Interbrand’s Best Global Brands 2025
AI-Powered Valuations and Surging Newcomers
Methodology and Analytical Approach
Interbrand’s Best Global Brands 2025 report leverages unprecedented analytical muscle and data. Over the past year, Interbrand (part of Omnicom) invested $300 million in AI technologies – via Omnicom’s Omni/OmniAI platforms – to enhance real-time consumer data analysis and valuation modeling. The firm also forged new data partnerships with Nasdaq (for extensive financial analysis) and Paradigm Sample (for quantitative consumer research). These investments, alongside a bolstered analytics team, yielded the most in-depth brand valuation study to date: the 2025 report encompasses over 150,000 brand profiles and 200,000+ hours of expert analysis worldwide.
Interbrand’s valuation methodology blends three key components – Financial Performance, Role of Brand, and Brand Strength. The Role of Brand Index (RBI) quantifies how much of a purchase decision is driven purely by the brand (versus factors like price or features), while Brand Strength is a 10-factor score indicating the brand’s ability to create loyalty and sustainable demand into the future. By combining financial results with these brand metrics, Interbrand calculates a brand’s dollar value and uncovers how brand strategy drives business growth.
Top 10 Brands in 2025
Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon continue to hold the top three positions in 2025’s ranking. Apple remains the world’s most valuable brand at $470.9 B (down 4% from 2024). Microsoft (#2) grew 10% to $388.5 billion and Amazon (#3) rose 7% to $319.9 B. Google (#4) saw a 9% increase to $317.1 B. Beyond the Big Four tech giants, Samsung (#5, $90.5 B) and Toyota (#6, $74.2 B) remain in the top tier despite value dips of 10% and a modest 2% gain, respectively. Notably, Instagram has surged into the top ten for the first time – now #8 with a $57.3 B valuation after a 27% jump – reflecting the growing clout of newer digital brands. Coca-Cola (#7, $60.1 B) is the highest-ranked non-tech brand on the list (slipping 2%), and McDonald’s (#9, $53.0 B) also joins the top ten with modest growth. Mercedes-Benz (#10) rounds out the elite group at $50.1 B (down 15%).
The table below shows the top 10 brands, their 2025 brand value, and year-on-year change:
Rank, Brand, Brand Value (USD),% Change from 2024
- Apple – 470.9 billion -4%
- Microsoft – 388.5 billion +10%
- Amazon – 319.9 billion +7%
- Google – 317.1 billion +9%
- Samsung – 90.5 billion -10%
- Toyota – 74.2 billion +2%
- Coca-Cola – 60.1 billion -2%
- Instagram – 57.3 billion +27
- McDonald’s – 53.0 billion +4%
- Mercedes-Benz – 50.1 billion -15%
AI and the Battle for Brand Indispensability
A major theme of the 2025 report is the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and its impact on brands and consumer decision-making. Interbrand argues that AI isn’t creating entirely new challenges for brand leaders so much as “accelerating and exacerbating the existing ones – exponentially.” With consumers increasingly using digital assistants and algorithms to make routine choices, brands risk being disintermediated. The report pointedly asks, “What happens when we delegate these decisions to an algorithm?” – for instance, letting a service like ChatGPT pick your meals or products. Many everyday purchases may indeed be brokered by AI agents rather than by individual preference.
Yet, the human desire for trusted brands is not disappearing; instead, it’s polarizing. Consumers will still actively choose brands for decisions they care deeply about – in these cases, brands need to be truly “desired” rather than just default options. Interbrand emphasizes that brands must become indispensable in consumers’ lives to thrive in the AI era. In fact, the report frames indispensability as the new competitive moat: a high Role of Brand Index means customers deliberately choose your brand, insulating it from being commoditized by algorithmic recommendations. As the report starkly puts it, “in the age of AI, if you’re not indispensable, you’re disposable.”
In other words, brands that fail to differentiate or matter to consumers could see their demand delegated to AI and their offerings become interchangeable.
