The Best Super Bowl 2023 Commercials We've Seen So Far

One of the more head-scratching ads of the night was in support of not just one brand, but two. Or three. Or maybe four? Marking the first Super Bowl ad for Miller Light and Coors Light in 30 years due to a contract stipulation with parent company AB InBev, the commercial purports to be for either one brand or the other, with a Coors Light guy and a Miller Light guy fighting it out in a bar. Of course, the ad is for both light beer brands, though a twist at the end makes it "officially" a commercial for Coors' craft brew imprint Blue Moon.

The spot itself is fine, but the most notable aspect is what came before: The ad's teaser was actually a commercial for online betting palace DraftKings, where you could visit the DraftKings site and place free bets on the number of people with facial hair who will appear in the ad, or what type of dog will be featured (if any), or which low-calorie beer brand will "win" at the end. It's an odd gambit but makes a certain amount of sense. People have been pitting Super Bowl ads against each other since seemingly the beginning of time (see the very story you are reading), so why not put some money on it?

One of the few athletes starring in a Super Bowl commercial this year is NFL legend, MLB outfielder, broadcaster, and coach Deion Sanders. In the ad, the man known as Prime Time hosts a family reunion cookout where his relatives show off various feats of strength, from his son and daughter crushing footballs and tackling each other to more superhuman acts, like Aunt Tracie knocking a football piñata into the sky and an elderly Sanders relative (Deion in old man makeup) breaking a picnic table with his bare hands.

What is the source of the Sanders family's phenomenal strength? Why, protein-packed Oikos yogurt, of course. The commercial is a follow-up to the Oikos Super Bowl commercial from 2022 that featured Deion and his son Shedeur (with an assist from Sanders matriarch Connie Knight). This year's ad continues the theme of the Sanders clan being incredibly strong thanks to their Oikos-centric diet while expanding the size and scope of the production.

Beer commercials and the Super Bowl go together like, well, beer and football, and this year has a full slate of flashy brewski ads. The most disappointing of the bunch is the one that seems to be trying the hardest. Busch Light's new campaign features actor Gerald Downey as the Busch Guy, a salt-and-pepper outdoorsman whose "Busch Guide" teaches you what you need to survive in the wilderness: Food, drink (specifically, ice cold Busch Light pulled from a mountain stream), and shelter.

At the mention of shelter, the flap on Busch Guy's tent opens to reveal Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan sitting with a wolf. The ad then pivots into a spoof of McLachlan's famous SPCA commercial before Busch Guy cuts in to remind her that he's talking about a different type of shelter. McLachlan deserves credit for lampooning her own performance (for a cause that she has long been passionate about), but the second half of the ad feels disconnected from the first, killing the overall experience.

Sometimes the Super Bowl is the stage for high-concept, mind-bending displays of promotional prowess. Sometimes, though, all you need is a wrestler-turned-surprisingly-good-comedy-actor and a song. That's the strategy taken by Experian this year, whose commercial is refreshingly simple, not just in execution but in its intent. Experian, you see, would like everyone to know that paying rent on time will improve your FICO score through its Boost program, and what better way to communicate that simple but important message than to have John Cena sing it at you.

The former WWE star and current DC anti-hero wakes up in his city apartment, so thrilled that it's the first of the month and rent is due that he breaks out into a musical number. Soon he is joined by other renters who are gleefully watching their credit scores rise thanks to Experian Boost. Cena's natural charisma works overtime to sell the ad as both a parody of peppy musical numbers and a tribute to them.

Despite the fact that it takes place so close to Valentine's Day, romantic Super Bowl commercials — and especially romantic Super Bowl beer commercials — are exceedingly rare. But this year, Bud Light is going down that exact route, presenting a charming slice of domestic life featuring Hollywood A-lister Miles Teller, his real-life wife Keleigh Sperry, their super-cute bulldog Bugsy, and arguably the most well-known hold music of all time.

As Keleigh waits on hold and Tim Carleton's "Opus No. 1" drones through her speaker, Miles comes to the rescue with a pair of Bud Lights and some impromptu dance moves. Soon, the couple are grooving to an updated take on the corporate music standard, dancing around their tastefully appointed living room and having such a good time that when a customer service rep finally answers the phone, they don't want the hold to end. It may sound saccharine on paper, but Teller and Sperry's chemistry is so infectious that it's hard to begrudge this beautiful, famous couple a moment of happiness.

If Rakuten is making a play for old millennials with its "Clueless" pitch, then Michelob Ultra is swinging straight for their older siblings and parents with a series of ads evoking the classic 1980 comedy, "Caddyshack." Former Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo steps into the droopy lip of Bill Murray's Carl Spackler, dreaming of fairway glory while whacking the buds off flowers. Meanwhile, boxer Canelo Alvarez tools around in Rodney Dangerfield's tricked-out golf cart (filled to the brim, of course, with Michelob Ultra), and Serena Williams takes on Brian Cox as Judge Smails, with original film star Michael O'Keefe on hand to offer advice.

