouTube is a prime destination for viewers during popular moments,” IHG Hotels & Resorts VP, paid media Chris Copp said. “We’re excited that Content Takeovers unlock more opportunities to easily align our brand to the culturally relevant content that viewers love.”

In the days leading up to the Super Bowl, Xfinity is running a new campaign featuring 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey and another Christian McCaffrey who doesn’t quite measure up.

The point of the campaign, created by Whistle, is that other providers don’t measure up to Xfinity.

The spot announces that “not all Christian McCaffreys are the same,” introducing the NFL All-Pro and his namesake, a restaurant manager from Belvidere, Illinois. “I make tacos,” the less well-known McCaffrey says.

With both dressed in similar workout togs, the two McCaffreys go through a series of drills, running, catching footballs and pushing a tackling dummy.

It’s easy to tell the football player from the restaurant manager.

“Don’t settle for slow … or unreliable … or weak,"  the spot says. “Get real deal,  speed, reliability and power with Xfinity.”

The spot will air across linear networks throughout February.

The video will also appear on Whistle’s and Xfinity’s social channels, including TikTok, Instagram, Facebook Reels and YouTube shorts.

“All three challenges that Christian McCaffrey and his namesake will participate in lean into key product features of our internet — speed, reliability and power — and demonstrate that just because another offering technically delivers the internet doesn’t mean they are the same,” Comcast VP of brand partnerships and activation Matt Lederer said. “We are grateful Christian saw the playfulness of the campaign and was such a good sport.”  

Like other cable companies, Comcast has been under pressure from lower-price wireless broadband providers. In the fourth quarter, Comcast lost 34,000 broadband customers.

“It was a ton of fun to try challenges knowing I would be competing against another Christian namesake,” said Christian McCaffrey of the 49ers, who will take on the Kansas City Chiefs February 11 in the Super Bowl. “The fact that he is a fan of mine and was willing to try and keep up with me makes me very much appreciate him and his good nature.” 

Said restaurant manager Christian McCaffrey: “I have always been a Christian McCaffrey fan, given the crazy coincidence that we have the same name, and people bring it up to me all the time. I loved the campaign concept and thought about the playfulness of it, trying to hold my own and compare skills against a legend that wears the same name on his back every Sunday.” 

Team Whistle is a sports and media company that specializes in data-driven content creation and distribution.

“At Whistle, our playbook is focused on creating shareable moments in sports culture,” Team Whistle VP of brand partnerships Corey Radel said. “We were so excited to partner with both Xfinity and Christian to deliver these commercial assets across the social platforms our audience will be scrolling while they’re watching the big game on February 11th.” 

With Paramount Global’s CBS broadcasting Super Bowl LVIII, Paramount Plus will again have a commercial during the big game.

This year’s super spot features features Star Trek: Picard star Patrick Stewart and other characters from the streaming service, which will also be carrying the game.

In the spot, Stewart and the other characters are trapped in an icy canyon on Paramount Mountain. Among those present is Tua Tagovailoa, quarterback of the Miami Dolphins, who fails to throw a rescue rope over the canyon ridge.

When Tagovailoa says he would have done better throwing something football-shaped, Stewart suggests Arnold of Hey Arnold!, whose head is famously football-shaped.

Tagovailoa balks at tossing a child (Drew Barrymore agrees) and Stewart decides to do it himself as Creed plays Higher.

Also Read: Paramount Plus Snaps New Spots as Super Bowl Nears

Stewart’s throw falls short. His next idea is to find something made of pigskin, an idea that makes Peppa Pig nervous.

Other chilly characters in the spot are Dora of Dora the Explorer,  Knuckles from Sonic the Hedgehog and  Jeff Probst of Survivor.

This is Paramount Plus’ 15th “Mountain of Entertainment” brand commercial and its third Super Bowl spot. Stewart also appeared in the streamer’s first Super Bowl spot three years ago when CBS last had the big game.

CBS was able to sell this year’s Super Bowl spots at prices topping $7 million.

Social media lit up Jo Koy with devastating attacks about his hosting duties at the Golden Globe Awards on January 7. 

But something funny happened on the way to the dustbin of Golden Globes history. Ratings had a dead-cat bounce, rising to 9.4 million viewers — a 50% jump from 2023’s record low of 6.3 million viewers.

Whether more people tuned in from social media’s lambasting of Koy’s unfortunate performance or whether they were drawn to the quality of the nominees (Barbie, Oppenheimer, Killers of the Flower Moon), and attendees (Taylor Swift, Greta Gerwig, Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin Scorsese, Robert DeNiro), is difficult to determine.

Linear TV is still quite a powerful advertising platform for live sports and tentpole events such as awards shows. The reasons are simple: ratings, cultural relevance via social media, and the ripple effect for days or even months after the fact in the form of user-generated shareable content (tweets, posts, hashtags and memes). 

Each year, Q1 is brings the linear-TV ad trifecta: the Grammy Awards (February 4), Super Bowl LVIII (February 11), and the Oscars (March 10). Perhaps the Golden Globes should be included to make Q1 a “quadfecta?” 

In 2020, the Grammy Awards drew about 19 million viewers, which fell to under 10 million in 2021 and 2022 before rising in 2023 to 12.5 million. And the bored Ben Affleck meme is still memorable a year later. 

The Super Bowl never fails to disappoint as a ratings draw with roughly 100 million viewers each year. While ratings for the other two shows fluctuate wildly, all are amplified by social media commentary.

When our clients ran TV Super Bowl commercials, they experienced increased engagement and a significantly higher response rate on their websites and apps.

Despite the high out-of-pocket cost, the substantial volume of web traffic more than offset the cost, resulting in a lower cost-per-visit for the Super Bowl. The down-funnel impact on new customers and conversions from the Super Bowl was similarly strong and efficient, with the greatest impact realized within the first three days and measurable for approximately 25 days post-spot.

Pregame spots have proven to generate a strong response for numerous brands. Placing ads in tentpole programming elevates awareness among consumers and adds legitimacy and credibility. This is important because there has been a steady decrease in ratings for primetime programming each year, showing a decline of 13.83% from 2022 to 2023.

Clever creative in the right placement drives conversations that happen outside of live broadcasts; what used to be called the “water-cooler” effect — next-day conversations in the workplace — can become immortal online.

The “Breaking Bad” Super Bowl spot for PopCorners last year was widely shared and discussed on social media, even though it aired only once on TV. However many millions the brand spent to run the 60-second spot helped to ensure it reached a substantial audience beyond the telecast and generated a lot of positive buzz for the brand.

Super Bowl LVII in 2023 drew the most viewers in the past five years with 115 million in total, up 16% compared to 2019. Naturally, eyeballs vary depending on the quarter in which an ad appears and whether the game is lopsided.

Like the Grammys, Academy Awards viewership has declined significantly, down 37% in 2023 versus 2019. Yet the Oscars broadcast was one of only seven non-NFL sports programs in the top 100 most-watched TV broadcasts of 2023, making it a still-valuable buy. It remains to be seen whether the current beef between New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers and scheduled Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel has legs that can stretch to March. 

To maximize impact, brands might consider leveraging strategic partnerships with popular platforms such as YouTube AdBlitz to amplify brand creative and achieve even more mass reach. The coupling generated five times the views of the Super Bowl game itself and provided opportunities to reach incremental consumers, aged 18-49 who didn’t see an ad on TV. The most successful YouTube AdBlitz ads during the 2023 Super Bowl garnered anywhere from 11 million to a staggering 140 million views, showcasing the immense reach of the platform. 

Considering the magnitude of pop-culture influence from a tentpole linear TV event through shareable content and the data derived from sentiments, conversation and interactivity, buying ads on these shows is practically a guarantee for return on ad spend. 

Think of it this way: Despite dismal material and the near-universal panning of his performance, the Taylor Swift death-stare meme generated from one of Koy’s jokes about the singer is worth its viralness in gold. At least now everyone knows who he is.

Pluto TV is teeing up a new channel that will feature replays of past Super Bowls to help fans get ready for Super Bowl LVIII.

Pluto, the free streaming platform, is part of Paramount Global. Paramount’s CBS will broadcast Super Bowl LVIII, its Paramount Plus will be streaming the NFL championship and its Nickelodeon cable network will have a kid-friendly telecast of the big game.

The new NFL Super Bowl Classics channel will be available January 18 through February 21. In addition to game replays, the channel will have series and specials including Greatest Super Bowl Finishes and Ranking Every Super Bowl MVP Performance.

The channel joins Pluto’s NFL channel, which launched in 2019 and shows live game-day coverage, NFL game replays and other shows.

“Thanks to our incredible partners at the NFL, we have the opportunity to offer a window into NFL history and we know audiences will be thrilled, no matter what team they root for,” Amy Kuessner, executive VP of programming for Pluto TV, said. “The addition of NFL Super Bowl Classics channel to Pluto TV's lineup allows fans to discover and relive those unforgettable games and moments in one place — all for free.”

After finding flaws in the way it tabulated the viewing of February’s Super Bowl, Nielsen has come up with a new figure for how many people watched the big game, and the new number makes Super Bowl LVII the most-watched Super Bowl ever.

Nielsen now says that 115.1 million viewers tuned in.

