Industry report · Data as of 11. June 2026
WM 2026 Sponsoren-Check
The official World Cup beer is never mentioned in a single AI answer: the match-night recommendations go to DFB partner Bitburger, Krombacher and Erdinger.
At the start of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the sponsor check shows a split picture: in five of the ten categories examined, the official sponsor also leads the AI recommendations (Adidas, Lenovo, Hyundai/Kia, Visa, McDonald's).
The gaps are just as striking: the official World Cup beer Michelob Ultra and Budweiser do not appear in a single answer, and the rest of the AB InBev portfolio remains a footnote with isolated mentions (Stella Artois, Leffe, Löwenbräu); for match night, the models instead recommend Krombacher, Erdinger, Augustiner and Bitburger, the latter even with its World Cup special edition. In German AI answers, the beer category thus goes to the DFB partner rather than the FIFA sponsor: Bitburger has been an official partner of the German national teams since 2025.
Coca-Cola is never named: the models recommend generic "cola", and from the company portfolio only Fanta and Sprite appear once each.
TV sponsor Hisense remains practically invisible next to Samsung, LG and TCL, and Qatar Airways trails Lufthansa, Delta and United. Even on the World Cup jersey question, Adidas leads Nike only narrowly (10 vs. 9 mentions): World Cup context alone barely shifts AI recommendations toward the sponsors.
21 Queries Sample: 273 AI models: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity
The 10 most visible brands in AI answers
Ranked by AI prominence, a consolidated 0–100 visibility score: how often a brand is named, across how many AI models, at what position, and in what sentiment. Two further factors (recommendation strength, momentum) cannot be measured here and remain hidden.
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Visa appears in 10% of queries across all four measured AI platforms, showing a purely AI-driven visibility profile since it does not rank in the top 10 of classic web search. The brand secures a notably high average AI answer position of 1.4. All 14 of its AI mentions are either positive or neutral, with zero negative sentiment recorded.
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Adidas is cited in 14% of queries across all four AI platforms and maintains an average classic web search rank of 5.5, indicating solid visibility in both environments. The brand achieves an average AI answer position of 2.5 alongside a high run consistency of 89%. The data reveals a significant volume of favorable sentiment, accumulating 41 positive and 17 neutral mentions with no negative remarks.
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Tfbank is cited in 5% of queries across all four AI assistants, displaying an AI-only visibility profile as it remains outside the top 10 in classic web search. Despite its narrower query coverage, the brand achieves a 100% run consistency and an average AI position of 2.2. Every recorded AI mention of the brand is positive, resulting in 14 positive citations and zero neutral or negative ones.
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Lufthansa appears in 10% of queries across all four measured AI platforms and also ranks in classic web search with an average position of 9.0. The brand shows a distinct visibility gap between the two channels, achieving a much higher average position of 2.4 in AI answers compared to its traditional search ranking. Its presence is supported by a 79% run consistency and a sentiment profile of 16 positive and 3 neutral mentions.
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LG is cited in 10% of queries across all four AI platforms, relying exclusively on AI visibility since it does not appear in the top 10 of classic web search. The brand records an average AI answer position of 2.8 but exhibits a relatively low run consistency of 42%. Its sentiment profile is heavily skewed toward positive citations, featuring 17 positive mentions alongside just one neutral remark.
| # | Brand | Prominence | Tier |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6 |
Tcl
tcl.com
|
67.1 | Big Name |
| 7 |
Nike
nike.com
|
66.9 | Big Name |
| 8 |
Dacia
dacia.de
|
66.3 | Big Name |
| 9 |
Puma
puma.com
|
65.9 | Big Name |
| 10 |
Hanseatic Bank
hanseaticbank.de
|
65.9 | Big Name |
Your brand not in the top 10? The free scan shows whether ChatGPT and Gemini recommend it.
Start free scanSame brands, different visibility
Brands present in both channels, normalized to the per-channel peak and sorted by asymmetry. A long AI bar next to a short web-search bar means the brand is named disproportionately often by AI models even though it barely appears in organic web-search results. The reverse holds too.