Michelob Ultra's 2022 Super Bowl ad, the "Big Lebowski"-biting "Superior Bowl," had a similarly high-profile rollout, though the final product felt anticlimactic. Similarly, the big game featured two "Caddyshack"-themed spots that had been released more than a week before: the Williams-starring "New Members Day" and another that also served as an ad for the Netflix golf reality show "Full Swing." The three-minute extended "New Members Day" spot, available online, is the best of the bunch for fans of the original movie.

Samuel Adams Boston Lager has changed its formula, apparently. It's now brighter in hue. Whether that means that it tastes any different is unclear, nor is it very clear if the darkness of the beer was a problem that really needed to be solved. Nevertheless, the new and possibly-improved Sam Adams has inspired what is currently the frontrunner of best 2023 Super Bowl commercial — certainly the best commercial that has been released before the game.

The ad is a bigger, better entry in the long-running "Your Cousin from Boston" series. As Your Cousin (Gregory Hoyt) buys a pack of the new, brighter Sam Adams, he allows himself to dream of "A Brighter Boston," where all the aggressive stereotypes that Boston has cultivated over the years are upended. Suddenly, strangers are friendly on the street and gladly give up their parking spots. Red Sox and Yankees fans embrace warmly, and Celtics legend Kevin Garnett reads from his new book titled "Don't Talk Trash, Spread Love." Witnessing all of this, Your Cousin is shocked, bewildered, and amazed, but alas, it's just a beautiful dream — he's brought back to reality when his card is declined. The beer is still brighter, though.

Sometimes a commercial doesn't work because it was poorly planned and or executed, but sometimes an ad is doomed by forces beyond its control. Take this year's ad from phone and internet provider T-Mobile, which features their current spokesmen, Zach Braff and Donald Faison, singing and dancing it up alongside John Travolta. The song is a T-Mobile-centric riff on the show tune "Summer Nights" from the beloved musical "Grease," which in its 1978 film adaptation was sung as a duet between Travolta and Olivia Newton-John.

Newton-John passed away this past August, and less than six months later here is her duet partner performing a parody with the guys from "Scrubs." And while notions of bad taste or "too soon" may be in the eye of the beholder, the commercial raises some logistical questions, such as whether its premise was come up before or after Newton-John's death, whether she was meant to be involved with it at some point, and either way, what rationale T-Mobile might have had in choosing to continue with the ad after her death. No matter the answers, these are questions that T-Mobile would prefer us not to ponder in the middle of their very expensive Super Bowl ad.

US rapper and Grammy-nominated artist Jack Harlow fronts this year's star-studded Doritos ad, a silly fantasy in which Harlow finds inspiration in Doritos' signature triangle shape and decides to make triangles (both the percussion instrument and the shape in general) the next big thing. Missy Elliott thinks he's crazy, but Harlow must chase his muse, and suddenly triangles have conquered the worlds of music, fashion, and finance.

Like the ads for Workday and Uber One, this ad falls squarely into the "random celebrity gathering" genre of Super Bowl ads, with Elliott and a mugging Elton John providing a momentary "Hey, they got that person!" endorphin shot. The British music icon even wins an award for triangle player of the year over Harlow. And while there are a couple of fun absurdist details (like triangles replacing the British Pound), ultimately Harlow and the ad are never quite as exciting as they think they are.

Like Experian, travel site Booking.com is banking on the old-fashioned appeal of a charismatic star belting out a song-and-dance number. Here, it's Melissa McCarthy as a restless woman dreaming of the beautiful and exotic resorts she could stay at through the famous online travel agency. A mountain cabin, a beach hotel, a ski chalet — as the song goes, "Somewhere, anywhere, as long as it has childcare."

Each locale gives McCarthy a different luxurious fantasy to try on, from movie star glamour by the pool, to wearing a mud mask and having her feet massaged, to being a caked-up snow bunny on the slopes. The commercial has no twist ending or meta conceit, just the eminently relatable sight of a woman scrolling through her phone in bed, dreaming of a vacation. McCarthy's husband and frequent collaborator Ben Falcone even has a quick cameo as a sexy gardener (sorry, "landscape architect").

General Motors is launching a new fleet of electric vehicles and has partnered with Netflix to showcase them in the streaming giant's original programming. There was a time when such blatant product placement would be an embarrassment rather than something to trumpet in a massively expensive ad campaign, but this is where we are now, apparently. To illustrate how these new EVs might be deployed, the commercial has Will Ferrell take a drive through some of Netflix's most popular offerings, whether it makes sense for him to be there (like the zombified Las Vegas of "Army of the Dead") or not (the sexy and diverse Regency England of "Bridgerton").