Originally, Nielsen said the Super Bowl, featuring the victorious Kansas City Chiefs beating Philadelphia, drew 113 million viewers, the most since 2017. It later upgraded that figure to 113.1 million viewers.

iSpot.TV, one of the measurement companies offering a big data alternative to Nielsen, calculated that the Super Bowl had 118.2 million viewers 

“Fox Sports is proud to have presented the most-watched Super Bowl and most-watched TV show of all time," Fox said in a statement. “The revised Super Bowl viewership figure is the result of a thorough review by Nielsen that revealed irregularities in the encoding that enables Nielsen’s measurement of TV viewing as well as in the measurement of out-of-home viewing. We appreciate Nielsen’s commitment to producing the most accurate viewership figure possible.”

Nielsen has been frequently criticized for undercounting viewers. The Media Rating Council suspended its accreditation of Nielsen’s national TV audience measurement system because Nielsen was unable to manage its panel homes during the pandemic, resulting in incorrect viewer totals. Last month, the MRC restored the accreditation of Nielsen national panel-based service.

Measuring viewing of sporting events has become more difficult, with more viewers streaming games. Networks have also been pushing to have out-of-home viewing included in audience estimates.

“We strive to meet the highest standards for transparency and accuracy in audience measurement,” Nielsen said in a statement. "The Super Bowl continues to be a unique media event in terms of its size and diversity in how audiences watch the game. We appreciate the support and collaboration from our partners at Fox and the NFL to correct previously unknown errors to ultimately provide a more accurate measure for this year's total audience for the game."

Super Bowl LVII drew 113 million viewers, which Fox said was the highest turnout for the big game since 2017, citing data from Nielsen Media Research and Adobe Analytics.

Last year’s Super Bowl had a total audience delivery of 112.3 million viewers, according to research done for NBCUniversal.

The tune-in across Fox, Fox Deportes and Fox and NFL digital properties makes the Kansas City Chiefs’ last second victory over the Philadelphia Eagles the third most-watched television show of all time.

A total of 182.6  million viewers watched all or part of the game, up from 167 million a year ago. The game had a 40 household rating and 77% share.

Also Read: Woof! The Farmer’s Dog Spot Scores At Super Bowl: iSpot

Super Bowl LVII was the most streamed Super Bowl in history, delivering an average of 7 million streams, up 18% from last year and up 103% from Fox’s last Super Bowl in 2020, according to Adobe.

Also Read: Super Bowl Viewing Up Slightly to 36.7 Million Households: Samba TV

Fox said the halftime show featuring pregnant singing star Rihanna was watched by 118.7 million viewers. It was the most watched halftime show since Katy Perry performed in 2015.

The game drew its highest local-market rating in Kansas City, where the game had a 52 rating and 87 share. Philadelphia was No. 2 with a 46.3 rating and 77 share. Other strong markets included Cincinnati, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Milwaukee.

Fox Sports Deportes had an average audience of 951,000, up 25% from 2020

Final Nielsen data is expected to be available Tuesday.

Viewing of the Super Bowl edged up 0.5% to 36.7 million households from 36.5 million households a year ago, according to early figures from Samba TV, one of a number of measurement companies likely to weigh in on the big game.

The halftime show featuring Rihanna and sponsored by Apple Music was down slightly, viewed by 28.5 million households, off 0.7% compared to 28.7 million a year ago. 

“Super Bowl 57 had a number of historic firsts that combined to make this year’s big game the most watched since 2020 with more than one in four American households tuning in,“ Samba TV founder and CEO Ashwin Navin said. “More than thirty-six and a half million homes watched the Chief’s come from behind victory over the Eagles, surpassing last year’s viewership by nearly half a percent.

“As we are seeing with almost all of linear television today, while the price of advertising continues to increase — in the case of the Super Bowl by nearly 10% per ad since last year alone — audience reach is not keeping up as this year’s slight year-over-year viewership increase demonstrates,” Navin said.

“Rihanna’s star power has only continued to grow since her last tour and album release more than half a decade ago,” he added. “Apple Music’s visually stunning halftime show drew in an impressive 28 and a half million viewers, falling just short of last year's star-studded show featuring the biggest names in rap music history including Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, 50 Cent and Mary J. Blige. Overall, the halftime show drew in about a quarter of a percent fewer viewers than last year.”

Chiefs fans pushed Kansas City to become the highest over-indexing market in the U.S., surpassing the national average by 20%. Hometown Eagles fans followed closely behind, with Philadelphia over-indexing the national average by 15%.

Samba TV analyzes audiences based on its U.S. TV panel, which pulls viewing data from about 25 million connected TVs, measuring both linear TV consumption as well as streaming. Samba TV said its panel is 80 times larger than Nielsen’s, allowing for far more granular analysis matched to the U.S. Census. ■

Fox Sports’ telecast of Super Bowl LVII telecast Sunday will feature the familiar voices of its lead National Football League announcing team of Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen, but for the announcers themselves the game marks their first time on the NFL’s biggest stage.

After taking over Fox’s lead NFL announcing team at the beginning of the season — replacing Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, who left for ESPN — Burkhardt and Olsen will deliver the play-by-play action for Fox’s Philadelphia Eagles-Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl telecast. Burkhart becomes the first play-by-play announcer other than Buck or Pat Summerall to call a Super Bowl for Fox since the network first acquired NFL television rights in 1994.

The significance of the opportunity is not lost on Burkhardt. A former reporter and substitute play-by-play announcer for New York Mets games on regional sports network SNY, he joined Fox Sports in 2013 to call the NFL and host Major League Baseball studio coverage. Burkhardt said he’s grateful for the opportunities that Fox Sports and its CEO and executive producer, Eric Shanks, have provided him over the years leading up to the Super Bowl LVII gig. (Shanks will be profiled in February’s B+C Multichannel News magazine as our 2023 Sports Executive of the Year.) 

Also: Tom Brady Announces NFL Retirement. When Will Legend Suit Up For Fox Sports?

“It’s amazing … the whole experience is going to be so unbelievable,” he said. “I owe a ton to [Shanks] — he’s taken multiple chances on me,” he said. “I was doing TV for the Mets and he brought me on as a baseball studio guy, and then right away as a NFL play-by-play guy as the [number] two crew with [former Fox Sports announcer] John Lynch,” he said. “Then this year Joe and Troy leave and we had the A (team) to fill. Just because I was on the B crew didn’t mean I was automatically going to get the gig, but [Shanks] pretty much said ‘you’re our guy.’ To entrust me with that responsibility is a big deal.”

Despite the high-profile nature of the Super Bowl, Burkhardt says he’s not doing things much differently to prepare for the Super Bowl than he does preparing to announce a regular-season matchup. “I know this won’t be like every other game, but I’m just preparing like I do every game,” he said. “When I got promoted this year, I said I was going to keep doing what I’m doing and keep the same prep routine because that’s what got me here. If I did something completely ridiculous for the Super Bowl I’d be an idiot.”

Burkhardt, who began his career calling high-school football games at a Northern New Jersey radio station in the late 1990s, says once the Super Bowl action starts, he’ll call it as he has every football game throughout his career.  

“The beauty for me is once the ball kicks off, it’s no different than any high school game I did,” he said. “I know how to do the game, so I think I’m just going to focus on that.” 

Fox Sports will deploy more than 94 cameras and 29 field-level microphones during its Super Bowl LVII telecast as it looks to provide in-depth coverage of the event. “We’re trying to do some things to get fans closer to the game, whether it’s with audio or new cameras,” Shanks said. “We usually end up doing some really interesting things from a graphics perspective or data perspective. But we'll be putting our second-to-none talent out front, from Kevin and Greg to our pre- and post-game talent. We always remember to put the game first.” ■  

Fox said it has sold out all of the in-game commercials available during Super Bowl LVII, overcoming a slow economy and the collapse of the crypto market.

Some of the 30-second commercials during the February 12 game sold for more than $7 million, people familiar with the situation said, with most costing between $6 million and $7 million.

The spots give advertisers a chance to be seen by what is usually television’s largest audience each year as the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles. More than 150 million people across platforms watched Super Bowl LVI, according to iSpot.tv.

Last year, in-game advertising in the Super Bowl generated $578.36 million in revenue for NBC, up $143.8 million from the previous year, according to Kantar, which tracks ad sales. The average cost of a 30-second spot in a Super Bowl LVI was $6.5 million. Including pregame and postgame ad revenue, NBC raked in $636 million during the Super Bowl in 2022. (NBCUniversal said the Super Bowl brought in $519 million.)

This year, there are still a couple of commercials available for a last-minute sale in the pre-kick segment just before the games starts, and one and a half units — a 30-second spot and a 15-second spot — in the post-gun, or the first national break immediately following the game, according to Fox Sports executive VP for sales Mark Evans. 

“The official sellout was somewhere in the middle of last week,” Evans said. “What I can say now, is we’re focusing on overtime, which if it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t happen, but we’re still prepared should the game go to overtime,” Evans said. “We were, fortunately, the only network to ever have an overtime Super Bowl game, in Houston, which I was very much in the middle of. We learned a lot of lessons from that game, so we handle overtime a little bit differently.”

