Taylor Swift has traveled all over the world on tour, setting numerous stadium attendance records throughout her career. But there’s still one highly coveted gig she hasn’t yet played: the Super Bowl.
Though rumors about her headlining the coveted halftime show spring up just about every year before the actual performer is announced, the pop star hasn’t yet joined folks such as Kendrick Lamar, Usher, Rihanna and The Weeknd in crossing it off her list. That’s remained true even as she’s become more entrenched in the football world than ever before over the past two years, cheering on her Kansas City Chiefs tight end boyfriend Travis Kelce at many of his games — including two back-to-back Super Bowls — after the pair first started dating in 2023.
Lately, though, fans have been wondering if that’s due to change — and soon. Especially as Swift gears up to release the Oct. 3-slated album The Life of a Showgirl — which she’s promised will be tailored for widespread commercial appeal, with a track list full of “bangers” produced by bona fide hitmakers Max Martin and Shellback — some of the 14-time Grammy winner’s listeners are beginning to suspect that the musician is hinting that the 2026 Super Bowl at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, will feature a spectacular showcase from pop’s biggest showgirl herself.
The announcement for next year’s headliner could be just a few weeks away, as the past few years’ performers have all been unveiled in September. That means the timing of Swift coming out with a new album so soon after 2024’s The Tortured Poets Department would perfectly align with a Super Bowl reveal. (But honestly, baby, who’s counting?)
With all that in mind, Billboard is keeping track of all the ways Swift might be hinting that she’ll play more of a role in next year’s big game than simply supporting her favorite player in the stands. Keep reading to see all the possible clues that the musician is headlining Super Bowl LX below.
The Super Bowl Talk on ‘New Heights’
On Aug. 13, Swift announced the Oct. 3 release date of The Life of a Showgirl at the same time as her debut episode on Travis and Jason Kelce’s New Heights podcast dropped. The topic of the Super Bowl came up casually (or perhaps, not so casually) a couple of times, including when the pop star revealed that she learned she’d purchased the rights to her master recordings just a few months after she attended the 2025 Super Bowl.
She discussed the event — and more specifically, its halftime program — again later on in the episode while detailing how little she used to pay attention to football growing up. “My relationship with sports was like, I grew up in Pennsylvania, I always heard my dad yelling at the screen watching Eagles games,” she said. “I was up in my room playing guitar, learning instruments, playing piano — I was focused on different things. I would go to sporting events so that I could sing the national anthem. I know every halftime show from the Super Bowls, but I didn’t watch the sports.”
Were all of those mentions of the Super Bowl just happenstance, or was Swift hinting at something more? With her, one can never be sure.
The Sourdough
Also on New Heights, Swift just so happened to shout out one of her new favorite hobbies: “Right now we’re deep in a sourdough obsession that has taken over my life … I’m really talking about bread 60% of the time now.”
Why is that significant? Two reasons. Not only is Sourdough Sam the name of the mascot for the San Francisco 49ers — aka the team whose Levi’s Stadium home is the site of next year’s Super Bowl — but the next NFL season-ending game will be the 60th Super Bowl, matching the percentage Swift used to describe her high level of bread talk as of late.
The Suspicious “47”
Much like the topic of the Super Bowl itself, Swift repeatedly brought up a certain number while on New Heights: 47. Following a particularly energetic intro from Jason Kelce listing her accomplishments at the beginning of the episode, the singer said, “Thank you for screaming for like 47 seconds for me, that was so nice!”
Later, when Jason asked how many countries she’d visited over the course of her Eras Tour, Swift quipped, “47,000,” even though the real answer is 21.
Stay with us. In the sequence of 149 total shows Swift played while on her global Eras trek, the 47th one took place in July 2023 at Levi’s Stadium — the same place where SBLX is set to go down next February. The musician also chose a sparkly orange outfit to wear while performing “Shake It Off” at one of her shows in Santa Clara (as pictured above), which was possibly one of the earliest Easter Eggs she deployed to tease the distinctly orange color scheme of her then-unannounced Life of a Showgirl album.
You may be wondering if placing such significance on the numbers 47 and 60 is too much of a stretch — but it’s worth remembering that Swift is a known fan of hiding clues about her next moves in numbers. Even on New Heights, she said, “The art of the Easter Egg … there’s do’s and don’ts. I love numerology, I love math stuff, I love dates. That stuff I find really fun.”
The Levi’s of a ‘Showgirl’
Every brand from Target to Crumbl, FedEx, McDonald’s and more shared Swift-themed posts in light of her stepping into the Showgirl era, but one in particular stands out. Denim company Levi’s — the company behind Levi’s Stadium — shared a video of someone sewing a sparkly orange tag into the pocket of a pair of jeans in honor of the pop star announcing her new album.
“subtle swap for the big day,” the caption read.
Now, the post may have just been Levi’s getting in on the trend. But maybe, just maybe, it was actually the business’ way of hinting that Swift will play at its stadium next February.
The Masters of It All
It’s worth noting that this coming Super Bowl will be the first to ever take place in a world where Swift owns her masters. After spending her career working to gain ownership of her first six albums, the singer was finally able to buy them from Shamrock Holdings in May.
On New Heights, Swift spoke about how meaningful it’s been for her to have control of her life’s work. It also goes without saying that the singer is likely more keen to perform her early hits on the most-watched televised event of the year now that she, and no other entities — such as Scooter Braun, whose initial purchase of her catalog in 2019 she vehemently opposed — will be the only one to benefit financially from the show.
