Super Bowl commercials are prime real estate for advertisers — so much so that brands can’t even mention the name “Super Bowl” without paying big bucks for the right to. With that in mind, some companies have spent millions to air an advertisement during the game, and Amazon Alexa’s “Mind Reader” starring Scarlett Johansson currently holds the record for the most expensive to run in the history of the event.
The one-minute and 30-second ad, which aired during 2022’s big game, cost an estimated $26 million to run during the game. As of this writing, it has yet to be surpassed, but with Super Bowl ad costs rising in 2026, this could be the year another entity breaks the bank and surpasses it.
In the commercial, Johansson and Colin Jost are assisted by an Alexa that can literally read their minds. It starts off innocently enough, but the technology eventually reveals the thoughts that they’d rather keep to themselves, and the couple’s marriage becomes complicated.
Despite commanding such a high price tag and exploring the theme of invasive technological growth, “Mind Reader” isn’t even the most controversial Super Bowl commercial starring Johansson — that honor goes to her 2014 SodaStream ad. What’s more, other commercials aren’t too far behind in terms of costs.
Mind Reader isn’t the only expensive Super Bowl commercial
For comparison’s sake, General Motors’ “No More Norway” and Cadillac’s “ScissorHandsFree” also cost upward of $20 million to run during their respective Super Bowls. Both cost $22 million exactly, which is quite a leap compared to other commercials that made up the top 10 most expensive as of February 2025, according to data obtained by Statista.
The other commercials that made the cut were significantly less than the aforementioned ads, but were by no means cheap to run. In fact, the bottom two — Kia’s “Give It Everything” and Amazon’s “Not Everything Makes the Cut” — cost around $15.6 million. Meanwhile, the rest cost over $16 million, with Amazon’s “Before Alexa” and Google’s “Loretta” both coming in at $16.8 million, making them the highest outside of the top three.
It remains to be seen if 2026’s commercials break any records, but it’s clear that brands are willing to pay blockbuster prices to air short ads. As such, it’s seems like only a matter of time until “Mind Reader” is surpassed in the expenses department.
This story originally appeared on TVLine
