15 Best Super Bowl Halftime Shows, Ranked

The Super Bowl halftime show was once a little-discussed platform for local marching bands, but, today, it is arguably the most coveted performing slot in the entire U.S. music industry. Craving visibility boosts while offering audience-drawing potential of their own, only absolute A-list superstars get brought on as headliners, even though Super Bowl halftime show performers are not paid.

The stakes are high, to put it lightly. And a baseline level of production competence and prudence has ensured that the majority of Super Bowl shows in the superstar era have been at least decent. But some, of course, have been better. Here, we've ranked the 15 absolute best Super Bowl halftime concerts on the combined levels of craftsmanship, iconicity, performance quality, impact, and influence — with maybe a few points for chutzpah here and there.

The 50th anniversary of the Super Bowl in 2016 called for a halftime show that would be not just fun but jubilant. It had to be a victory lap for the institution itself, a convincing climax to decades of musical entertainment. As such, it called for a band willing to angle for irony-free, atavistic euphoria, and Coldplay definitely fit the bill.

The British quartet run-through of stadium-filling anthems was flawless, and they were clearly loving it. No drummer could have banged on that floor tom during "Viva la Vida" with as much infectious glee as Will Champion, and no other vocalists would have thrown themselves into the climatic medley of past halftime songs as guilelessly and earnestly as Chris Martin.

The swagger-injecting legacy cameos by Beyoncé and Bruno Mars, battle-singing each other's signature songs in sun-kissed, perfectly-pitched glory, balanced out the party's sentimental mood. By the time all three acts got together for a closing hurrah, it was impossible not to feel as though the Super Bowl was the most important thing on Earth.

Janet Jackson's 2004 Super Bowl halftime concert was a galvanizing feat of showmanship and creativity that had its reception all but completely ruined by external forces. First, there were the nominal co-headliners and de-facto side guests: A who's-who of now-unfortunate 2000s spectral presences including P. Diddy, Kid Rock, and Nelly, all of them swamping what should have been the Janet Show with superfluous and incongruent musical contributions.

Then, there was that year's Super Bowl halftime show controversy, an incident which by most accounts was supposed to reveal only a red bra underneath Jackson's bustier but wound up baring too much — derailing not just the reception to the show but Jackson's entire career (while Justin Timberlake, who did the actual ripping, essentially got away scot-free).

Set all that mess aside, however, and Jackson's set in itself emerges as a clear turning point in Super Bowl history: Befitting her stature as a trailblazer of dance-pop spectacle, she brought a level of purpose, pizzazz, and choreographic complexity to her performances of "All for You" and "Rhythm Nation" that launched halftime shows into a whole new era. It would have been historical even without any FCC run-ins at all.

If Coldplay's 2016 set was Super Bowl halftime kitsch at its most endearingly sincere, the Aerosmith-NSYNC double bill of 2001 was Super Bowl halftime kitsch at its most gloriously bonkers. On paper, mashing together two outfits so brashly crowd-pleasing and campy in such radically different ways might not seem like an idea that had any chance of working — but all parties involved were so game, and so willing to commit to the bit, that the whole thing somehow hung together.

Unlike other multi-headliner galas with virtually no cohesion between the different cohabitating shows (Shania Twain and No Doubt in 2003 still being the most egregious offender), the five-piece Orlando boy band and the legendary Boston rockers established an unbelievable symbiosis, gleefully cutting into each other's sing-along hits in increasingly cheeky and amusing ways, all the way up to the delirious rush of Steven Tyler rasp-belting the final high note of "It's Gonna Be Me." And then, Avengers assemble: Britney Spears and Mary J. Blige joined in, eager to jam along, and the irresistible-fun meters just exploded.

Within a pop history context, the 2023 Super Bowl halftime show was a realization of years of long-speculated possibility: How would the great Rihanna, who had all but vanished, respond to all the intervening pop culture changes since her artistic peak and subsequent disappearance from music? Would she go conceptual on us? Would she do TikTok dance moves? Would she engage in a "Homecoming"-style display of career-canonizing athleticism? In the end, Rihanna pulled the rug out from everybody by simply doing her thing — but better than ever.

