Report: New Blockbusters, Volkswagen, Poppi, and Temu Win Most Effective Super Bowl LVIII Ads

EDO today released a complete ranking of national Super Bowl LVIII ads, awarding Disney’s Deadpool & Wolverine, Universal’s Wicked, and Volkswagen with the most effective spots of the night. EDO scored all Super Bowl LVIII ad airings from pre-kick to post-game to identify the top-performing spots across major categories including alcohol, automotive, sports betting, streaming, and more. The ranking, produced for the ninth year, is scored using real-time, consumer engagement data that is proven to predict business outcomes across categories.

“The Super Bowl is the pinnacle of TV advertising, offering brands an unmatched opportunity to captivate a mass audience and drive engagement behaviors that are most predictive of future sales,” said Kevin Krim, President & CEO, EDO. “Brand marketers know they need to drive awareness, consideration and loyalty, but they also know a high-stakes investment like the Super Bowl demands an outcome that predicts sales lift. This year, Volkswagen, Poppi, Dunkin’ and Hollywood studios can be confident that their ads will drive their businesses forward.”

MOST ENGAGING SUPER BOWL LVIII AIRINGS

According to EDO’s proprietary brand performance data, the top ten Super Bowl ads that drove the greatest online engagement include: 

1. Deadpool & Wolverine (Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures), Coming Together :15, generated +2,243% as much engagement as the median-performing Super Bowl LVIII in-game ad. 
2. Wicked: Part One (Universal Pictures), Afraid :60, +2,008%
3. Volkswagen, An American Love Story :60, +1,594%
4. Poppi, The Future of Soda is Now :60, +1,561%
5. Temu, Billionaire :30, +1,342%
6. Twisters (Universal Pictures), Chase It :30, +1,125%
7. Temu, Billionaire :30, +1,041%
8. He Gets Us, He Washed Feet :60, +942%
9. Robert F. Kennedy for President, Kennedy :30, +891%
10. Shogun (Hulu), Epic Event Promo :30, +639%

BIG GAME TRENDS

Super Bowl LVIII is only the second Big Game ever to go to overtime, and the competition was just as thrilling between the ad breaks. This year, brands reunited our favorite TV casts, tugged at our heartstrings with inspiring stories, and introduced new products with style that only the Super Bowl can bring.

Here are the five key trends that played out in the battle for Super Bowl ad effectiveness supremacy:

1. Foreign auto brands step into the void left by Detroit: The “big three” U.S. automakers sat out this year’s Super Bowl, but international competitors were happy to step up. All four auto advertisers at this year’s game drove more engagement than the median Super Bowl ad, led by Volkswagen’s nostalgia-fueled triumph that generated 1,594% more engagement than the median spot.
2. Temu proves the critics wrong with stellar ad engagement: Online retailer Temu ran the same, jingle-powered animated ad repeatedly throughout the game. While many critics panned the spot — which appeared six times from pre-kick through post-game — four of Temu’s airings placed in the game’s top 15 most effective spots. Its most impactful airing finished fifth in EDO’s rankings, generating 1,343% more engagement than the median Super Bowl ad.
3. Soft drink brands pop with new entrants at the Big Game: New and revived soda brands were oh-so-refreshing during a tense championship game. The health-conscious, prebiotic soft drink Poppi was the standout as the evening’s fourth most engaging ad, and Pepsi’s lemon-lime challenger brand Starry and Mountain Dew’s revived Baja Blast brand each generated more than twice as much engagement as the median Super Bowl ad.
4. Alcohol ads all but dry up after a heavy investment a year ago: AB InBev’s exclusive rights to the Super Bowl ended at last year’s game, and nine beer and liquor brands took the field in the new era of open play. Just four brands took the plunge this year — AB InBev’s Michelob Ultra, Bud Light, and Budweiser, and Molson Coors’ Coors Light. Budweiser led the pack by driving 84% more engagement than the median by bringing back the Clydesdales.
5. Nostalgia-driven TV reunions celebrate our streaming faves: Streaming is the new syndication, and brands played to our penchant for binging reruns by reuniting cast members from shows like 30 Rock (Booking.com), Scrubs (T-Mobile), Friends (Uber Eats), and Suits (e.l.f. and T-Mobile). Mountain Dew Baja Blast scored big by bringing together Aubrey Plaza and Nick Offerman from Parks & Recreation, generating 196% more engagement than the median Super Bowl ad.

Find EDO’s complete ranking of Super Bowl LVIII ads at EDO.com/SuperBowl. Learn how your brand stacked up against competitors by downloading EDO’s Share of Search infographics across 10+ categories.

How we rank the ads

For the ninth year, EDO has scored every Big Game ad based on incremental online activity for an advertised brand or product immediately following an ad airing. Each Super Bowl ad performance is indexed to the median-performing in-game spot, such that the median airing is scored at 100. Data in this release is preliminary and subject to slight adjustments based on EDO’s final Super Bowl analysis.