Super Bowl LIX is still three months away but it’s already a record-setting event, at least when it comes to Fox’s ad sales.
According to the Sports Business Journal, Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch told investors Monday that the company is completely sold out of ad inventory for the big game, at “what we believe are record pricing.”
Variety reported earlier this year that Fox was offering commercials for the game at around $7 million per 30-second spot. That’s roughly what advertisers who waited until the last minute paid for ads for the Super Bowl earlier this year on CBS between Kansas City and San Francisco.
According to Guideline, which measures ad spending by major media corporations, Paramount Global’s CBS averaged about 6.47 million per 30-second ad unit in Super Bowl LVIII.
It’s no surprise to see Super Bowl ad prices reach new heights. Last year’s reported $6.47 million average for 30 seconds marked an 11% increase from 2023, which averaged $5.83 million for Fox, according to Sportico. Fox earned nearly $600 million in revenue for Super Bowl LVII in 2023.
Going much further back, 30-second units for Super Bowl XLII in 2008 averaged $3 million; the cost had risen to $5.5 million by 2020.
Speaking of ads, Murdoch apologized for the flood of political commercials that aired during Week 9, saying, “I apologize to anyone who was enjoying their football over the weekend and was bombarded with political ads.”