Before the National Football League season started in September, Fox said it was 95% sold out of its Super Bowl inventory — earlier than usual. Evans said there were a number of factors that kept Fox from selling out the game until last week.

Evans explained that once an advertiser agrees to buy a Super Bowl spot, it owns it. Unless Fox has another buyer lined up or there’s an “extraordinary circumstance,” Fox will put that money across the rest of its portfolio rather than return it. But this year, a company in the crypto business that had bought multiple spots blew up and “more or less ceased to exist,” creating extra inventory for Fox to sell. As CNN noted, four crypto or crypto-affiliated companies advertised in the Super Bowl a year ago. Of them, FTX collapsed altogether while Coinbase, Crypto.com and eToro "have fought against industry headwinds." 

Late Sales Gains

As the economy turned south in the fall, “the enthusiasm to spend $7 million on 30 seconds waned a little bit,” Evans said. “As things have now settled down a bit and people feel better about the economic trajectory, a few of those units that were available picked up in earnest the last week.”

In some cases those last spots were bought by companies that had already bought 30-second or 60-second slots, but wanted to expand them because they had hired high-priced talent to appear in their commercials and wanted to double down on that investment, Evans said. 

For this year’s game, Anheuser-Busch InBev, brewer of Budweiser and other beers, gave up its exclusivity, so multiple brands will appear during the game, a departure from past seasons.

As usual, autos, telecommunications companies and salty snack foods will be well-represented in the game. Other big spenders include movie studios and streaming services, Evans said.

According to Kantar, buying a Super Bowl commercial has been a good investment.

Kantar’s Super Bowl LVI Ad Effectiveness Report found that 2022 Super Bowl ads delivered an average ROI of $4.60 per dollar spent, with ads for T-Mobile, Verizon Communications, AT&T, Disney Plus, Sam’s Club and General Motors achieving the best results. 

“Telcom had the strongest financial return for their ads in Super Bowl LVI,“ Kantar partner for brand & marketing ROI Alfredo Troncoso said. “All three advertisers — T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon — saw double-digit ROIs for their ads. Financial services had a very soft performance in 2022, mainly driven by the crypto ads that did not achieve strong ROIs across the board.”

Last year, the Super Bowl halftime show alone generated $32 million in ad revenue.

A recent Kantar study found that of people who regularly watch the Super Bowl, 26% do so specifically to watch the halftime show, which this year will be sponsored by Apple Music, replacing Pepsi. In 2022, the Super Bowl LVI halftime show had more than 120 million viewers. Interest in the halftime show has grown since 2021, when viewers said watching commercials was a bigger reason for watching the Super Bowl than the halftime show.

Inclusive Ads Break Through

While Super Bowl ads offer a captive audience, promoting diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) in Super Bowl creative can deeply impact a brand’s return on investment (ROI). According to Kantar's Super Bowl Creative Evolution – DEI in the Big Game 2023 Report, 29% of respondents claimed they would stop using brands that do not promote inclusion and diversity during the Super Bowl. The majority also expected talent in ads to be inclusive and diverse — especially through inclusion of people of color, women, and younger generations.

In 2022, 89% of Super Bowl ads featured one or more underrepresented groups and 40% of ads had three or more groups represented. While there was greater racial representation, other groups including LGBTQ+ and people with disabilities are still underrepresented in lead roles, as well as inclusion of women, Kantar said.

“Having more diversity in Super Bowl advertising is part of a larger trend where brands are participating more in social and cultural dialogue — which is what consumers want,” Kantar creative solutions lead Kerry Benson said. “This new brave and purpose-oriented world requires brands to lean into an expanded sphere of social dialogue, which may require a point of view about politically polarizing subjects or pre-existing controversies.” ■

YouTube on Tuesday said it launched AdBlitz, its sight were viewers can find this year’s Super Bowl commercials.

A large number of advertisers either tease or preview their Super Bowl campaigns, and YouTube has proved a popular place to do that. 

Hyundai’s Super Bowl spots and the NFL’s are already available on AdBlitz. 

Also Read: NFL, Google Announce 'NFL Sunday Ticket' Is Coming to YouTube TV, YouTube Primetime Channels

Last year, according to a Comscore statistic cited by YouTube, YouTube reached 77% of adults with a Super Bowl ad, compared to 72% for TV.

“We’re excited to bring our Super Bowl campaign back to AdBlitz again this year as the program provides us with an innovative way to reach our current and next generation of fans,” said Blake Stuchin, VP  and Head of NFL Digital Media Business Development. “The NFL and YouTube partnership continues to grow and create new touchpoints for fans – from highlights every week of the season, to original shows like the Emmy-winning Game Day All-Access, to NFL Sunday Ticket coming exclusively to YouTube starting in the 2023 season.”

YouTube said it provides Super Bowl advertisers with tools that drive awareness, relevance and conversions.  ■

Last year, Hyundai ran a month-long AdBlitz campaign before and  after the Super Bowl. AdBlitz generated  more than 247 million impressions. 

“The Super Bowl is one of the most-watched televised events in the world. That said, the landscape has changed. In order to connect with our audience, we need to evolve and explore different ways to ensure our brand is front and center. That’s where YouTube comes in,” said Hyundai Super Bowl Angela Zepeda.  ■

On the eve of Super Bowl LVII, Fox Sports will air a new documentary saluting 10 football icons who have won both the Heisman Trophy and were elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The documentary, The Perfect 10, debuts February rings together seven of the 10 athletes -- Marcus Allen, Tim Brown, Earl Campbell, Tony Dorsett, Barry Sanders, Roger Staubach, and Charles Woodson -- who have achieved the rare dual accomplishment in football. O.J. Simpson, Paul Hornung and Doak Walker round out the "perfect 10" list. 

Actor Andre Braugher narrates the 90-minute documentary, according to Fox Sports.

“Fox Sports is thrilled to present audiences with the captivating and inspiring stories behind these legendary football icons while celebrating their individual legacies as we head into Super Bowl Sunday,” said Fox Sports Vice President of Development & Original Programming Barry Nugent said in a statement. “We are delighted to be working with renowned actor Andre Braugher who graciously lent his powerful voice to bring each of these athletes personal and professional achievements to light.”

The Perfect 10 is executive produced by Brown, Woodson and Nugent, along with Eric Shanks, Mark Silverman and Charlie Dixon.■

With two more games left in the 2022 FIFA World Cup, Fox Sports Digital is already looking to shift focus from its unprecedented and successful coverage of the soccer tournament to future big Fox Sports events. 

Fox’s World Cup coverage — led by its FIFA World Cup NOW pre- and post-match series for every tournament game — has garnered record usage across Fox Sports’s app, website and social media platforms, executives said. While digital live-game coverage was available only to subscribers of a multichannel video programming distributor (MVPD) or virtual MVPD service, nearly one-third of all Fox Sports digital app downloads came during the last three weeks, according to Fox Sports senior VP of digital Michael Bucklin.

“Even if you removed all World Cup content from our app, almost every day over the last two weeks would have been a record traffic day,” he said. “That new exposure for so many fans who came to us for our World Cup coverage but learned about our NFL and college football coverage will pay dividends for our upcoming NASCAR, USFL and college basketball coverage as we look to serve fans better digitally.”

Also: Fox Sports’s World Cup Coverage Plays on Broadcast and Cable Field

Bucklin said Fox’s exclusive English-language rights to the World Cup has helped push fans to its digital offerings to get up-to-the-minute information, statistics and highlights from the tournament. 

“Unlike many other sports, we are the only ones people can turn to get that action and those live rights from those matches,” he said. “What we saw our task being is to maximize that gift of live, exclusive rights by providing every single goal, big save and big moment in under 5 minutes from when they happen on our website, app and social-media page.”

The result has been unprecedented use of the digital platform. FIFA World Cup NOW, a 20-minute digital pre- and post-match show for every game of the tournament, had generated a total of 79 million views through the semifinal round games — the most-viewed original project ever developed by the group, Fox Sports said.

Bucklin added that digital viewing and usage continued to grow even as some of the biggest and most popular teams, including the U.S., were eliminated. The December 9 lineup of games that included Brazil’s loss to Croatia generated as much traffic on its digital platforms as did the November 25 lineup of games that included the U.S.-England matchup, Bucklin said. The December 10 Morocco-Portugal post-show was the most-watched show of the tournament, he added, with 1.6 million viewers.  

Also: Despite U.S. Loss, Fox Sports Expects World Cup to Keep Surging

Fox Digital’s World Cup experience will better help the group shape its offering for other big events across multiple sports, including Fox’s February 12 coverage of Super Bowl LVII.

“The novelty of the World Cup is hard to replicate, so we want to bring some of that passion as producers for events that we have ahead of us, including the [NFL] NFC championship [game], the Super Bowl, the Big East Tournament, Daytona 500 and the Women’s World Cup next summer,” Bucklin said. “We want to try to instill that into everything that we do that we want to own and dominate in the future.” ■ 

The National Football League said that Apple has signed a long-term deal to be the sponsor of the Super Bowl halftime show, replacing Pepsi, which was part of the big game for 10 years.

The musical extravaganza will promote Apple Music.

Financial terms were not disclosed. Published reports estimated the price tag at $50 million annually.