Normalized per channel to the peak · sorted by |Δ|
Normalized per channel to the peak · sorted by |Δ|
Normalized per channel to the peak · sorted by |Δ|
Normalized per channel to the peak · sorted by |Δ|
Normalized per channel to the peak · sorted by |Δ|
AI top 10 vs. web-search top 10
On the left, the brands named most often in AI answers; on the right, the brands most visible in classic web-search results. Pink lines connect brands that appear in both top-10 lists.
10 AI only 0 in both 10 web search only
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1
Adidas stabil58 Nennungen
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2
AutoScout24 stabil42 Nennungen
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3
Nike stabil36 Nennungen
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4
33 Nennungen
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5
33 Nennungen
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1
DIE WELT⌀ Rank 4,4 · 5 Treffer
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2
Essen-Und-Trinken⌀ Rank 4,5 · 4 Treffer
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3
Faz⌀ Rank 5,0 · 4 Treffer
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4
ntv.de⌀ Rank 3,3 · 3 Treffer
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5
Hifi⌀ Rank 3,7 · 3 Treffer
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Download PDFMethodology
Achtung.app sends typical German-language queries for each industry to classic web search and to the active AI models. Queries are brand-free, so results show which brands surface organically. Both channels receive identical prompts so answers can be compared directly. Every brand named in the responses is extracted and consolidated on its canonical domain. The classic-web-search source is Brave Search, a Google-independent organic index.
Sponsor check for the 2026 FIFA World Cup: we examined ten product categories with an official World Cup sponsor, from sportswear (Adidas) to TVs (Hisense). Each category was tested with one neutral purchase question and one World-Cup-framed variant, 21 queries in total. This makes it possible to measure whether World Cup context shifts AI recommendations toward the sponsors. The queries deliberately contain no brand names and no questions about the sponsors themselves, so sponsor lists cannot distort the measurement. Each query runs 3 times per AI model, each with live web search per request; classic web search serves as the comparison via a single top-10 fetch. Models queried: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity. Collected on 11 June 2026, at the start of the tournament. Sponsor attribution follows the official FIFA tiers (FIFA Partners and 2026 World Cup Sponsors); the beer category is attributed to AB InBev, the company behind the official World Cup beer Michelob Ultra. We count brand mentions by name. For corporate sponsors (AB InBev, The Coca-Cola Company, Frito-Lay/PepsiCo), the category verdict refers to the activated sponsor brand; portfolio brands such as Stella Artois, Löwenbräu, Fanta or Doritos are reported separately in the analysis. Sponsors without a meaningful consumer purchase question in the DACH market are not covered (Aramco, Bank of America, Verizon, Mengniu, Unilever). Platforms and infrastructure (e.g. Google Analytics, Instagram, YouTube) are excluded from the brand list because they are marketing channels, not competitors. The report measures presence in AI answers, not the advertising impact of the sponsorship.
Frequently asked questions about this report
How is the AI prominence score calculated?
AI prominence is a 0–100 score built from four measured factors: in how many queries the brand is named (coverage), how many of the evaluated AI platforms cite it (breadth), where it appears in the answers (position), and how the mentions read (sentiment). Only measured values go in — no estimates.
Which AI platforms does the report evaluate?
This report is based on answers from ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity. Each query was asked multiple times per platform; the details are in the methodology note above.
How current is the data?
The numbers come from the collection run of 11. June 2026. Custom reports are a one-time collection.
Does ranking first mean the brand is the best?
No. The ranking measures how visible a brand is in AI answers, not the quality of its products or services. A high AI prominence means AI assistants name the brand frequently and prominently when users ask questions in this field.
Why is a specific brand missing?
The report only lists brands that appeared in the AI answers or in the classic web search top 10 for the tested queries. If a brand is missing, it was not named for this query set; that says nothing about other topic areas. Pure platform and infrastructure domains are deliberately excluded.
Can I reuse the data?
Yes. The published figures and rankings are licensed under CC BY 4.0: you may share and reuse them as long as you credit Achtung.app as the source and link to this page.
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