JAY-Z Will Headline the Apple Music Super Bowl LXI Halftime Show

By Cole Ashby,

Crowd in a packed indoor arena holding up phone lights toward a brightly lit stage

JAY-Z will headline the Apple Music Super Bowl LXI Halftime Show on Sunday, February 14, 2027, at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California. Apple Music, the NFL and Roc Nation made the announcement Monday night, October 26, during the Dallas Cowboys-Philadelphia Eagles Monday Night Football game on ESPN, according to NFL.com.

Roc Nation has produced the halftime show since it partnered with the NFL in 2019. In the NFL's announcement, Commissioner Roger Goodell says that when the league first reached its agreement with Roc Nation to produce the show, "I had just one request," and that request was for JAY-Z to perform himself one day.

Apple Music: JAY-Z headlines the Apple Music Super Bowl LXI Halftime Show

What this means for Roc Nation's halftime run

Roc Nation's job on the show has two parts. The release, which Roc Nation, Apple Music and the NFL also put out on PR Newswire, says: "The Apple Music Super Bowl LXI Halftime Show telecast will be executive produced by Roc Nation. Hamish Hamilton will serve as director. Roc Nation also serves as the strategic entertainment advisor of the live performance."

NFL.com lists the headliners since the partnership began, including Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, The Weeknd, Rihanna, Usher, Kendrick Lamar and Bad Bunny. This time the company producing the show is also presenting the act that Goodell says he asked for at the start.

My take: that's the business story here. Since 2019, Roc Nation has produced the show around other headliners. Now the act on its stage is JAY-Z, with the league on record that this was the ask from the start. That raises the stakes for the production as much as for the performance.

How to watch the Super Bowl LXI halftime show

The release lists these outlets for Sunday, February 14:

The show airs on ESPN, the same network that carried Monday's announcement. It's also the Super Bowl's second stop at SoFi Stadium, per NFL.com, after Super Bowl LVI in 2022.

What JAY-Z said

The release carries one statement from him:

"From Reasonable Doubt to standing on the Super Bowl Halftime stage, this has been a journey," he said. "Thirty years of music, work, and culture on the world's biggest stage. This run continues to be a dream come true."

The NFL and Apple style his name JAŸ-Z throughout the announcement, and his Apple Music artist page uses the same spelling.

The Reasonable Doubt year

The timing lines up with an anniversary. The release says 2026 was built around a year-long celebration of the 30th anniversary of Reasonable Doubt, his debut album, and that the run included "three sold-out concerts at Yankee Stadium, as well as sold-out concerts in London, Paris and Los Angeles." NFL.com adds that his JAY-Z30 Concert Series played SoFi Stadium on October 23 and 24, the same building he'll headline in February.

The album's ℗ line on Apple Music reads "℗ 1996 S. Carter Enterprises, LLC., under exclusive license to ROC Nation distribution."

JAY-Z: Reasonable Doubt

The release also lists his credentials. It calls him "the first hip-hop artist to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, a four-time Emmy winner, and a 25-time GRAMMY Award winner," and notes he's a 2021 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee.

The bar the last two shows set

The release puts recent shows on the record too. It says Bad Bunny's Super Bowl LX show "made history as the most Emmy-awarded halftime show of all time, earning seven wins." It says Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl LIX show "became the most watched Super Bowl Halftime Show." We covered the chart run that followed that night for SZA in our piece on her 53 weeks in the top ten.

What's not announced yet

Guests and a setlist. Neither the NFL nor Apple Music has named any, and I'm not going to guess. Until they do, Apple Music is running a Road to Halftime page for the show, and the release says Apple Music Radio's Zane Lowe, Eddie Francis and Brooke Reese went live on-air right after the announcement.

We'll update this page when the NFL, Apple Music or Roc Nation adds details, and guest news will run in our hip-hop coverage as soon as it's announced.

Start with: 'Reasonable Doubt'.

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