The opening set the tone: A straight smash-cut to Rihanna's face, because Rihanna needs no entrance. From there, she paraded through an unbelievable collection of hits with stunning sci-fi stage design, simple and punchy visuals, zero guests, and top-form vocals (when not drowned out by an excessive backing track, that is). Some found it underwhelming for a big comeback, but the Rihanna-style laid-back choreography — made impressive by her visible, previously unannounced pregnancy — cinched the message: She doesn't need to jump through hoops. She's Rihanna, and we're all still eating out of her hand.

After years of male pop stars treating their interchangeable falsettos like God's gift to television, Usher stormed into Allegiant Stadium at the 2024 Super Bowl with a mission to remind the United States of what a proper show looks like — and why he's uniquely suited to offer it. Clad in regal layers of white and a Swarovski crystal-dotted vest, the veteran R&B superstar (and former "The Bold and the Beautiful" cast member) launched right into a series of sing-and-dance numbers so dynamic and flawless that you barely had time to process how difficult they were.

Without once losing his breath or fumbling a high note, Usher proceeded excitedly through several costume changes, varied but consistently complex choreography (remember when male singers weren't beholden to bland performances of macho nonchalance in their dancing?), affectionate guest features ("My Boo" featuring Alicia Keys being a huge highlight), and an improbably tight rollerskating stunt, all while pouring so much heart into the setlist's nostalgic revisits that each song sounded as fresh as ever.

The first Super Bowl halftime set dedicated to celebrating Latin American culture was a triumph of sheer charisma. The overarching structure was simple and efficient: One half all to Shakira, another to Jennifer Lopez, and then a brief but brilliant coda bringing both pop legends together. Shakira's half breezed by so flawlessly and enchantingly that it made a series of brazen choices seem like business as usual: In a glittering blood-red two-piece, she segued from guitar playing to belly dancing to a trap-boogaloo duet with Bad Bunny to enthusiastic crowd-surfing to a zaghrouta wail straight at the camera, clearly having a blast as she hit every step of multiple successive dance breaks.

It was a magical, quietly bold five minutes — and then J-Lo descended from an antenna-shaped platform and tore into a hit parade with the hunger and precision of someone eager to put to rest years of skepticism around her pop star credentials, complete with some impressive pole-dancing that showed up the Oscars for snubbing her "Hustlers" performance a couple weeks prior. You could just feel the indestructibility radiating from the two women as they embraced, beaming with pride in each other, at the end of the routine.

The 1996 halftime show was a typical Diana Ross outing — which is to say, a blast of pure, unfettered joy. Although Ross was tasked with the Super Bowl's second-ever solo headlining superstar show and the game's 30th anniversary celebration, you'd never know it just from watching: The weight of the responsibility bounced off of her, leaving only the enthusiasm of a four-decade artist eager to make an unprecedented splash.

Mostly eschewing choreography and leaving it to her veritable battalion of costumed dancers, Ross instead honed in, like a great singer turned actress, on the key components of pop diva eminence: The voice, the energy, the stage presence, and the looks. Her live vocal performance, by turns angelic and powerful enough to match the enormity of the production, still ranks among the most incredible anyone has ever pulled off at the Super Bowl.

The succession of dresses was astonishing to the point of defying belief; just when you thought she couldn't one-up the orange and purple frill layers of her second outfit, she put on that shimmering coat that floated in waves around her like a sea of gold. Her famed helicopter exit was the only suitable conclusion: Could you imagine this woman just walking down the stairs to a stuffy dressing room?

