Taylor Swift is finally setting the record straight — revealing why she won’t be performing at the 2026 Super Bowl halftime show.
The pop megastar, 35, appeared on the Monday, Oct. 6 episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to promote her record-breaking new album The Life of a Showgirl — but it was an unaired segment that had everyone buzzing.
In the extra chat, Fallon ran through a list of rumors swirling around the superstar — including one claiming she turned down an invitation to perform at the Super Bowl halftime show, a gig that ultimately went to Puerto Rican hitmaker Bad Bunny.
Fallon even asked if she’d passed because the league wouldn’t allow her to own the performance footage, now that she controls her entire creative catalog after buying back the rights to her music and videos earlier this year.
Swift immediately shut it down.
‘No,’ she said, before launching into a detailed explanation — one that even involved Jay-Z, whose company Roc Nation has overseen halftime show selections since 2019.
Taylor Swift is finally setting the record straight — revealing why she won’t be performing at the 2026 Super Bowl halftime show
Swift also pointed out that her personal life makes the timing complicated — after all, she’s engaged to NFL star Travis Kelce, who’s helped lead the Kansas City Chiefs to three Super Bowl victories in 2020, 2023, and 2024
‘Here’s the thing,’ she began. ‘Jay Z has always been very good to me. Our teams are very close. They sometimes will call and say how does she feel about… and that’s not an official offer or a conference room conversation.’
Swift also pointed out that her personal life makes the timing complicated — after all, she’s engaged to NFL star Travis Kelce, who’s helped lead the Kansas City Chiefs to three Super Bowl victories in 2020, 2023, and 2024.
‘We’re always able to tell (Jay-Z) the truth, which is that I am in love with a guy who does that sport on that actual field,’ she told Fallon.
She went on to describe how nerve-wracking it is to watch Kelce play.
‘That is violent chess,’ Swift said. ‘That is gladiators without swords. That is dangerous. The whole season I am locked in on what that man is doing on the field. Can you imagine if he’s out there every single week putting his life on the line, doing this very dangerous, very high-pressure, high-intensity sport, and I’m like, ‘I wonder what my choreo should be. I think we should do two verses of ‘Shake It Off’ into ‘Blank Space’ into ‘Cruel Summer’ would be great.’”
She clarified it wasn’t about Kelce discouraging her — quite the opposite. “This is nothing to do with Travis, he would love for me to do it. I’m just too locked in,” she explained.
Fans had been convinced Swift was secretly teasing a Super Bowl appearance after she joked during the Aug. 13 New Heights podcast that she thinks about bread “60% of the time” — a possible wink, they thought, to Levi’s Stadium mascot Sourdough Sam, where the 2026 game will take place. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell didn’t help when he teased on Today that Swift would “maybe” headline the show.
But on Sept. 28, it was officially confirmed that Bad Bunny would take the stage for the Apple Music Super Bowl LX Halftime Show.
During the same Tonight Show segment, Swift also addressed another viral rumor — that she teased Selena Gomez at her recent wedding to Benny Blanco by saying, “Hey, you beat me to the altar.”
Another firm “no.”
“I got to see her be the most elegant, gorgeous — not only bride but just — vision that I’ve ever seen in my life. I’ve never seen anything so beautiful as her on her wedding day,” Swift said of Gomez’s Sept. 27 ceremony.
Her Tonight Show appearance marked her first since the Midnights era in 2022.
Swift released The Life of a Showgirl at midnight on Friday, Oct. 3, and within hours, it shattered Spotify’s record for the most-streamed album in a single day in 2025.
“I can’t tell you how proud I am to share this with you, an album that just feels so right,” Swift wrote on Instagram after its release, thanking longtime collaborators Max Martin and Shellback.
“A forever thank you goes out to my mentors and friends Max and Shellback for helping me paint this self-portrait,” she added. “If you thought the big show was wild, perhaps you should come and take a look behind the curtain…”
