8 Artists Who Turned Down the Super Bowl Halftime Show

From commercials to food to football players themselves, everything about the Super Bowl seems to be larger than life, and halftime shows are no exception. In 2025, Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show was viewed by an estimated 133.5 million people, cementing just how iconic this particular gig has become.

These performances can become highlights of artists’ careers—one only needs to look to the legacies of Prince and Beyoncé’s halftime shows to see that—but they can also be extremely high-pressure, and can even lead to lasting humiliation and damaged reputations. 

Over the years, there have been some famous artists who've made the decision to not headline the Super Bowl halftime show. Each of these artists has their own reasons for turning down the performance, and we’ll probably never know the full extent of their logic. But some have been more candid than others, citing everything from politics to song length requirements as reasons why they said no to this particularly massive gig.

1. Adele
2. Taylor Swift
3. Jay-Z
4. Dolly Parton
5. Drake (Possibly)
6. Outkast
7. Pink
8. Cardi B

Adele

In 2016, Adele told the crowd at a Los Angeles show that she wasn’t interested in performing at the Super Bowl. "First of all, I'm not doing the Super Bowl," she said. "I mean, that show is not about music. I can't dance or anything like that. They were very kind, they did ask me, but I did say no."

The NFL and Pepsi later issued a joint statement denying that they’d offered Adele the gig. "We have had conversations with several artists about the Pepsi Super Bowl half-time show," the statement read. "However, we have not at this point extended a formal offer to Adele or anyone else. We are focused on putting together a fantastic show for Houston and we look forward to revealing that in good time."

Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift has certainly spent a fair amount of time on camera at football games in the past few years, thanks to her relationship with Travis Kelce. But she has yet to take the stage at the Super Bowl—though not for lack of opportunity.

In an October 2025 appearance on The Tonight Show, Swift denied turning down an offer to perform in the show in 2023. However, she also explained that her team regularly talks to Jay-Z's company Roc Nation, which produces the Super Bowl halftime show, and noted that she is sometimes asked if she’s interested in the gig.

"Here’s the thing: Jay-Z has always been very good to me. Our teams are really close," she said. But she went on to explain that her relationship with Kelce is part of why she's been saying no. "They sometimes will call and say, 'How does she feel about it?' And that’s not an official offer or a conference room conversation…And we’re always able to tell him the truth, which is that I am in love with a guy who does that sport on that actual field."

She also clarified that Kelce isn’t trying to hold her back, but he is at least part of the reason she’s avoiding performing at the Super Bowl for now. "The whole season, I am locked in on what that man is doing on the field," she said. "Can you imagine if he's out there, every single week, doing this very dangerous, very high-pressure, high-intensity sport and I'm like: 'I wonder what my choreography should be?' This is nothing to do with Travis. He would love for me to do it. I am just too locked in."

Jay-Z

It turns out that Jay-Z himself ran into some conflicts when approached about performing at the 2018 Super Bowl. In a 2020 interview with The New York Times, he said that he turned down the gig after being asked to bring Rihanna and Kanye West to perform their song "Run This Town."

"Of course I would have," the mogul said of the opportunity. "But I said, 'No, you get me.' That is not how you go about it, telling someone that they’re going to do the halftime show contingent on who they bring. I said forget it. It was a principle thing."

He elaborated on his decision in another interview, per the New York Daily News. "I didn’t like the process. I think the process of selection was fractured," he said. "Take four of us [performers] and everybody thinks they’re playing the Super Bowl. It’s almost like this interview process. So if I could pick one, three other people are upset. That’s not even good math. After three years, nine people are upset and three people are going to play. I just think the process could’ve been more definite."

However, his company Roc Nation began producing the halftime show in 2020, meaning that a Jay-Z appearance definitely could still be in the cards.

Dolly Parton

Parton is a musical icon, but it’s never worked out for her to take the Super Bowl stage—and as it turns out, this was largely due to conflicts and a lack of confidence. "I couldn’t do it because of other things, or I just didn’t think I was big enough to do it—to do that big of a production," she told The Hollywood Reporter in 2023. "When you think about those shows, those are big, big productions. I’ve never done anything with that big of a production," she continued. "I don’t know if I could have. I think at the time that’s what I was thinking."

Still, a Dolly Parton Super Bowl appearance isn’t out of the question, especially now that she’s veered into rock-and-roll music in recent years. "It would make more sense," she added in the interview of performing in an upcoming Super Bowl. "That might change. I might be able to do a production show."

Drake (Possibly)

Drake did make an appearance of sorts at Kendrick Lamar’s 2025 Super Bowl halftime show, but probably not in the way he wanted, as he was name-dropped—and not in a good way—in Lamar’s searing diss track, "Not Like Us."

It’s not entirely clear whether or not Drake has been offered a chance to perform at the halftime show, though there have been rumors. On a 2024 episode of the New Rory & MAL podcast, host Jamil "Mal" Clay claimed that "Drake has been offered this Super Bowl show for some years now and has turned it down. Probably four years, he's been offered to perform at the Super Bowl, said no for whatever reason."

On the other hand, a reporter at Bloomberg has since alleged that Drake has never been offered the gig. "There's a rumor that Drake has turned down the opportunity to perform at the Super Bowl multiple times. League sources tell me that isn't true," the writer alleged. "In fact, one of them said 'it's a blatant lie.' I was told in the five years the NFL has been partnered with Jay-Z's Roc Nation, the two parties have never offered the Toronto native the Super Bowl Halftime Show."

The reporter continued, "Sure, there have also been occasions where an artist has been considered and there were scheduling conflicts. Drake does not fit in the declined or schedule conflicts categories."

Outkast

Outkast apparently also rejected the Super Bowl Halftime Show for a very specific reason: not wanting to cut their songs short. In a 2015 interview with ESPN, Big Boi said that André 3000—the other half of the duo—turned down the opportunity to perform because he wasn’t allowed to play their songs in their entirety. "[André] didn’t want to cut the songs; he wanted to do the full songs," Big Boi said. "He said, 'Nah, can’t do it.'" Big Boi noted that he personally had wanted to do the gig, and added, “Hopefully, they invite us back."

Pink

Pink is known for her elaborate live shows, and seemed like she might be a fit for a halftime performance after wowing audiences with her rendition of the National Anthem at the Super Bowl in 2018. But she told Billboard that she wound up turning down the opportunity in 2019, partly because of the amount of scrutiny performers tend to receive. "Everybody that does it gets so persecuted," she said.

She also shared that she probably wouldn’t have been able to resist showing her support for NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who famously refused to stand during the 2016 National Anthem at the Super Bowl to protest racial injustice and police brutality. "I’d probably take a knee and get carried out," she said.

Cardi B

In 2025, Cardi B revealed that she turned down the halftime show because she felt it wasn’t the right time. "I got asked to do the Super Bowl and I denied it. I feel like soon, if I get to do it, I’m going to have more hits. I’m going to be more experienced and I’m going to eat that up," she said in an interview with Billboard.

Apparently she’s been in talks about the gig for a while, though. In 2019, she told The Associated Press that she rejected the chance to perform at the halftime show to “stand behind” Colin Kaepernick. "I got to sacrifice a lot of money to perform. But there’s a man who sacrificed his job for us, so we got to stand behind him," she said of the decision.

However, rumors have been swirling for a while about Cardi B possibly joining Bad Bunny at the 2026 Super Bowl Halftime Show—so while she might not quite be ready to headline yet, her debut on the field might be in short order.