Why Super Bowl 2025 was a triumph for Internet Resilience

When you’re spending close to $8 million for a 30-second Super Bowl ad, the one thing you don’t want to leave to chance is your website—especially when millions of viewers, whether they came for the game, Kendrick Lamar, or to catch a glimpse of Taylor Swift in the stands, might head there right after the spot airs. Make no mistake: web performance is just as critical as the ad itself. A slow page can turn potential customers away in seconds, effectively undoing your multimillion-dollar investment.

With that in mind, Catchpoint conducted an analysis of the web performance of homepages for select brands that advertised during the Super Bowl broadcast. Our tests ran from February 1 through 14 to capture performance before, during, and after the big game. We focused on key metrics such as DNS Lookup Time, Time to First Byte (TTFB), Document Complete, Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS), Page Load Time, and Availability.  

Here's a quick snapshot of how top brands fared:  

Super Bowl 2025 web performance snapshot

• 100% availability – Every monitored site stayed accessible throughout.

• Totino’s speed surge – The surprise standout, dominating three key metrics.

• Haagen-Dazs: 27 ms TTFB – A masterclass in server optimization.

• Instacart’s comeback – From 1,051 ms TTFB to improved speeds on game day.

• NFL’s heavy page – 8,594 ms load time and 3,339 ms LCP made it one of the slowest.

Now, let’s dive deeper into the data to see exactly how the big day played out.  

All brands up and running: 100% availability

All monitored sites maintained 100% availability, ensuring that users could access their websites without interruption. While this is non-negotiable during a high-stakes event like the Super Bowl, achieving this is no small feat and speaks volumes about the rigorous planning and robust infrastructure these companies had in place.

The stellar availability values underscore a significant theme of Super Bowl 2025: Internet Resilience. When failure isn’t an option and success hinges on something as inherently fragile as the Internet, what these brands pulled off is nothing short of impressive. There are a few outliers (which we’ll get to), but most rose to the occasion—led by a surprising champion in Totino’s.

Totino’s: The surprise speed champion

In a field dominated by digital giants, Totino’s emerged as the surprise speed champion of Super Bowl 2025. They excelled at three key metrics:

1. Document Complete
2. Page Load Time
3. Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)

As we break down their performance across each metric, you’ll see how a nimble, well-optimized site can outshine even the biggest players.  

Totino’s achieved the lowest Document Complete time of all the monitored sites, clocking in at just 623ms. This metric measures when the page is fully rendered and interactive. By minimizing the number of requests loading before Document Complete, they ensured that their page loaded quickly and efficiently. This is in stark contrast to sites like TurboTax and the NFL, which had significantly higher Document Complete times due to a larger number of requests and third-party dependencies.

The chart below shows average page load times and total number of page requests.  

Although Pringles has the fewest requests and the fastest page load times overall, Totinos’ minimal requests (just 82 total requests) contributed to their lightning-fast Document Complete time. Fewer requests mean fewer potential bottlenecks, resulting in a smoother, faster user experience.

Totino’s also delivered the fastest Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) time at 355 ms.  

By preloading their LCP image as early as the 17th request, they ensured that users saw the most important content almost immediately. This is a best practice that other brands can emulate to improve their own LCP times.

Instacart: the agile comeback

TTFB is a critical metric that measures how quickly a server responds to a user’s request. Haagen-Dazs led the pack with an exceptional TTFB of just 27ms, but the real story here is Instacart. At first glance, their average TTFB of 1,051ms is eye-opening—especially for a top e-commerce platform. But on game day (February 9th), Instacart demonstrated significant improvements in TTFB.  

By identifying bottlenecks and optimizing accordingly, they ensured peak performance when it mattered most. This is a powerful reminder that preparation and proactive monitoring are key to delivering exceptional user experiences during high-traffic events.

NerdWallet’s unexpected layout shifts

Though many performed well, NerdWallet had a CLS score of 0.47, indicating significant layout shifts that could annoy visitors. Ads, pop-ups, or late-loading elements might be jumping around. Eliminating these jarring movements fosters a more seamless user experience—crucial during high-traffic events like the Super Bowl, where users are likely to be less patient.

NFL: The star player that stumbled

Despite hosting the event itself, the NFL’s site left room for improvement.  

While availability was rock-solid, certain performance metrics—particularly page load time—lagged behind other brands. The NFL’s Super Bowl page averaged 8,594 ms to fully load, making it one of the slowest in our benchmark. This delay was largely due to the high number of requests (461 total requests) required to load the page, which included a mix of first-party and third-party content.

The NFL’s Homepage also struggled with Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), clocking in at 3339 ms, well above the recommended 2.5 seconds.  

LCP measures when the largest content element becomes visible to the user. For the NFL, this delay meant that users saw a blank page for several seconds before the content loaded, which could have led to frustration and higher bounce rates. The LCP element on the NFL Homepage was the Onetrust Policy text, which experienced delays in loading due to blocking scripts or stylesheets.

The NFL’s LCP performance serves as a reminder that text-based LCP elements can be just as critical as images. Optimizing these elements—whether through preloading, reducing blocking resources, optimizing font loading, or streamlining render paths—is essential for delivering a fast, engaging user experience.

The global stage: Why geography matters

Monitoring from real-world locations is crucial for understanding how users in different regions experience website performance and is a unique capability that sets Catchpoint IPM apart.  

Here’s what the data reveals about regional performance disparities for the NFL’s Super Bowl site.

Document Complete Times

Denmark (2725 ms) vs. United States (7631 ms): A 180% difference in load times.

• Why? The U.S. version required 561 requests before Document Complete vs. Denmark’s 264.

• Third-party scripts (e.g., ads, trackers) and unoptimized images in the U.S. added latency.

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)

Denmark (2227 ms) vs. United States (4797 ms): The NFL’s LCP element (Onetrust Policy text) loaded 2x slower in the U.S.

• Why? Delays in font loading and render-blocking scripts in the U.S. version.

These findings highlight how geography can dramatically impact the Super Bowl viewing experience online. Fans in different regions weren’t just seeing slight variations in site speed—some encountered significantly longer load times and delays. Factors like excessive third-party scripts, request load, and render-blocking resources meant that while some users could quickly access scores and highlights, others were left waiting.

The final score  

From Totino’s surprise speed championship to Instacart’s last-minute comeback and the NFL’s somewhat subpar performance, Super Bowl 2025 showcased how web performance can make or break the user experience—especially under massive, real-time pressure. Yet overall, these brands delivered impressively. Here’s the ultimate takeaway: success wasn’t accidental.

Of the 17 brands tested, 7 (41%) relied on Catchpoint WebPageTest for automated testing and continuous monitoring. Their ability to identify bottlenecks, refine caching strategies, and optimize key metrics was critical to rising above the extraordinary Super Bowl traffic. It’s a reminder that even with millions on the line for prime-time ads, investing in Internet Performance Monitoring (IPM) is what ensures every one of those seconds—and every one of those ad dollars—is used to its fullest potential.

Ready to see how your site stacks up?

Start a free test on WebPageTest to get real-time insights into your performance and stay a step ahead—no matter how big the event.

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