To quantify this, Interbrand spotlights RBI (Role of Brand Index) as “the crucial long-term metric” for brands in an AI-driven marketplace. RBI measures the degree to which a product is “chosen by humans” versus “brokered by agents” – i.e. how much the brand itself drives choice, rather than price or an AI’s suggestion. A high RBI indicates a brand is strongly preferred (chosen by sentient customers), whereas a low RBI means an AI bot could easily swap in a competitor.
Interbrand’s analysis finds that a high RBI is the best antidote to AI mediation: it reflects a brand so relevant and trusted that consumers seek it out deliberately. In summary, brand loyalty and relevance (as captured by RBI and Brand Strength) become mission-critical in the age of algorithmic curation – only brands seen as truly indispensable will retain control over customer choice.
Record Gains and Rising Brands
This year’s ranking witnessed remarkable shake-ups, including a record number of new entrants and unprecedented growth for certain brands.
“This year, we welcome 12 new entrants – the most significant change since the inception of the ranking in 2000,” noted Interbrand Global CEO Gonzalo Brujó, “We also observe the highest single increase in brand valuation ever recorded – with NVIDIA increasing 116% to reach $43.2B and advancing 21 places to #15.”
NVIDIA’s explosive growth – +116% in brand value – reflects the surging importance of AI and semiconductor technology; it is the largest one-year jump in the history of Best Global Brands.
Another big winner is YouTube, whose brand value soared 61% this year to $48.4 B. YouTube’s double-digit growth underlines the influence of content platforms and the creator economy on consumer attention. Instagram (now #8 globally) also leapt +27%, underpinned by its cultural relevance with younger audiences. The report calls out several fast-rising digital brands – “NVIDIA, Instagram, YouTube, Uber and Netflix power up the ranking,” as the study puts it – many of them leveraging AI, data, or platform business models to fuel brand strength.
Beyond the top ten, new entrants were a major storyline. A total of 12 brands joined the Top 100 for the first time in 2025 – from travel and retail names like Booking.com (#32) and Uniqlo (#47) to fintech and tech firms like Airbnb and Uber. This infusion of new blood is the biggest since the ranking began, illustrating how quickly disruptive companies can attain global brand status.
As Interbrand observes, these newcomers often “do one thing well” and then expand their brands into adjacent arenas of consumer need. By addressing unmet needs with singular focus – whether it’s simplifying travel bookings or popularizing electric vehicles – such brands drive huge value gains. They continuously reaffirm their place in customers’ lives, and as they become synonymous with a core need, they “drive human choice, becoming indispensable – increasingly immune to algorithmic recommendations.”
In short, the biggest risers in 2025 tend to be those leveraging innovation to become must-haves in their category, rather than mere options.
Home-Market Focus and 2026 Outlook
Under the pressure of global uncertainties and technological disruption, many brands are refocusing on their home markets as a strategy to strengthen brand value. Interbrand’s analysis notes that over the past year, several companies “focused more exclusively on their home markets – a rational, value-maximizing focus that can improve their Role of Brand.” In moments of uncertainty, doubling down on core domestic customers can provide stability: brands can better control their narrative, deepen local relationships, and deliver consistent results that investors understand.
The report suggests that concentrating on one’s home country (or primary market) often boosts aspects of brand strength – cultural relevance, customer experience, and trust – which in turn bolsters the Role of Brand Index. In essence, brands that dominate at home create a stronger platform for future global growth, rather than stretching themselves thin worldwide during volatile times.
Overall, Interbrand’s 2025 Best Global Brands report paints a picture of a brand landscape in flux. Total brand value of the Top 100 reached $3.6 trillion (up 4.4%), but this growth is uneven – flowing disproportionately to brands that harness technology, data, and singular focus to become unavoidable in consumers’ lives.
As AI reshapes consumer behavior, the stakes for brand builders are higher than ever: build a brand that algorithms can’t live without, or risk being one the algorithms forget. The companies that understand this – those cultivating loyalty, adaptability, and truly human-centered identities – are not only climbing the 2025 rankings, but are positioning themselves for sustained success in an AI-driven future.
In the words of Interbrand’s study, great brands must be “chosen by humans” now and next – or they may be chosen by no one at all.