How Much Are Celebrities Paid for Super Bowl Commercials?

Before I get into this blog, I want to make it clear that most of this information isn't readily available. As I tweeted during the Super Bowl last night, I would love to see a comprehensive list of how much money each celebrity who acted in a Super Bowl commercial was paid out. But then a couple people snarkily told me, "that's what we call a blog topic." 

No shit that would be a great blog. That list would do great numbers. That's why I asked the question. Everyone wants to know that. Unfortunately it's just not all public information. I found a few examples from specific commercials from past years, but the actual dollar amount actors made per commercial aren't readily available. At least as far as I can tell. If I'm wrong then please let me know. But based on the information I found on the internet, we can get an idea as to how much celebrities are being paid for what I imagine was significantly less than one week's worth of work. Probably less than a day in some cases.

First off, here's what I found regarding how much some actors have been paid for Super Bowl commercials in the past.

CNN - Larry David received $10 million to appear in a 2022 Super Bowl ad for FTX, a source told CNN, prior to the cryptocurrency company's collapse and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud conviction. 

This is a pretty funny $10 million dollars for Larry David to make. We all know what happened to FTX. Some crypto asshole named Sam Bankman-Fried made an unlimited amount of money by getting involved in crypto before everyone else. Then he proceeded to throw gigantic sums at the most famous people in the world to would appear in his commercials. He had Larry David, Tom Brady, and Steph Curry promote FTX. In the end his whole company was bullshit. Those guys even got named in a handful of lawsuits. Reportedly Tom Brady lost $30 million in crypto investments alone. However he was reportedly paid $55 million for his commercial appearance, so he still made a cool $25 million out of his whole FTX experience. Steph Curry was paid $35 mil. But I HAVE to imagine that's on the very high end. If you're a company as shady as FTX you have to throw crazy amount to get that type of talent. They were printing money at that time. I don't think regular, legitimate companies are dishing that out. FTX seems like a bit of an anomaly. 

Take a regular company for example. Consider Ben Affleck's Dunkin Donuts commercial from last year.

CNN - Last year’s Super Bowl ad for Dunkin’, which also starred Affleck, helped sell more donuts the following day “than any other day in their history,” a person close to the campaign told CNN last week. Affleck was paid close to $10 million dollars for last year’s Dunkin’ commercial, according to three sources with knowledge of the partnership. 

Again, that was last year's commercial. This year Dunkin' Donuts added even more star power. Once again, Tom Brady was called upon, along with Affleck and Matt Damon.

So I'm guessing they each pulled in somewhere close to $10 million this year as well.

Beyonce's pay for her Verizon ad this year was actually available. She was reportedly paid $30 million for 60 seconds of air time. Which I suppose make sense considering Beyonce rarely appears in anything. On the other hand, her commercial also doubled as promotion for her new album. Being paid $30 million to promote your own shit seems like a hell of a fleecing.

But again, that's very much on the high end

"It can be as little as $25,000 for someone to do a cameo that's not a megastar, but as high as $10 million. It depends on the brand and it depends on the stature of the celebrity," says Tim Curtis, a partner in the brand partnerships division at the Hollywood talent agency, WME. "The majority of bigger stars are usually in that $1 to $3 million range for Super Bowl, but there are exceptions that go out north of that. It's rare for someone that you think of as a true movie star to be paid less than a million."

Most Super Bowl shoots are usually one to two days, the agent added.

At least two major Hollywood stars received more than $5 million for their participation in ads this year in which they are seen on-camera for less than 20 seconds, sources tell CNN.

So I think it's safe to say actors like Jeff Goldblum who have never said no to anything in their lives are closer to the $1 million range

When you see actors like Zach Braff and Jason Momoa, I think somewhere in the $1-$5 million range is a safe bet.

In case this hasn't been made abundantly clear, I don't have all the necessary information to write this blog. Only a handful of celebrity Super Bowl commercial payouts are available. But I like thinking about how much these people are cleaning up for such a small amount of work. It's hard to imagine these commercials end up paying for themselves, but I have to assume they do. There must be value in these commercials, seeing as they continue being such a big deal every year.

Commercial spots alone are in the $7 million for 30-seconds range. It's always funny to me how much money these companies will put into production. Especially when you see someone like Kanye West put in ZERO production costs, and end up with what in my opinion was one of the better Super Bowls ads of this year.

The whole phenomena behind Super Bowl commercials is crazy. Especially considering most people will tell you they don't care about the commercials at all. Super Bowl ads are just so engrained into our culture. They're never going to stop. 

One final thought… how much do you think Jesus paid is people for the feet washing commercial?

I can't help but wonder if these actors were volunteers. I can picture Jesus sitting them down in a church puw and explaining to them how spreading the good word is more important that money. I can't confirm that. I'd like to think Jesus paid them out handsomely. But I'd be dumb to not be skeptical of the church.