Faced with mid-pandemic production restrictions, The Weeknd's 2021 Super Bowl set harnessed the incomparable power of strong imagery, turning America's biggest stage into a playground for compelling visual experimentation. From the choir of geometrically synchronized dancers to the carefully-mapped colored lights to the gigantic neon skyline scenery (placed unconventionally on the stands of Raymond James Stadium instead of the field), The Weeknd delivered a maximalist feast for the eyes that called to mind not so much previous Super Bowl halftimes as the gargantuan stagecraft of Summer Olympics opening ceremonies.

He and director Hamish Hamilton were savvy about camerawork, too, staging an indoors long take for "Can't Feel My Face" that left viewers feeling a bit dizzy, matching the explosive charge of "I Feel It Coming" with an unexpected reverse-shot of the sprawling stadium under fireworks, and accentuating the grandeur of the full-field grand finale with choice aerial drone movements. All of this only worked, of course, because The Weeknd's vocals and stage-slash-screen presence were impeccable; with his talent as a dependable center, it never once felt as though this were a pared-down halftime.

Multiple legendary rock acts have played the Super Bowl halftime show, and the vast majority of them delivered the same thing: A regular, solid concert on a somewhat ritzier stage. Leave it to Bruce Springsteen, then, to blast clean through years of legacy rocker complacency and finally understand that the Super Bowl show is supposed to be an event — and, more to the point, a TV event.

Just from the opening silhouette of Springsteen and saxophonist Clarence Clemons (who would pass away two years later, making the show even more iconic in hindsight) against a white LED screen and the introductory pleas to "step back from the guacamole dip" and "turn your television all the way up," it was clear from the jump that the Boss understood the assignment like few before him.

Joined by the E Street Band in ecstatic renditions of "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out," "Born to Run," "Glory Days," and then-fresh hit "Working on a Dream," Springsteen danced and jumped around the stage like a possessed man, played call-and-response with the crowd, and generally had the time of his life — as did anyone who was watching, in the stadium or at home.

Janet Jackson's fate-sabotaged 2004 set offered the promise of a suitably gigantic Super Bowl pop show with rounds of massive ensemble ballet spearheaded by the headlining star herself. And, in 2012, Madonna — who else? — finally delivered on that promise. The Queen of Pop pulled out all the stops in service of the kind of jaw-dropping TV spectacle that she'd been putting on since the '80s.

Even by Madonna's standards, the 13-minute medley of "Vogue," "Music," "Give Me All Your Luvin'," "Open Your Heart," "Express Yourself," and "Like a Prayer" (with a little "Sexy and I Know It" sprinkled in, because it was 2012 and LMFAO still existed) was an overwhelming thing to witness. She came flying out of the gate and didn't let up until the final note was finished.

The whole thing was somehow very smooth. There were perfectly-executed segues from Roman Empire to cheerleading squad to gospel choir themes, with Givenchy and Cirque du Soleil contributions thrown in on top of some impossibly detailed and acrobatic choreography. It all served to highlight Madonna's incomparable versatility, endurance, and love of music.

No other show had ever exhibited so much thoughtful, thorough, impassioned consideration of what a Super Bowl halftime concert could be before Kendrick Lamar's 2025 outing. With Samuel L. Jackson in tow as a version of Uncle Sam designed to poke holes in outdated ideas of patriotism (he criticized Lamar for being "too loud" too unruly, too ghetto"), the Pulitzer-winning rapper gave the people what they wanted while remaining steadfastly committed to his own brainy, challenging, and uncompromising artistry.

Surrounded by red, white, and blue-clad dancers who alternately assembled and disassembled the U.S. flag around him at lyrically meaningful moments, Lamar flaunted some of the most flawless vocal delivery in Super Bowl halftime history. He toyed with expectations, both aesthetic ones (flowing carefully through impossible camera and ensemble setups while giving off the impression of effortlessness) and musical ones (playfully teasing out "Not Like Us" for as long as he possibly could and joining SZA for a beautiful mellow duet).

