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For the fourth consecutive year, Apple has topped Kantar’s BrandZ Most Valuable Global Brands report, a 237-page analysis of brand value and consumer perception over the past two decades.
At $1.3 trillion, Apple’s brand value has risen 28% year-over-year, according to the 20th annual report, released on Thursday.
The BrandZ report measures brand value through financial performance (such as revenue and profitability) and consumer perception. This methodology quantifies the intangible value of brands in consumers’ minds and is accredited by the Marketing Accountability Standards Board.
The 2025 ranking is based on insights from 4.5 million respondents across 54 markets, covering 22,000 brands in 538 categories. This year, the world’s top 100 brands reached a combined value of $10.7 trillion—a 29% increase from 2024.
On average, brand accounts for 33% of a company’s total value, a figure that continues to rise.
“We set out to understand… the biggest lessons and takeaways from the last 20 years, that we want to take [into] the next 20,” Ellie Thorpe, director of Kantar BrandZ, told ADWEEK. “The ultimate finding is something that we’ve been saying for years now, but really, we wanted to reiterate again: brand is so important to businesses.”
Tech brands dominate the rankings
Tech companies dominated this year’s rankings, with Apple followed by Google (No. 2), Microsoft (No. 3), Amazon (No. 4), and Nvidia (No. 5) in the top five slots.
Nvidia, Huawei, VMware, Xiaomi, and Instagram had the biggest gains year on year, each achieving more than 100% brand value growth. According to Thorpe, ChatGPT is the highest ranking new entrant in the Top 100, followed by Stripe. Spotify also re-entered the Top 100 this year.
While ChatGPT is as the top AI-driven entrant, Thorpe noted that AI’s influence extends beyond tech brands.
“If you look at a brand like Zara, which is performing ahead of the apparel sector, it’s really leveraging AI within its business to better predict its inventory, to better support its operations, to enhance the customer experience,” she said, also pointing to Chipotle’s investment in AI to improve operational efficiency and customer interactions.
Meanwhile, retail brands continued their post-pandemic momentum, with the sector’s overall brand value rising 48%.
Internationally, India’s Airtel was the fastest-growing telecom brand globally, and Argentina’s Mercado Libre remained the only Latin American brand in the ranking. Canada’s RBC led financial services brands with a 43% year-over-year increase.
And Chinese brands like Xiaomi and Anta have doubled their presence in the Top 100 this year.
Disruptor brands drive growth
Disruptor brands account for 71% of the total value in the BrandZ Global Top 100, reflecting their outsized role in driving growth across all sectors.
However, Thorpe cautioned that disruption alone isn’t enough to build a valuable brand. “If you’re disrupting for disruption’s sake, you’re not going to succeed because you need to be really in tune with what people in your category really want from you.”
Despite the rise of disruptors, 39 legacy brands, including Coca-Cola, Louis Vuitton, and Hermès, have remained in the ranking since Kantar’s inaugural study in 2006. “I think it’s quite an impressive number,” Thorpe said.
Bucking pricing pressure
Strong brands have been able to justify their pricing, even amid inflationary pressures.
“Consumers… really [need] to perceive brands to be worth the price they pay in order to keep coming back to them,” Thorpe said. “The brands in the Top 100 are much better at justifying their prices.”
Thorpe said that brands that are “meaningful” and “different” have “a really clear growth advantage over the longer term.”
She warned that reducing marketing budgets during economic uncertainty is a short-sighted move.
“Marketing is often seen as a cost and not as a critical investment. We really want to change that narrative, because we’ve seen from experience the risk of going dark,” she said. “In the long term, it will damage your brand.”
Correction 5/16 at 7:00am ET: An earlier version of this story grossly misstated the value of Apple’s brand value. It has been corrected.
