halftime show

Defense wins championships and Super Bowl LX showed it can get ratings too.

NBC’s Sunday telecast of the Seattle Seahawks’ 29-13 win over the New England Patriots averaged 124.9 million viewers according to Nielsen data, falling short of the record of 127.7 million set last year on Fox.

Seattle’s smothering defense preventing New England from ever getting on track in the game at Levi Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., was more appreciated by serious football fans than casual watchers. But the controversy surrounding the event with halftime performer Bad Bunny likely stoked additional interest.

Bad Bunny’s halftime show averaged 128.2 million viewers, higher than the game overall. The performance aired after the second quarter, when the game was still close and hit a peak of 137.8 million viewers.

The NFL’s selection of Bad Bunny riled up right-wing commentators who objected to having an artist singing only in Spanish performing at the premier U.S. sporting event of the year. Bad Bunny has also been outspoken over the Trump administration’s aggressive tactics in removing undocumented immigrants. He skipped the mainland U.S. on his last tour, citing fears that his fans would be targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Right-wing activist group Turning Point USA presented an alternative halftime show on YouTube, which topped 6 million viewers, a surprisingly high number considering details of the program were not revealed until days before game day. A concert featuring Kid Rock and several lesser-known country artists did not get a strong critical reception on social media.

But the audience size showed that a hot musical act could attract a significant chunk of the audience already gathered to watch the game.

“More bands should go head to head with the halftime show and not in a political way,” said one rival network executive not authorized to comment publicly. “It would be a good stunt for HBO Max or some other company that’s not an NFL rights holder.”

Nielsen’s improvement to its measurement of viewing through internet connections and set-top boxes — which boosted NFL TV ratings throughout the season, also likely helped the Super Bowl LX number. The additional data was incorporated into TV ratings starting in September.

Another 3.3 million watched the Spanish-language broadcast on Telemundo. NBC did not release data for viewing on its Peacock, saying only that it was the biggest day ever for the streaming platform.

NBC sold out the commercial time for the game at an average price of $8 million for a 30-second spot, with some going for $10 million. USA Today’s annual “Ad Meter” panel chose Budweiser’s “American Icons” as its favorite commercial on the telecast.

The Rams won’t be the only no-shows at the Super Bowl. President Trump will be conspicuous in his absence from the biggest annual, single-day sporting event in the United States.

“It’s just too far away,” Trump told the New York Post. “I would go if, you know, it was a little bit shorter.”

Or perhaps not so far to his left?

Super Bowl LX will be played Feb. 8 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, part of the San Francisco Bay Area that Trump has so often reviled.

The teams — the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks — hail from deeply entrenched blue states. Massachusetts and Washington have voted for the Democratic presidential candidate in every election since 1988.

Trump also has expressed disgust over the musical performers at this year’s game: Bad Bunny and Green Day, both unabashed critics of the current administration. Bad Bunny will play the halftime show while Green Day will perform ahead of the kickoff.

“I’m anti-them,” Trump said. “I think it’s a terrible choice. All it does is sow hatred. Terrible.”

Ahead of a tour last fall to promote his most recent album, Bad Bunny (whose real name is Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio) announced he would skip the United States because he was afraid of ICE raids at his concerts. The Puerto Rican superstar — who has nearly 84 million monthly listeners on Spotify — explained why he made an exception for the Super Bowl.

“What I’m feeling goes beyond myself,” he said in a statement. “It’s for those who came before me and ran countless yards so I could come in and score a touchdown. This is for my people, my culture and our history.”

Green Day, an American pop-punk band of almost 40 years, has since Trump’s first term swapped a line in the lyrics of the 2004 hit “American Idiot” from “I’m not part of a redneck agenda” to “I’m not part of the MAGA agenda.”

Turning Point USA, the conservative non-profit founded by the late Charlie Kirk, announced in October that it would stage its own counterprogramming to the Super Bowl and stream it on conservative outlets. The “All American Halftime Show” is billed as “Celebrating Faith, Family, & Freedom.” As of Monday, musical artists had not been announced.

Trump became the first sitting president to attend a Super Bowl a year ago when he received a muted, mixed reaction of cheers and boos in New Orleans. But this year, the 5½-hour flight from Washington D.C. to the Bay Area apparently is too long for the president, who in January alone has flown to Switzerland, Detroit and Palm Beach.

Trump has long enjoyed attending high-profile sporting events. He was present at the College Football Playoff title game between Indiana and Miami a week ago and in 2025 attended the Army-Navy college football game, the U.S. Open Final and the Ryder Cup. In 2019, he attended Game 5 of the World Series in Washington D.C., where he was resoundingly booed.

The NFL has resisted pressure to replace Bad Bunny with a performer more politically palatable to Trump.

“There’s a lot of people right now who don’t like Bad Bunny being in the Super Bowl halftime show,” NFL chief marketing officer Tim Ellis said at a conference in October. “Well, not everyone has to like everything we do. Bad Bunny is f—ing awesome.”

Not everyone has to like the teams that earned Super Bowl berths and the states they call home, either. And not everyone has to approve of the venue. That includes the President, who made it clear that if he decides to watch, he’ll do so from a distance.