Bad Bunny's Super Bowl LX Halftime Show Wins Seven Emmys, Setting a Record
Bad Bunny now has an Emmy. The Puerto Rican music star won his first Emmy Award at the 2026 Creative Arts Emmys on 5 September, earning it as both a performer and a producer of the Apple Music Super Bowl LX Halftime Show (The Hollywood Reporter).
The halftime show did not just win one. It took home seven Emmy Awards across the first night of the 78th Emmy Awards at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, making it the biggest winner of that ceremony (Men's Journal). Those seven wins broke a major Emmy record for a Super Bowl halftime broadcast.
The awards spanned nearly every craft that goes into a live stadium spectacle: outstanding variety special (live), music direction, choreography, sound mixing, lighting design, technical direction/camerawork, and directing (The Hollywood Reporter). Hamish Hamilton, who directed the special, won for Outstanding Directing for a Variety Special (Television Academy). Bruce Rodgers and Shelley Rodgers won for production design (Television Academy). Jesse Collins served as an executive producer alongside Jay-Z, who collected his third Emmy for the broadcast (The Hollywood Reporter).
The roughly 13-minute performance took place at Levi's Stadium in February 2026 and ended with a message on screen: "The only thing more powerful than hate is love" (The Hollywood Reporter). The special aired on NBC.
This is the second time a Super Bowl halftime show has won the outstanding variety special (live) Emmy. The first was the Pepsi Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show in 2022 (The Hollywood Reporter). The category this year also nominated the 83rd Annual Golden Globes, the 68th Annual Grammy Awards, the 2026 Oscars, and the 78th Annual Tony Awards (The Hollywood Reporter).
Night One of the Creative Arts Emmys — the awards covering technical, craft, and creative categories, held ahead of the main Primetime telecast — also saw wins for The Traitors, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, the Muppets, and Mariska Hargitay (Television Academy). The ceremony's first night was held on 5 September, with a taped broadcast airing on FXX on 12 September at 8 p.m. ET/PT (Television Academy). Presenters across the two Creative Arts nights included Colin Hanks, Julianne Hough, Wanda Sykes, Betty Gilpin, Jeff Hiller, and Noah Wyle (Emmys.com).
The main 78th Emmy Awards telecast airs live on NBC and Peacock on 14 September (Emmys.com). The sitcom I Love Lucy will receive the inaugural Legacy Award at that ceremony (Emmys.com).
For a stadium concert that lasted barely longer than a quarter of an hour, seven Emmys is a haul that few live broadcasts of any kind can match. The record it broke puts the Super Bowl halftime show in rare company as an awards contender, not just a ratings event.
