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Introduction
For decades the Super Bowl ad was the domain of A-list celebrities and seven-figure film budgets. In 2025 that changed. Creators did not just react to the spots online, they fronted them, with a soda brand handing its in-game commercial to TikTok stars and a telecom giant swapping a megastar for a squad of creators. The most-watched ad slot on earth has become a creator stage, with the playbook still being written.
Here is why creators own the moment now, the standout team-ups, the honest case for and against, the lessons, plus how to pick the creators behind them.
Why creators own it now
The Big Game and the second screen have merged, which plays straight into a creator's hands. A few forces drive it.
- Creators stepped into the ads. In 2025 they starred in spots rather than only amplifying them afterward.
- The base keeps growing. By one count 148 brands activated creators in Super Bowl week 2025, up from 103 a year earlier.
- Dual-screen attention. Fans scroll while they watch, so a creator blitz catches eyes the ad alone misses.
- Niche at scale. Many subculture-specific creators can beat one mass-market message.
The moments
A spread of 2025 creator team-ups, from in-ad starring roles to second-screen blitzes. Figures are reported by third parties.
| Brand | Creator moment |
|---|---|
| Poppi | Built its in-game ad around social stars like Alix Earle and Jake Shane |
| Verizon | Replaced its previous celebrity face with a squad of creators |
| Hellmann's | Featured Alix Earle alongside an experiential activation |
| Uber Eats | Paired its TV spot with a TikTok micro-influencer blitz |
| e.l.f. and Instacart | Leaned into social-first stunts beyond the broadcast |
Campaign details and figures attributed to public coverage (CreatorIQ, Aspire, Viral Nation, AdAge).
The honest case
Creators are not a guaranteed Big Game win, so it is worth holding both sides up fairly.
The lessons
You do not need a Super Bowl budget to borrow its creator playbook. The principles travel to any cultural moment.
Go deep in the niche, working with many creators who each own a specific subculture rather than betting on one mass message, since that is where the relevance lives. Plan beyond game day, using pre-game teasers and post-game buzz to stretch a single moment into weeks of attention. Think dual-screen, designing for the fan scrolling a feed while the event plays. And match the creator to a real audience, because at this cost and speed, a poorly chosen voice is an expensive miss.
How Flinque helps
The whole creator-led approach rests on one fragile assumption: that the creators you pick truly fit the subcultures you are targeting and have real audiences behind them. Get a few wrong and a multi-creator blitz turns into expensive noise.
Flinque is one option for de-risking the picks. It surfaces creators on Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and X by niche and audience, letting you assemble a roster mapped to the exact subcultures you want, with a fake follower check and engagement benchmark confirming each audience is real. That matters most when you are activating many creators at once on a tight clock. Coverage stretches to 10M+ verified creators across 25+ countries, on a free plan to start, then $49 monthly. Build the roster on relevance, verify it on data.
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Try Flinque free →Common questions
How are influencers used in Super Bowl marketing?+
More prominently every year, increasingly inside the ads themselves. In 2025 creators did not just amplify spots online, they starred in them, with Poppi making social stars the face of its in-game commercial and Verizon swapping a megastar for a creator squad. Around the broadcast, brands run influencer blitzes targeting the second screen, since fans scroll while they watch. By one count, 148 brands activated creators during Super Bowl week 2025, up from 103 the year before.
Which brands used creators well at the Super Bowl?+
Several stood out in 2025. Poppi built its in-game ad around social stars like Alix Earle, Jake Shane and Robert Rausch, while Verizon replaced its previous celebrity face with a squad of creators. Alix Earle also featured for Hellmann's, Uber Eats paired its TV spot with a TikTok micro-influencer blitz aimed at hungry viewers, while Instacart and e.l.f. leaned into social-first stunts. The thread is creators as the campaign, not an afterthought.
Do influencer-led Super Bowl ads really work?+
Sometimes, with real caveats. Creators bring cost efficiency, authenticity and the ability to target niche subcultures at scale, which is why so many brands jumped in. But the Super Bowl is a rare mass-appeal moment, where digitally-native creators can lack the broad recognizability of an A-list celebrity. Data also suggests that as more brands piled in during 2025, average per-brand results softened. Creators are powerful here, though they are not an automatic win.
Why is the Super Bowl good for influencer marketing?+
Because it is one of the last true monocultural moments, watched on two screens at once. Fans scroll TikTok while the game plays, so a creator blitz can intercept attention the ad alone would miss. Super Bowl LIX reportedly drew millions of online mentions, with the halftime show generating enormous social engagement. That dual-screen behaviour, plus weeks of pre-game and post-game buzz, gives creators far more runway than the broadcast window suggests.
How should brands pick creators for a Super Bowl campaign?+
Go deep in the niche rather than chasing one mass message. The Super Bowl audience is not a monolith, so the winning move is to work with many creators who each resonate with a specific subculture, building scale through relevance. Match each creator to an audience you really want, then verify their following is real before committing budget. With money and timing this tight, vetting for genuine engagement and fake followers is not optional.
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