The halftime show, which has featured performers ranging from Prince to U2 to Jennifer Lopez and Shakira, is typically the most-watched music performance of the year, occasionally sparking controversy a la Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake.

Last year’s acclaimed show featured classic rappers Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar and 50 Cent. More than 120 million viewers tuned in and the show won three Creative Emmy Awards.

“We are proud to welcome Apple Music to the NFL family as our new partner for the iconic Super Bowl Halftime Show,” Nana-Yaw Asamoah, senior VP of partner strategy for the NFL said. “We couldn't think of a more appropriate partner for the world's most-watched musical performance than Apple Music, a service that entertains, inspires, and motivates millions of people around the world through the intersection of music and technology.”

Apple has been moving into the TV sports business with its Friday Night Baseball doubleheaders. It is also a contender for the NFL’s Sunday Ticket out-of-market package.

“Music and sports hold a special place in our hearts, so we’re very excited Apple Music will be part of music and football's biggest stage,“ Oliver Schusser, Apple's VP of Apple Music and Beats, said. “We’re looking forward to even more epic performances next year and beyond with the Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show.” ■

With the new season about to kick off, commercials in National Football League games are selling out earlier than ever, with spots in the Super Bowl already nearly gone at prices topping a record $7 million.

Network sales execs this year’s haul from NFL games -- TV’s highest rated programming -- should top the $4.43 billion generated during the 2021-22 season.

Also: New Nielsen Study for NFL Finds 208 Million Watched Super Bowl LVI

As viewers shift to streaming, sports remain one of the few places on traditional TV where advertisers can reach large audiences. So instead of waiting till after upfront entertainment deals are done, sponsors began snapping up NFL inventory ahead of the network presentations in May, Mark Evans, executive VP of ad sales for Fox Sports, told Broadcasting+Cable.

“Coming out of the upfront, we found ourselves over 90% sold for the full year,” Evans said. “We typically come out of the upfront market about 80% to 85% sold.”

Demand was particularly strong for special games on Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day.

Evans declined to talk about price increases, but a source familiar with the situation said Fox was getting increases ranging from high single digits to low single digits on a cost-per-thousand viewers (CPM) basis.

Fox, which also has the FIFA World Cup and baseball's World Series coming up, is looking at a big football postseason as the first network in 40 years to carry two Wild Card playoff games, two NFC Divisional Playoff Games, the NFC Championship Game and the Super Bowl.

Sponsors are enthusiastically buying up spots in Super Bowl LVII. Usually, most Super Bowl sales take place after the start of the season, in September and October. This year, Super Bowl deals were done in concert with upfront deals. “That was very different for us,” Evans said. “We’re months ahead of where we typically are.”

Immediately after the upfront, Fox had 90% of its Super Bowl inventory sold, he said. Now its up to about 95% with just a handful of units still available. The good news for prospective advertisers is that Fox still has spots available in both the first half and the second half of the game, giving sponsors more flexibility. 

Again, Evan’s declined to discuss price, but sources said 30-second commercials were going for more than $7 million, up from the $6.5 million NBC received for its highest-priced  commercials in the February 2022 Super Bowl. 

Also: Fox Super Bowl Ads Getting Record Prices: Lachlan Murdoch

"We feel excellent about what we’ve sold, the pricing structure and how we’ve managed our inventory,” Evans said, adding he has warned potential advertisers that the price of Super Bowl ads will only rise. As far as the remaining spots go, “we’re open for business and we’ll transact for a deal that makes sense.”

For the Super Bowl, Verizon will be Fox’s halftime sponsor. (Pepsi has pulled out as sponsor of the NFL’s halftime musical performance. No replacement has been announced.) 

Sellout levels are also high for Fox’s Super Bowl pre-game programming. Some of the half hours have presenting sponsors and a vast majority of those are already gone, with just two half-hours still available.

All in, Super Sunday is expected to generate upwards of $500 million for Fox.

Sean Hanrahan, senior VP, Disney Advertising Sports Brand Solutions, says Monday Night Football spots on ESPN are also well sold at this point. 

”Sell-throughs are tremendous, with double-digit price increases,” Hanrahan said. “We’re happy to have the Manning-cast back again. That was a big hit for us last year,” he added, referring to the simulcast on ESPN2 featuring Peyton Manning, his brother Eli Manning and special guests.

On Monday Night Football, Target is the new sponsor of the half-time highlights that lead into the start of the third quarter. Progressive returns as the pre-kickoff programming sponsor. Subway is back as the sponsor for the Countdown show leading into MNF and Snickers is back for Sunday night’s NFL Countdown.

Evans said Fox’s regular season sales were bolstered by adding 28 new advertisers who hadn’t bought the NFL on Fox last year. Those advertisers generated more than $100 million of new business for the NFL on Fox. 

The bulk of Fox’s NFL sales remain in familiar categories, such as insurance, technology and autos. But there were also some categories registering double-digit increases, up as much as 30%. Those include travel and entertainment, with theatrical films and streaming services spending big, and the dining category also up strongly.

Given the run on NFL inventory, Evans said he’s seeing more clients looking to strike multi-year deals. ■

Commercials in February’s Super Bowl are pacing ahead of schedule and attracting record pricing, according to Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch.

Last year, NBC Sports sold 30-second commercial for as much as $6.5 million.

Speaking on Fox’s fourth-quarter earnings call Wednesday, Murdoch said that the despite the “chatter around advertising headwinds … we are currently not seeing an adverse advertising impact on our business.”

During the upfront market, advertising commitments for the 2022-23 broadcast year were up 15% from last year’s upfront, Murdoch said, with price increases on a cost-per-thousand viewer (CPM) basis in the high single to the low-double-digit range.

Fox increased the amount of inventory it sold in the upfront from the traditional 70% range to the low to mid 80% level, Murdoch said, in order to gain more certainty.

He said the upfront totals exclude the Super Bowl, but noted that Fox sold more advertising for its Sunday NFL games this year than it did last year for its Sunday and Thursday Night Football games combined.

Murdoch said pricing was particularly strong for cable, as sellout levels increased for Fox Entertainment and more incremental dollars went into the Tubi streaming service.

At Fox’s local stations, base advertising sales were stable, Murdoch said, with the company seeing a return to growth in the auto category.

“This provides a good foundation for the upcoming political cycle,” Murdoch said. “In the fourth fiscal quarter, political ad sales were three times larger than during the last presidential election in 2020 — a record year for political advertising.”

He said this year’s midterm elections are “certain” to surpass the 2020 political revenue generated by the Fox stations.

“We are seeing an unprecedented wave of political spending, which accelerates as we head toward November,” he said.  ■

An analysis of ads run on NBCUniversal brands by iSpot.tv indicated that "advertisers today are underinvesting in streaming" and missing out on valuable audiences, iSpot.tv CEO Sean Muller told B+C business editor Jon Lafayette in a keynote at the recent Advanced Advertising Summit in Los Angeles.

The measurement firm's "test and learn" experiment with NBCU found that streaming outlets got about 10% of a campaign's ads on average, when a more optimal level would be 30%-40%, Muller said at the June 7 event. "You get a lot more reach against younger demographics and at lower frequencies," Muller said. 

Also: NBCU Says 30%-40% of Campaigns Should be OTT Based on iSpot.tv Data 

Separately, Comcast recently estimated that the optimal portion of the ad spend on streaming was 20%-30%, and said returns declined beyond a 40% share.

Muller also read out some stats from iSpot.tv's measurement of Olympics, Super Bowl and March Madness college basketball that showed the importance of cross-screen measurement of viewing of big events. For the Beijing Winter Olympics, for example, iSpot.tv measured 27.4 million viewers on streaming, and 65.9% of them only watched the games on streaming. Super Bowl LVI in February had 10.4 million average viewer minutes, and 70% of them were cord cutters. March Madness drew 12.3% of its audience from streaming (68% of those only watched on streaming). 

"It's important to get cross screen right and it's important to [deduplicate] these audiences," Muller said.

There were 31.7 million out of home viewers for the Beijing games, 12.5 million for the Super Bowl and 40.6 million for March Madness, he said.

Putting in a plug for measuring ad ratings separately, as iSpot.tv does, Muller said the most watched ad in the Super Bowl (an NFL ad during halftime) had a 22% bigger audience than the least watched ad, which is a big swing during a game that has a fairly steady audience throughout. 

Muller also noted that iSpot.tv was the first to report an audience figure for the Super Bowl (150 million) and didn't revise the number later, while Nielsen revised its number twice as more data became available. The iSpot.tv database is smart-TV centric, bolstered with panel data, census data and set-top box data, he said.

Muller said iSpot.tv was able to attract a recent $325-million investment from Goldman Sachs Asset Management because the audience measurement field is a $10 billion industry and is in flux with new developing technologies and changing viewer dynamics. Those conditions also led to private equity interests buying industry Nielsen for $16 billion, he said.

"This space is great," Muller said, unlike the music business where he started his career. 

The Advanced Advertising Summit was part of L.A. TV Week. The next Advanced Advertising Summit will be held in September in New York City as part of Fall TV Week. ■

NBCUniversal reported higher profits in the first quarter despite continued losses from Peacock as the Super Bowl and Olympics generated big revenue numbers.