The ad is well-made, and Ferrell is a welcome guide through this new era of corporate synergy, whether he's dressed up as Dustin from "Stranger Things" or slowly succumbing to the zombie virus. But for such a new initiative, the ad's references feel oddly stale. "Army of the Dead" premiered two years ago in 2021, and the high point of "Bridgerton's" cultural saturation was back in 2020. Perhaps this is an unintentional acknowledgment that these days Netflix is better known for canceling beloved shows than airing them.

It's the commercial so nice they made it twice. After over half a century of diet drinks being on the market, soda companies are apparently still insecure about how they taste and are desperate to tell you that they are indistinguishable from their full-calorie siblings. This year, Pepsi Zero Sugar is leaning into their anxiety over flavor with a pair of ads featuring Ben Stiller and Steve Martin as themselves, illustrating how their job as actors requires them to convincingly fake emotions. At the end of each ad, they take a drink of Pepsi Zero Sugar and are blown away by the taste. But was it real or just acting?

It's a bold gambit, to court the notion that their product doesn't taste good not just once, but twice; other than a quick appearance by Stiller's beloved Derek Zoolander character, he and Martin perform essentially the exact same commercial. The ploy is to get the audience to try Pepsi Zero Sugar for themselves in order to determine whether Stiller and Martin's enjoyment was real or not, and there is something refreshingly honest about a commercial allowing for the fact that some people will not enjoy its product.

Downy Unstopables laundry detergent started its Super Bowl campaign over a month ago, with a set of teasers featuring an unnamed, unseen celebrity whose head was covered up by a still-fresh-smelling hoodie. The teasers treated the celeb's identity as a secret to be revealed, though anyone who has seen a comedy film in the last 15 years or watched "The Righteous Gemstones" on HBO would have no trouble recognizing the voice of Danny McBride — or rather, Downy McBride, as the incredible long-lasting freshness of Unstopables has inspired him to change his name and become a detergent evangelist, speeding through his neighborhood in a golf cart and shooting bottles of the good stuff at his neighbors with a t-shirt gun.

There's little more to the final ad than McBride's typical incompetent overconfidence, though for fans of his abrasive brand of comedy, that's more than enough. There's a certain amount of novelty in seeing him do his thing without a barrage of profanity or other R-rated descriptors; if ever a commercial called out for an unrated cut, this is the one.

For years, Google's ads have positioned its services and hardware as a positive force in the world, bringing people together and generally improving humanity through effortless connectivity. This year, however, the online behemoth has taken a different approach: they want to keep people apart. Specifically, they want to get rid of all the weird strangers, pooping animals, and ill-considered t-shirt graphics that are in your favorite photos. The Google Pixel 7 phone comes with advanced photo editing software that can clarify and repair old blurry photos, as well as remove any unwanted elements — people included.

The ad features a few celebrities delighting in the Pixel's new features; Amy Schumer excitedly removes all her ex-boyfriends from her pics, while rapper Doja Cat corrects a blurry photo taken with a fan and Milwaukee Bucks player Giannis Antetokounmpo brushes out an opposing player from a picture his slam dunk. But the real star of the ad is the phone itself; this is one of the rare Super Bowl commercials that actually unveil a new product that people might want, rather than reminding them of a product that already exists.

Dunkin' (formerly Dunkin' Donuts) is a New England institution, and so it only makes sense that they would be repped by Beantown's own Affleck brothers. But while younger brother Casey is only a donut pitchman in late-night comedy sketches, big bro Ben gets the primetime slot, literally, in this Super Bowl ad. The actor, writer, and director mans the drive-through booth in this hidden camera-style spot, having fun with the customers who recognize him — or don't — in the case of one unimpressed townie.

And since it's 2023, where Affleck goes, so does his wife, Jennifer Lopez (and vice versa). J.Lo cameos at the end of the spot, shocked and horrified to find her husband working a shift at Dunkies. Affleck stammers in response when Lopez asks if this is where he's been going every day when he says he's at work, and sheepishly walks off the job — but not before taking one last order.

Arguably the most creative ad of the night was one of the shortest, a 15-second burst of Andy Kaufman-esque mischief courtesy of streaming service, Tubi. The ad-supported app does not have a roster of original programming to lure in subscribers like Netflix or Disney+, but what it does have is an incredibly vast catalog of eclectic movie and TV choices; it is perhaps the streaming service that gets the closest to the old days of "let's just see what's on" channel surfing.

Tubi shows off its odds-and-ends assortment and the ease with which you can find it with an ad that starts as if you've returned to the game from a commercial break. Fox commentators Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen are on the screen when suddenly a menu pops up on the bottom of the screen; the cursor scrolls to the Tubi app and selects the Brad Pitt-Angelina Jolie action comedy, "Mr. and Mrs. Smith." Designed to send viewers into a panic that someone at home has switched off the game (or perhaps just sat on the remote), the commercial is clever, attention-grabbing, and blessedly brief.