It's impossible to overstate what a leap forward Michael Jackson's 1993 Super Bowl performance was, not just for Super Bowl halftime shows themselves — which had never previously gone for that "headlining superstar" format, much less with such pomp and circumstance — but for the medium of televised concerts as a whole. As if inviting the breathless anticipation of history about to be made, Jackson began by leaping out from a trapdoor and then standing silently for around 90 seconds while the crowd roared endlessly, allowing the excitement to reach fever pitch.

Once he got down to business, it was perfection: Flawless choreography, exuberantly imaginative scene design, multiple legacy-building Big Moments (including an instantly iconic use of fog machines during "Black or White"), and an unabashedly sincere choir-backed performance of "We Are the World" and "Heal the World" that made the most of the production budget with an enormous audience card stunt and an inflatable globe. No wonder Super Bowl star concerts became a thing after this.

Invited to perform during the halftime show just prior to the industry-breaking experimental phase she'd jumpstart with the surprise release of "Beyoncé" later that year, the greatest pop star of the 21st century utilized her 13 minutes during Super Bowl XLVII to remind the world that she is, simply put, a perfect entertainer.

No matter what criterion or unit of measurement you hold up against Beyoncé's go-round, it still emerges as an all-time achievement. Best vocal performance? Yes, by a mile. Most exacting ensemble choreography? Yes, complete with stomp-dancing. Strongest package of hits? Hard to beat a run of "Run the World," "Love on Top," "Crazy in Love," "End of Time," "Baby Boy," "Bootylicious," "Independent Women Part I," "Single Ladies," and "Halo." Most memorable guests? Three words: Destiny's Child reunion!

It's a testament to the heights of conceptual ambition reached by Beyoncé in subsequent years that such a relentlessly stupendous Super Bowl set looks relatively minor within her performing oeuvre, just by virtue of playing it "safe." No other artist in history could have played it safe like this. It's hard to imagine anyone ever taking away Beyoncé's status as the queen of the Super Bowl.

It's still too early to tell what the cultural impact of Bad Bunny's effervescent 2026 Super Bowl halftime show will be. But, the second he threw down that football with "Together we are America" written on it, it was clear that he'd made the ground shift underneath him. Singing and speaking almost entirely in Spanish across 13 daylit minutes on the Levi's Stadium field, the proud Puerto Rican star (whose real name is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio) never once defaulted to norms or expectations of what the Super Bowl halftime is "supposed" to be: He made it his own thing, and all future halftime shows are likely to be judged against this.

The political and emotional significance of his paean to Puerto Rican and broader Latin American culture is well-documented at this point, so consider, too, the show's sophistication as a piece of musicianship and spectacle. Gliding on a consistent, studio-level rendition of his signature baritone rap-crooning, Bad Bunny grounded a veritable symphony of electronic and live-played organic arrangements, marched through a series of elaborate theatrical mini-scenes (with so many small details you may have missed), made the most of a highly inventive stage, addressed the audience in moments of striking intimacy, and effectively brought his era-bridging musical vision to glittering physical life. That he did it all while offering the fieriest, most radical statement in Super Bowl halftime history is just additional confirmation of his genius.

When Coldplay played a montage of past Super Bowl halftime performers during their 50th anniversary bash, every shout-out spotlighted the face of the singer in question except one: When Chris Martin sang "Purple rain, purple rain" over the "Fix You" instrumentals, the image overlaid on him was just a silhouette playing guitar against a fluttering backlit white cloth. There was no need to clarify that it was the legend that is Prince.

Prince's 2007 halftime show at Miami's Dolphin Stadium didn't just create one of the most iconic images of 21st century live television. This performance pushed Super Bowl halftime show artistry to the level of the sublime, accessing a rarefied level of sweeping beauty that no one would have previously thought possible from this particular gig.

It's hard to even describe the show in the terms afforded by a ranking: Although Prince's singing and guitar playing were as perfect as ever and his funk-rock hits are self-evident masterpieces, there's no sufficient technical description for the awe of watching him saunter through that barn-burning set under heavy rainfall, the screen often all dark except for himself and the neon contours of his Love Symbol-shaped stage. You just have to see and marvel at it for yourself.