Parent company Comcast said NBCUniversal’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization rose 7.4% to $1.6 billion, including losses from Peacock.

The Peacock losses were $456 million in revenue of $472 million, compared to a $277 million loss a year ago in revenue of $91 million.

Also: Brian Roberts Says Peacock Had ‘Exceptional’ Quarter

Revenues rose 46.6% to $19.296 million with theme parks making a comeback and NBC airing the Olympics and Super Bowl in the quarter. 

Media EBITDA was $1.159 billion, down 21.3%.

The Olympics generated $963 million in revenue and the Super Bowl brought in $519 million. 

Excluding the Olympics and the Super Bowl, media revenue was up 5.9% to $5.383 million, compared to a 36.3% jump to $6.865 including those events.

Distribution revenue was up 21.6%, partly because of the Olympics.

Comcast Cable said its residential video customers fell to 17.011 million from 18.590 a year ago. Residential broadband customers increased to 29.836 million from $28.774 million.

Net income rose 6.6% to $3.549 billion, or 78 cents a share, from $3.329 billion, or 71 cents a share, a year ago.

Revenue rose 14% to $31 million.

“2022 is off to a great start. For the first quarter we reported healthy growth in adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EPS, generated significant free cash flow, and increased our return of capital to shareholders. We also continued to make important organic investments and strategic decisions, highlighted by yesterday’s announcement of our new joint venture with Charter,” said CEO Brian Roberts.

“Our media business is performing well, and the scale of our reach is underscored by our successful broadcast of the Super Bowl and the Olympics in the same week. These events were viewed by more than 200 million people in the U.S. across NBCUniversal’s platforms, including Peacock, which had an exceptional quarter,” Roberts said.

Roberts said the Charter venture “demonstrates the benefits of our focus on innovation and enables us to bring entertainment aggregation and streaming products that run off our global technology platform to millions more customers.” ■

Linear TV advertising sales slowed in February, leaving year-to-date linear TV investments up 6% so far this year compared to last year, according to Standard Media Index.

In January, linear TV sales were up 9%.

But sales remain down from 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. Compared to 2020, linear television ad sales are down 6% so far this year.

Broadcast TV sales are up 17% so far this year, offset by a 4% decline in cable. SMI said that TV sales were boosted by the Olympics, NFL Playoffs and Super Bowl LVl. So far, 2022 has been the best year ever for broadcast dollars.

That made Comcast NBCUniversal, which carried those big sports events, a big winner. Comcast media revenue was up 139% in February, topping Google in the ad revenue tracked by SMI. Google was up 13%. Disney was down 10%, Facebook was up 16% and Paramount was down 59% after having the Super Bowl on CBS in February 2021.

Comcast’s share of ad dollars was 18%, followed by Google at 12%, The Walt Disney Co. at 7%, Facebook at 6% and Paramount at 5%.

Across all media, ad investment rose 15% year over year in February, leaving it up 17% so far in 2022.

So far this year, digital advertising is up 26% and accounts for 51% of all ad dollars.

Out of home jumped 116%, radio was up 16% and newspapers showed a 12% gain.

Magazines are down 27% so far this year.

SMI gets its figures from the invoices at all of the major holding companies and most major independents, representing 95% of national brand ad spending. ■

The National Football League and Nielsen said that a new study they collaborated on estimates that more than 208 million people watched Super Bowl LVI, a number 25% higher than the 167 million unique viewers who watched at least one minute of the  game based on Nielsen’s previous report.

The new study was designed to better understand how many people watched the big game in group settings, Nielsen and the NFL said.

The new number would indicate that two-thirds of the entire population of the U.S. watched the game on February 13.

Also: Analysis: Super Bowl Could Kick Off Media Measurement Multiverse Mess

A custom survey of 6,600 households, conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago using the AmeriSpeak panel, examined the size of viewing groups at any location and to what extent those groups are larger than that which is measured today.

Super Bowl Watched by 150 Million People Across Platforms: iSpot.TV

“While it’s no secret that the Super Bowl is the biggest event across the media landscape on a yearly basis, the exact number of people watching the game has been challenging to pinpoint given the fact that people tend to gather in groups to watch the game,“ NFL chief data and analytics officer Paul Ballew said. “We’re grateful for the work put into this custom survey by Nielsen, the results of which we feel provide the most accurate picture to date of the total viewership for this unique event.”

Nielsen normally measures out-of-home in locations such as bars and restaurants across about 65% of the United States and its co-viewing measurement covers groups of up to 16 people in households across the entire country. This viewing is included in Nielsen’s national ratings numbers.

“We recognize that the Super Bowl is a truly unique watching experience. While we are confident in our measurement which is the gold standard for the industry, we are always looking for ways to more strongly collaborate with our clients to better understand who may be watching, and how they may be watching,” said Jon Stainer, Nielsen sports managing director for the Americas. “We have worked closely with the NFL for years and performed other similar studies to better understand who may be tuning in to the largest TV event every year.” ■

Sunday was a big day for AMC Networks’ AMC Plus ad-free direct-to-consumer service.

AMC Networks ran an ad in the Super Bowl highlighting the programming on AMC Plus, including upcoming conclusion of popular series like The Walking Dead, Better Call Saul and Killing Eve, as well as new series like Interview with the Vampire. 

AMC Plus subscribers got early access to the first episode of part 2 of the final season of The Walking Dead starting Super Sunday. The episode will appear on AMC Networks this Sunday.

AMC said that in the first three days it was available, the new Walking Dead episode became the most-watched episode of any series on AMC Plus to date.

The company said “this week’s episode also becomes the #1 season launch for customer acquisition, with double-digit growth from the prior season.” Maybe that means AMC Plus had a record number of sign ups. Maybe not.

On Monday during its earnings call with analysts, AMC Networks said its group of streaming services ended the year with more than 9 million subscribers, up 50% year over year. Interim CEO Matt Blank, said that by the end of the year, AMC would be halfway toward reaching its 2025 target of 20 million to 25 million subscribers.

CFO Christina Space said the company expected to add 400,000 to 500,000 net subscribers in the first quarter of 2022.

The Super Bowl ad is part of AMC Networks’ ramped up marketing effort.

“One of the things you are going to see in addition to the aggressive pursuit of subscribers for our streaming services as we begin the year with our best content in history, you are going to see us doing a lot of marketing to support that content and support the brands that we offer as a backdrop to all of the directed specialized marketing we do in the streaming world,” Blank said on the earnings call. “So, the Super Bowl spot was one part of it. I think that with the type of content we have this year, that was an important opportunity to kind of take advantage of that content and get our message out more broadly to consumers.” 

“For the Super Bowl ad, we felt it was important for AMC Plus, as an extension of our linear business, to let consumers know, to let audiences know that the final episodes, the final seasons of franchises like The Walking Dead, Better Call Saul, Killing Eve are now going to be premiered on AMC Plus,” added Miquel Penella, president of streaming services for AMC Networks.

“But that is not typically what we do to acquire customers,” Penella added. “What we do to acquire customers follows a very disciplined approach that includes creating audience profiles and really targeting our marketing campaigns based on our understanding of the consumer's lifetime value and with a very specific target for the cost per acquired customer. And that’s something that we do systematically in a disciplined manner, and we manage it on a daily basis.” ■

With Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Mary J. Blige, Eminem, Kendrick Lamar and 50 Cent performing, the half-time show was one of the most-watched parts of this year’s Super Bowl.

Fans couldn’t get enough of the hip-hop legends and many flocked to music video service Vevo, which saw big increases in viewing on Sunday and Monday.

Viewing of Dr. Dre’s catalog increased by six times the day of the Super Bowl halftime compared to an average of the prior 10 Sundays and seven times more views the day after compared to the previous 10 Mondays.

Also: Music Video Service Vevo’s VOD App Launched on Google, Android TV Devices

Snoop Dogg’s videos got four times the viewing on Super Bowl Sunday compared to the previous 10 Sundays and he got a nine times bump on Monday.

Dr. Dre’s Still Dre featuring Snoop Dogg was the most-viewed music video across TV and video in both Vevo’s rap/hip-hop category and for its 90s collection following the halftime show. The next day, viewing was nine times higher than average.

The Super Bowl boost took Still Dre over the 1 billion views mark just before his birthday on Friday.

Also: Vevo Drops Needle on Holiday Channels For Viewers, Sponsors

The other performers also saw significant increases.

Kendrick Lamar was up 181% on Sunday and 159% on Monday. Eminem got a 55% lift on Sunday and 67% on Monday. Mary J. Blige views grew 129% on Sunday and 125% on Monday and 50 Cent got a 80% boost on Sunday followed by a 162% lift on Monday.

Rap and hip-hop content got a 14% lift the day after the show, Vevo said.

Some of the biggest boost came in California home of the champion L.A. Rams and where the game was played, and in Ohio, where the Cincinnati Bengals play.

"Across the Vevo network, we regularly see an uptick in viewership of certain music videos around major pop culture events, such as the halftime show at the Super Bowl. This year's performance particularly tapped into nostalgia from the 90s and 2000s, as well as hip-hop culture," said JP Evangelista, senior VP of content, programming and marketing at Vevo.

