The first Grand Prix winners of Cannes Lions 2026 have been announced, marking the Festival’s opening wave of highly awarded work across Audio & Radio, Creative B2B, Creative Brand, Health & Wellness, Health for Good, Pharma, Print & Publishing, and Outdoor.
Monday’s winners included work for Hyundai Puerto Rico, SKF, Anheuser-Busch InBev, The Ordinary, Caritas, Novartis, Heinz, and Mercado Livre. The early results reflected several of the major themes already shaping the 73rd Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity: brand systems, cultural specificity, health advocacy, sustainability, AI-enabled utility, and the continued power of simple product truths.
Simon Cook, CEO, LIONS, noted, “The body of winning work selected by our Jurors clearly demonstrates creativity as a growth driver for people, business, and society, setting the global creative benchmark. Thank you to all our Jurors for your commitment, generosity of time, and depth of expertise in establishing the work that is raising the creative bar.”
Hyundai
In Audio & Radio, Hyundai Puerto Rico won the Grand Prix for “Coquí Alarmed,” created by BBDO Puerto Rico. The campaign responded to a tourist’s Reddit post asking how to silence Puerto Rico’s beloved coquí frogs, whose distinctive call is widely considered part of the island’s cultural identity.
Rather than quiet the sound, Hyundai Puerto Rico made it unavoidable. The brand replaced the standard lock and unlock alert in Hyundai rental cars with the real sound of the coquí at Avis, Enterprise and Charlie Car Rental locations. Neck hangers in the vehicles explained the frog’s cultural significance, turning a tourist complaint into a celebration of Puerto Rican pride. Listen below:
SKF
The Creative B2B Grand Prix went to Swedish bearing and seal manufacturer SKF for “Faroe Islands Space Program,” created with Nord Stockholm. Despite the name, the work was not about space travel. It used the language and cultural fascination around space exploration to spotlight tidal energy in the Faroe Islands.
The campaign centered on Luna, an underwater kite that silently harvests energy from tidal streams powered by the moon. Developed with tidal energy company Minesto Faroese and public energy company Sev, the project helped draw attention to the Faroe Islands’ goal of relying entirely on renewable energy by 2030.
Anheuser-Busch InBev
Anheuser-Busch InBev won the inaugural Creative Brand Grand Prix, a new award created to recognize internal creative capabilities that drive sustained business results. AB InBev was honored in the talent and workplace culture subcategory, further underscoring the Festival’s growing focus on how brands build the systems that drive creative excellence.
Mastercard also won a Creative Brand Lion in the collaboration and partnership models subcategory. The new category offers a deeper look at the operating models, cultures, and capabilities that help brands produce award-level work over time.
The Ordinary
In Health & Wellness, The Ordinary won the Grand Prix for “The Periodic Fable,” created by Uncommon Creative Studio and Smuggler London. The campaign took aim at the beauty industry’s reliance on vague and scientifically questionable marketing language.
The work spoofed the periodic table, replacing real elements with beauty buzzwords such as “magic,” “pore erasing,” and “eliminates scars.” A dystopian film showed consumers in a sterile classroom performing ritualized skincare routines while chanting marketing jargon. A companion microsite allowed visitors to explore the fake elements and learn why the claims were scientifically meaningless.
Caritas
The Health Grand Prix for Good went to “Vehicle of Hope” for Caritas, created by Differ Stockholm and Colony Stockholm. The project transformed a popemobile used by Pope Francis in Bethlehem into a pediatric mobile clinic for children in Gaza.
Equipped by Caritas Jerusalem with support from Caritas Sweden, the vehicle was designed to provide basic healthcare, including vaccinations, infection testing, oxygen, and emergency treatment, in areas where medical infrastructure has been devastated. The work served as both a practical aid and a symbolic advocacy, using one of the Catholic Church’s most recognizable vehicles to draw attention to children in need.
Novartis
In Pharma, Novartis won the Grand Prix for “Relax Your Tight End,” its Super Bowl campaign created by Fallon Minneapolis. Directed by Eric Wareheim, the spot used football humor to bring levity to prostate cancer screening.
The campaign featured tight ends, including Rob Gronkowski and George Kittle, in relaxed settings, along with Super Bowl-winning coach and prostate cancer survivor Bruce Arians, who delivered the campaign’s central message about early detection. The work highlighted how Novartis is promoting a blood test option rather than relying on the traditional prostate exam.
The Print & Publishing Grand Prix went to Heinz Ketchup for “Looks Familiar,” a global campaign from Rethink. The idea pointed out that French fry boxes around the world often resemble Heinz’s Keystone logo.
Heinz
The campaign extended the brand’s “It Has to Be Heinz” platform through print, out-of-home, digital, social influencer work, Uber Eats integrations, and restaurant tie-ins. The simplicity of the observation helped turn packaging familiarity into a brand claim.
Print & Publishing Jury President, Jessica Apellaniz, Chief Creative Officer, Wieden+Kennedy, Mexico, added, “The Grand Prix had to be Heinz. What we rewarded wasn’t the absence of the product. We rewarded the presence of the brand. The campaign trusted the audience, trusted years of consistency, and trusted that a brand built over time could do the work. Its simplicity wasn’t an executional choice – it was proof of extraordinary confidence. In a year obsessed with adding more, the best work had the confidence to remove.”
Field Barcode
Mercado Livre won the Outdoor Grand Prix for “Field Barcode,” created by GUT São Paulo. The Brazilian e-commerce company transformed São Paulo’s Pacaembu soccer stadium into a 140-meter barcode during a match between Corinthians and Boca Juniors.
Viewers in the stadium, on TV, and on YouTube could scan the barcode to unlock a 25 percent discount. AI helped ensure the code could be read even when partially scanned or viewed from different angles. According to the entry, the activation generated 53,000 coupon uses and $1.78 million in sales.
Monday’s Grand Prix winners gave Cannes Lions 2026 an opening snapshot of where the industry’s attention is moving. The awarded work was not limited to traditional campaign craft. It stretched across brand infrastructure, cultural participation, public health, sustainability, live experience, and commerce.
As the Festival continues through the week, the first set of winners suggests Cannes is rewarding work that does more than deliver a message. It is honoring ideas built to move through culture, solve problems, and create measurable value.
Outdoor Jury President, Aaron Starkman, Global Chief Creative Officer, Rethink, Global, shared, “Awarding ‘Field Barcode’ the Grand Prix was pure joy. Before the Jury even met in Cannes, I saw a soccer pitch reimagined as a giant barcode and fell in love with it. That same reaction was what I hoped the Jury would share. Outdoor is about being seen in the real world, not online. It’s a physical experience that stops you in your tracks, proving the world’s oldest medium is still our most surprising way to connect.”
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