U2 to headline halftime at the NFL’s first Thanksgiving Eve game

U2 will headline the halftime show at the NFL’s first-ever Thanksgiving Eve game, Netflix announced on 20 October. The Green Bay Packers face the Los Angeles Rams on 25 November at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, with kickoff at 8 p.m. ET, streaming live on Netflix.

The Bono-led band returns to a football halftime stage after their Super Bowl XXXVI show in 2002. Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos called it “an unforgettable night for football fans”. According to Billboard, the NFL’s partnership with Netflix previously brought Beyoncé’s Christmas Day halftime show in 2024 and, a year later, Snoop Dogg’s Holiday Halftime Party at the Detroit Lions vs. Minnesota Vikings game.

The performance lands just after the band’s 16th studio album, “Carnaval de Luz”, due on 13 November, which has so far been previewed with “Street of Dreams”, “Silencio” and “The Greatest Show on Earth”. According to Consequence, the band’s world tour “The Greatest Show on Earth” launches in 2027. Billboard also notes that U2’s 2023 Las Vegas Sphere residency grossed $244.5 million and sold 663,000 tickets across 40 shows, per Billboard Boxscore.

U2 formed in Dublin in 1976 and are marking their 50th anniversary this year. In October mbuzz reported that the band released the single “The Greatest Show On Earth” with the first dates of their 2027 stadium tour, and that the new album is getting a limited-edition vinyl with Jack White’s Third Man Records.