"The halftime show also created much social buzz afterwards, especially between Gen Xers and Millennials, with each generation claiming representation and ownership of this moment. All of this drives tune-in to each performer's respective music videos on Vevo, and these viewership lifts are a testament to the cultural relevance and influence of music videos. We're proud to be the home of powerful music video content that people want to relive over and over," Evangelista said. ■

The Super Bowl drew an average TV audience of 101.1 million viewers, according to Nielsen, up 5% from a year ago.

NBC, combining data from several sources, said the close contest between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals had a total audience delivery of 112.3 million viewers and reached 167 million viewers -– making it the most watched show in five years. In addition to NBC and Telemundo the game was viewed on Peacock, NBC Sports Digital, NFL Digital platforms and Yahoo Sports mobile properties.

Also: Super Bowl Watched by 150 Million People Across Platforms: iSpot.TV

NBC had an average audience of more than 99 million viewers. That includes out-of-home viewing and Nielsen’s Digital in TV Ratings data.

Telemundo, NBCUniversal’s Spanish-language network, drew 1.907 million views on its own.

Last year’s game was watched by 91.6 million people on CBS, according to Nielsen, which was the lowest number since 2006. Adding in streaming services and mobile phone apps took total viewing of Super Bowl LV to 96.4 million. 

“The Super Bowl once again delivered a massive audience, which included NBC and the unmatched power of broadcast television as well as first-ever presentations on Peacock and Telemundo, and led into our most-watched Olympics coverage in four years,” said Mark Lazarus, chairman, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming.

According to Nielsen, the game had a preliminary 37 U.S. household rating and was viewed in an average of 45 million homes. Nielsen said that about 72% of U.S. homes with television in use were tuned into the game.

The top top metered market for the Super Bowl was Cincinnati, with a 46.1 rating and 84 share. Los Angeles, home of the victorious Rams, was not in the top 10. ■ 

Super Bowl LVI was watched by 150 million people on TV and streaming platforms, according to iSpot.TV, a measurement company being used as an alternative to Nielsen by NBCUniversal.

The game had an average minute audience of 121 million viewers, with 56% of U.S. households watching all or some of the telecast on NBC, Telemundo and Peacock.

iSpot's average audience numbers beat Nielsen's calculation of an average audience of 101.1 million viewers. Last year’s game had an average audience of 91.6 million viewers on CBS, according to Nielsen. Adding in viewers on other platforms raised the Nielsen count of the game a year ago to 96.4 million.

Also: Super Bowl Draws More Than 101 Million Viewers: Nielsen

Linear viewership of Super Bowl LVI averaged 98.1 million viewers per minute, according to iSpot, with total in-home reach of 134.5 million on NBCU networks. NBC had 131.6 million viewers and Telemundo added 2.9 million viewers.

Streaming averaged 10.5 million viewers per minute, and 15.5 million total viewers. iSpot worked with Conviva to get sensor level data about connected TV, mobile and tablet consumption.

Also: Men Paid More Attention to Super Bowl Ads Than to the Game: TVision

The out-of-home average audience for the Super Bowl was 12.5 million, as measured by Tunity Analytics, another iSpot partner.

The average Super Bowl ad reached 106 million viewers. The game generated 4.39 billion verified household ad impressions across all platforms in 216 minutes.

Working with iSpot, NBC and its advertisers are getting data about the commercials that usually aren’t available for weeks.

Also: Super Bowl Commercial Prices Increase 5%, SMI Reports

During the game, the commercial attention rate was 36% higher than the average across all networks and shows on Sunday. The commercial completion rate was 98.6%. 

Viewership peaked during the halftime show featuring hip-hop legends Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar and Eminem, getting a 12% bump.

Ads running during the halftime show generated an average audience of 116.8 million verified impressions for in-home viewing.

Also: NBCU Puts iSpot in Lead as It Evaluates Measurement Companies

The NFL’s animated two-minute commercial during the halftime show had the highest in-home audience, seen by 19 million viewers.

NBC is also broadcasting the Olympics and over the course of all of Sunday, NBCU-owned networks accounted for 69% of all household ad impressions for the day, iSpot.TV said.

Another data company, Samba TV, said that 36 million U.S. households watched the Super Bowl, up 12% from last year. 

“In Q4 of 2021, every one of the top five television programs was an NFL game, and that momentum helped linear TV notch its first ratings increase since 2020,” said Cole Strain, head of measurement for Samba TV. “We saw that same momentum and excitement for the NFL carry over to this year’s match-up between the Rams and the Bengals, with the NFL continuing its ratings winning streak gaining Super Bowl viewership year over year by 12%, reaching 36 million households.”

Samba also found the game’s halftime show to be a big audience draw, watched by 29 million households, up 19% from last year.

“The powerhouse performances from Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem, Mary J. Blige and 50 Cent rocked the ratings on Sunday night, shattering last year’s halftime audience drawing in millions of more viewers across both linear television and streaming,” said Strain. ■ 

Men paid more attention to the commercials that aired during Super Bowl LVl than to the game between the Rams and the Bengals, according to research from TVision Insights.

Among men, attention to commercials registered a 126.7 index number, compared to 125.7 for the program. Men also paid more attention to the ads than women viewers did, by 126.7 to 120.3. (One hundred represents the normal amount of viewer attention.)

TVision also said that more viewers streamed the Super Bowl than ever before, with 33.65% watching the game via connected TV or other devices. That’s up 64% from last year game.

Also: Super Bowl Commercial Prices Increase 5%, SMI Reports

The commercials that generated the most attention were The Cable Guy spot for Verizon, the LeBron James ad for Crypto.com, the Super Charged Seth ad for Wallbox, the G.O.A.T. spot for Disney Plus and the NFL’s “Live Ball” spot.

TVision noted that the halftime show featuring hip hop legends Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, 50 Cent and Kendrick Lamar captured more attention than ever before.

Also: AMC Networks Runs Super Bowl Spot With Highlights from AMC Plus

The attention index for the halftime show was 141.2, compared to 110.1 last year and 123.2 for 2020.

Viewers in the 25-34 and 35-49 age ranges paid more attention to halftime than to the game itself. ■ 

AMC Networks bought a Super Bowl spot to show off the shows coming to its AMC Plus premium streaming service.

The 30-second spot provides a first look at the new series Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire.

It also had clips from the final seasons of Better Call Saul, Killing Eve and The Walking Dead.

The spot featured voiceovers from Giancarlo Esposito from Better Call Saul.

AMC Plus was launched in 2020 and costs $8.99 a month, but AMC is offering a 33% discount this weekend.

Also: AMC Networks ‘On Track’ To Meet Streaming Subscriber Goals

NBC said 30-second spots in the Super Bowl sold for as much as $7 million.

The commercials are a big part of the Super Bowl experience, and many viewers go online to rewatch the spots.

According to Google, the most watched ads online during Sunday through 10 p.m. were:

1: Amazon -- Amazon’s Big Game Commercial: Mind Reader

2: T-Mobile -- Zach Braff and Donald Faison Sing a Duet for Home Internet | T-Mobile

3: Hyundai USA -- History of Evolution | IONIQ 5 | Hyundai ***This ad did not run during the Super Bowl but raked in game day views, demonstrating the power of digital!

4: Universal Pictures -- Jurassic World Dominion - Official Trailer [HD]

5: NOPE -- NOPE - Official Trailer

6: T-Mobile -- Miley Cyrus Sings a Song for 5G Phones | T-Mobile

7: Nissan -- Nissan Presents: Thrill Driver

8: Booking.com (Booking Holdings) -- Booking.com I Idris Elba says things | 2022 big game ad

9: Rakuten -- High Stakes | Rakuten's Big Game Commercial Extended Cut

10: BMW -- Zeus & Hera | BMW USA (Official Video)

The Super Bowl is here and so are the ads.

NBC, which aired Super Bowl LVI Sunday, February 13, sold spots for as much as $7 million, averaging, according to Standard Media Index, $4.8 million per ad.

Advertisers brought the star power this year.

From Jim Carrey reprising his role as the Cable Guy to Seth Rogen and Paul Rudd shilling for Lay's, take a look at some of the commercials that aired during the big game.

This weekend’s lineup of TV sports events begins at arguably the biggest sporting event of the year, Super Bowl LVI. NBC’s telecast of Sunday’s NFL Championship matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Los Angeles Rams is expected to be the most watched television event of 2022.

Following the Super Bowl, NBC will air live coverage of the 2022 Winter Olympics, part of the NBC Sports’ weekend-long coverage of the games across such networks as USA Network and CNBC. The full schedule of Olympics events can be found here.

In other weekend sports action, ABC will continue its Saturday night primetime NBA telecasts with live coverage of the Los Angeles Lakers-Golden State Warriors game. The network on Sunday afternoon will televise the Atlanta Hawks-Boston Celtics contest. 

On the soccer field, NBC and Peacock will offer Saturday morning Premier League coverage, while FS2 on Saturday begins Club World Cup coverage. On the links, CBS and the Golf Channel will offer weekend coverage of the PGA Phoenix Open golf tournament. 

ESPN Plus will distribute the UFC 271 pay-per-view mixed martial arts event featuring a main event rematch between middleweights Israel Adesanya and Robert Whittaker. In the squared ring, DAZN will carry live the Daniel Jacobs-John Ryder super middleweight boxing match.

Saturday’s college basketball schedule features top-ranked Auburn battles Texas A&M on ESPN, second-ranked Gonzaga takes on No. 22 Saint Mary’s on ESPN2, and fourth-ranked Arizona travels to play Washington on Pac 12 Network. Other games include No. 5 Kentucky-Florida (ESPN) No. 6 Houston-Memphis (ABC), No. 7 Duke-Boston College (ACC Network), No. 8 Kansas-Oklahoma (CBS), No. 9 Texas Tech-TCU (Big 12 Network) and No. 10 Baylor-No. 20 Texas (ESPN2). On Sunday, third-ranked Purdue faces Maryland on CBS.

Commercials in Super Bowl LVI on NBC cost an average of $4.8 million, up 5% from last year’s game on CBS, according to preliminary data from Standard Media Index.

Last week, NBC said that it had sold out of its Super Bowl commercial inventory, and said it had gotten prices as high as $7 million.

SMI gets its data from the invoices in the computer systems in the major media buying agencies. But some of the highest prices are being paid by new advertisers, including direct-to-consumer marketers who don’t work with the big agencies.

Also: Amazon Buys Super Bowl Spot To Promote ‘Thursday Night Football’

NBC said there were more than 30 advertisers in this year’s game who weren’t in last year’s Super Bowl. Also a handful of spots were sold at the last minute–after the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals won their championship games.

Every year, the Super Bowl is the most-watched program on television and the commercials are widely discussed in living rooms and online before and after the game. ■

The anchors from NBCs Today show appear in a new public service announcement supporting girls pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) that will debut on Sunday before the Super Bowl.

The PSA, featuring Savannah Guthrie, Hoda Kotb, Al Roker, Craig Melvin and Carson Daly, is part of the Ad Council’s "She Can STEM" campaign.

In the spot Guthrie daydreams about herself and her fellow anchors in school together, thinking about what they want to be when they grow up.

The PSA also features STEM role models Tiffany Kelly, Mitu Khandaker and Karina Popovich, who are part of the AAAS IF/Then Ambassadors Program that encourages more young women to explore careers in science and technology.

“So many kids start off with big dreams, dreams that can help our world be more innovative, collaborative and cutting edge, but then they get discouraged along the way,” said Lisa Sherman, president and CEO of the Ad Council. “With the She Can STEM campaign we can show girls, non-binary youth, and trans youth that their passion in STEM can become a reality. We are so grateful for this extraordinary collaboration.”

The new PSA will debut between noon and 3 p.m. ET on NBC during Super Bowl Sunday. NBCUniversal donated airtime for the 30-second spot to air two times. Additionally, Today will feature the PSA in segments on Friday before the game and Monday, including a behind-the-scenes “making of the PSA” segment.

“We are honored to partner with the Ad Council and shine a spotlight on the impact of empowering girls and diverse individuals in their STEM journey. By combining compassion, creativity and credibility, this mission will be showcased on the biggest stage for millions of people across the country tuning in on Super Bowl Sunday,” said Linda Yaccarino, chair of global advertising and partnerships at NBCUniversal and current Board Chair of the Ad Council. “NBCUniversal is committed to reflecting diverse voices, representation, and action in our content and work with advertisers to bring that trusted content to our viewers. All over the world, what we share shapes culture, entertains people and informs them of today’s most critical topics.” 

The Ad Council worked with ad agency Deloitte Digital to create the PSA. ■

Attorney General Letitia James is warning consumers of streaming and social media to beware of ads from "deceptive online sports betting companies" during the Super Bowl.

Online sports betting only became legal in New York in January and James said New Yorkers have been bombarded with come-ons for "risk free bets" and "$1,000 welcome offers." Online sports book ads online and on-air have been bombarding the country at large of late with some big name actors and sports figures touting in-game betting, parlays and the like.

James said the free bet offers often come with strings attached that consumers may miss. She said that online sports betting companies whose ads mislead consumers "can expect to hear from my office."

James offered some tips: 1) "Learn what other users are saying about the platform"; 2) "Read the fine print on bonuses and other promotions"; and 3) "Beware of unexpected restrictions on accessing your account."

James also included links in her statement to the New York Council on Problem Gambling and Gamblers Anonymous. ■

Amazon Prime Video is looking forward to next football season with a Super Bowl spot for Thursday Night Football that reminds viewers how much they’ll miss the sports after the big game is over, the trophy has been awarded and the confetti has been cleaned up.

The spot hangs a “closed” sign on this football season, but looks ahead to when the NFL is open again. And each football weekend will start next season on Thursday nights, when Prime Video will launch its first season as the exclusive national carrier of the TNF franchise.

Also: NFL Quick Kick: ‘Thursday Night Football’ to Amazon in 2022

Prime Video is releasing its Super Bowl spot on Thursday via social media at @NFLonPrime and online at amazon.com/tnf.

NBC has said it has sold out its Super Bowl commercials, with some advertisers paying as much as $7 million for a 30-second spot.

Prime Video previously ballyhooed the new logo for Thursday Night Football.

With the games streaming, Prime Video is planning more interactive features, including NextGen stats and polls. Prime Video is also planning to create new pre-game, halftime and postgame shows. ■

Verizon is turning to a middling mid-1990s Jim Carrey comedy movie to spark sales of its hot new fixed wireless product, commissioning the actor to reanimate "Cable Guy" for a Super Bowl ad.

The 15-second spot, at the 9:16 mark of the Verizon video below showcasing the wireless company's numerous Super Bowl-related marketing activities this coming Sunday, reveals a leery woman approaching her front door after a knock from a man who identifies himself simply as, "cable guy!"

"Your internet will never be the same," said Diego Scotti, executive VP and chief marketing officer at Verizon, introducing the spot on LinkedIn Monday. 

Verizon reported an impressive 78,000 new signups of its new fixed wireless access (FWA) service in Q4, upping the customer base for the fledgling service to 228,000.

Verizon and T-Mobile are aggressively marketing FWA products in an effort to pull back some of cable's high-speed internet market share in the U.S., which currently stands at around 70%. 

Verizon said it spent $80 million upgrading its network in and around Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla., the site of last year's Super Bowl. It's unclear how much the wireless giant will spend in and around SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on Sunday. Prices for a 30-second spot on NBC are reportedly going for $6 million, up 9% over the 2021 game. 

As for The Cable Guy, it was directed by Ben Stiller and starred Matthew Broderick as a heart-broken young man whose problems are further compounded when he gets a tech visit from his cable company. The movie scored an aggregated 53% among critics and grossed just over $100 million at the global box office. ■

NBCUniversal said its broadcast of Super Bowl LVI is sold out across NBC, Telemundo and all digital platforms including Peacock, with only a handful of pre-game spots still remaining.

NBC said the game will set a record for the average price for a spot and that multiple 30-second spots sold for $7 million.

Every in-game advertiser will run spots on NBC, NBC streaming assets including Peacock and Telemundo.

Also: Amazon Buys Super Bowl Spot To Promote ‘Thursday Night Football’

“The NFL has never been stronger and has led us to new records this year,“ NBCU president, advertising and partnerships Mark Marshall said. “From Sunday Night Football to Football Night in America and through the nail-biting playoffs, we’ve seen an increased appetite for fans to watch the NFL across all our platforms.  

“This multiplatform consumption has attracted even more advertisers who have the desire for the immediate scaled reach of sports,“ Marshall added. ”And with the power of our One Platform, we’re able to utilize these major moments to maximize viewership and drive business impact for our advertising partners.” 

Also: Fox Is Selling 2023 Super Bowl Spots as Sports Ad Market Heats Up

Two weeks ago, NBC said it had a handful of Super Bowl spots to sell, but that it was holding those until the game’s matchup was decided to give last-minute advertisers a shot at the big game.

The Los Angeles Rams will be playing the Cincinnati Bengals.

NBC has also been busy selling ads in the Beijing Winter Olympics, which will be taking place before, after and during the Super Bowl. 

NBC said there were more than 30 advertisers in this year’s game who weren’t in last year’s Super Bowl. They represent about 40% of Super Bowl advertisers. The new advertisers are in 12 different categories, including automotive, technology and travel.

The categories showing the largest growth in this year’s Super Bowl, compared to last year’s game are automotive, technology, entertainment, travel and health and wellness. ■ 

Amazon has bought an ad in Super Bowl LVI to promote that it will be the exclusive national home of the NFL‘s Thursday Night Football franchise next season.

The commercial’s theme will be about the future of football and focus on the personalized experiences fans will be able to get on Amazon Prime Video, according to the platform's chief marketing officer, Ukonwa Ojo.

Those personalized features will include NextGen stats and polls.

She added that Amazon will position Thursday night as the beginning of the football week.

Prime Video is planning to create new pregame, halftime, and postgame shows around Thursday Night Football.

Amazon has been simulcasting Thursday Night Football since 2017, along with Fox (since 2018) and NFL Network. 

Amazon has been in the Super Bowl before, most recently to promote the original movie Coming 2 America with Eddie Murphy.

NBC, which will air the Super Bowl on February 13, has said it has only a few commercial stills available for sale. Some spots have sold for as much as $6.5 million. ■

The list of marquee TV sports events for the last weekend in January starts with the NFL Conference Championships.

On Sunday afternoon, CBS will televise the AFC Championship game between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Kansas City Chiefs, while later that evening Fox’s NFL Championship telecast will feature the San Francisco 49’ers and Los Angeles Rams. The winner of each game will meet in Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles on February 6, which will air live on NBC.

On the mixed martial arts front, Showtime on Saturday will televise live the Bellator 273 fight card featuring a main event heavyweight championship fight between Ryan Bader and Valentin Moldavsky.

ABC on Saturday will air a live primetime NBA game between the Brooklyn Nets and Golden State Warriors, while the NHL Network on Sunday will telecast the Seattle Kraken-New York Rangers hockey contest. 

ESPN on Saturday and Sunday morning will hit the tennis court for live coverage of the Australian Open women's and men's finals, respectively,  while on the auto racing track USA and NBC will offer weekend coverage of the IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship. On Saturday, FS1 will offer live coverage of the Professional Bowlers Tour’s Players Championship Finals. 

The weekend college basketball lineup features several top ten-ranked teams playing on Saturday, including No. 1 Auburn hosting Oklahoma on ESPN and No. 3 Arizona against Arizona State on CBS. ESPN will also televise fourth-ranked Baylor against Alabama and fifth-ranked Kansas versus 12th-ranked Kentucky. ESPN2 will air seventh-ranked Houston’s game against UCF. On Sunday, CBS carries No. 6 Purdue against No. 16 Ohio State.

With two of the biggest events in sports coming in February, NBCUniversal said it has commercials remaining to sell in Super Bowl LVI and still needs to do some work to meet its ad-sales goals for the Beijing Winter Olympics.

During a presentation on Wednesday, Dan Lovinger, who was recently promoted to president, NBCU Ad Sales and Partnerships, said Olympic sales were pacing “exactly the same” as they had before the Pyeongchang, South Korea, games four years ago.

“We still have some work to be done between now and the end of the games, but we feel really confident that we’re going to achieve all of our goals,” he said.

NBC has about 100 advertisers signed up for the games. Returning advertisers are spending slightly more than they did four years ago, “which seems to indicate that they have faith in the franchise and they’re happy to be back,” Lovinger said.

There are also about 40 new advertisers in the Olympics and digital revenue is up double digits.

He said that the U.S. diplomatic boycott of the games hasn’t had much of an effect on sponsors, who get a positive rub-off from supporting the games and the athletes.

On February 13, NBC will start the day with Olympic events, switch to Super Bowl pregame programming, show the championship game, then return to the Olympics--something that hasn't happened before.

In terms of the Super Bowl, there seemed to be little change in the situation since NBC last updated its sales progress in September, when a handful of spots remained unsold. 

“We tend to hold a few units in our back pocket until the final game matchup is announced,” Lovinger said. Some matchups create better opportunities for creative executions, he said. “That optionality is there and we’ll be able to react with the last few units.”

Since the last time NBC had the Super Bowl in 2018, prices per 30-second spot are up about 20%, he said. Units have sold for as much as $6.5 million.

“If you're looking to reach 100 million people in an evening. There's really only one place you can go and that's the Super Bowl,” he said.

Lovinger noted that NFL football has been strong this year, especially relative to other programming. The economy is holding up and consumers are confident. “When consumers consume, advertisers advertise,” he said.

This year, movie studios are advertising again. Gambling and crypto marketers are stepping up their activity and old standby categories such as automotive, quick-serve restaurants and beverages have been spending, he said.

In September, NBC said it had sold all but five spots for the Super Bowl and was holding onto those on purpose in order to find the best ways to monetize them.

NBC said it sold one 30-second commercial for $6.5 million.

Fox last year said it is taking advantage of the strong market by beginning to sell commercials in the Super Bowl it will broadcast in 2023. ■ 

Bel-Air, a drama inspired by ‘90s comedy The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, premieres on Peacock on Super Bowl Sunday, February 13. Will Smith executive produces. 

Peacock describes Bel-Air as being about “Will’s complicated journey from the streets of West Philadelphia to the gated mansions of Bel-Air. With a reimagined vision, Bel-Air will dive deeper into the inherent conflicts, emotions and biases that were impossible to fully explore in a 30-minute sitcom format, while still delivering swagger and nods to the original show.”

T.J. Brady and Rasheed Newson are co-showrunners. They executive produce, along with Morgan Cooper, Will Smith, Terence Carter, James Lassiter, Miguel Melendez, Malcolm Spellman, Quincy Jones, Benny Medina, and Andy & Susan Borowitz.

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which starred Will Smith, was on NBC 1990 to 1996. 

Universal Television and Westbrook Studios produce the show, which shoots in Los Angeles and Philadelphia. 

Jabari Banks plays Will, Adrian Holmes portrays Phillip Banks, Cassandra Freeman is Vivian Banks and Olly Sholotan plays Carlton Banks. 

NBC has the Super Bowl. It and Peacock are part of NBCUniversal. ■

FX and Hulu this November will chronicle performer Janet Jackson’s 2004 Super Bowl wardrobe malfunction in a new The New York Times Presents film debuting Nov. 19.

Malfunction: The Dressing Down of Janet Jackson, features rare footage and interviews with several people who were at the controls of the halftime show during Super Bowl XXXVIII when performer Justin Timberlake briefly revealed Jackson’s breast during the performance, FX said. The show examines the racial and cultural currents that collided on the Super Bowl stage, and explores how the incident impacted one of the most successful pop musicians in history. 

The film, which will premiere simultaneously on FX and Hulu, also features new reporting by the Times, as well as insights from music industry insiders, cultural critics and members of the Jackson family as it illuminates the extraordinary fallout, and former CBS CEO Les Moonves's role in it, said FX and Hulu. 

Malfunction: The Dressing Down of Janet Jackson is directed by Jodi Gomes, who also serves as a producer. Executive producers for The New York Times Presents are Ken Druckerman, Banks Tarver, Mary Robertson, Jason Stallman, Sam Dolnick and Stephanie Preiss.

Malfunction: The Dressing Down of Janet Jackson follows The New York Times Presents’ Controlling Britney Spears, the follow-up documentary to Framing Britney Spears that focused on the singer’s conservatorship battle. The New York Times Presents also produced The Killing of Breonna Taylor.

The National Football League announced that a group of hip hop legends will perform at halftime of the Super Bowl on Feb. 13.

Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige and Kendrick Lamar will appear together for the first time at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.

The halftime show is sponsored by Pepsi and will appear on NBC, Peacock and Telemundo.

“The opportunity to perform at the Super Bowl Halftime show, and to do it in my own backyard, will be one of the biggest thrills of my career,” Dr. Dre said. “I’m grateful to Jay-Z, Roc Nation, the NFL, and Pepsi as well as Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige and Kendrick Lamar for joining me in what will be an unforgettable cultural moment.”

“Artists like Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg were at the forefront of the West Coast hip hop revolution, so to be able to bring them back to LA, where it all began alongside Eminem, Mary J. Blige and Kendrick Lamar will prove to be an epic, unforgettable celebration of the impact hip hop has today,” said Todd Kaplan, pepsi Marketing VP.

“The Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show has become a landmark cultural moment, bringing about some of the most iconic performances over the years — from J-Lo and Shakira to Lady Gaga to The Weeknd — and we are thrilled to bring together such an incredible array of talented, record-breaking musicians to put on a performance for the ages,” Kaplan said.

The halftime show was put together for the third straight year by Roc Nation, founded by Jay-Z.

Comcast’s NBC Sports said it has seen strong demand for Super Bowl 56 and recently sold one 30-second commercial for $6.5 million.

NBC Sports Group executive VP for sales Dan Lovinger said that all but about five spots for the Super Bowl have been sold. NBC is holding off selling that last handful of ads on purpose.

“There’s plenty of interest in those units and we’re trying to find out the best ways to monetize those units,” Lovinger said.

For the past few years, Super Bowl spots have been selling in the $5.5 million range, excluding advertisers paid lower prices under long-term commitments.

The advertiser that paid $6.5 million for the Super Bowl spot also made a similar-sized commitment to other NBC properties, he added.

Lovinger said that NBC’s Sunday Night Football package is very well sold, with record setting price increases in the double-digit range in the upfront. The scatter market is also strong, with pricing 30% above upfront levels.

CBS Sports reported similiarly strong NFL sales for this season. Fox said it is taking advantage of the strong market by beginning to sell commercials in the Super Bowl it will broadcast in 2023.

Lovinger said that NBC’s other sports properties are also seeing strong demand.

Coming off the Tokyo Olympics, Lovinger said advertisers that saw strong returns on their Olympic investment were eager to tap those large, passionate audiences again. 

The Winter Olympics are virutally sold out, he said. and new requests for Winter Olympic inventor are being looked at on a case-by-case basis. 

NBC finds itself in a unique position because, for the first time, it is selling a Super Bowl that will air while one of its Olympics is going on. 

Also seeing good sales were NBC”s golf, auto racing and soccer packages.