Coca-Cola’s effort looks decent, but are the AI grinches silenced?

Following last year’s ill-advised AI outing, Coca-Cola’s Christmas Advert 2025, the (also) AI-powered ‘Holidays Are Coming’ is far more like it. But will you be raising a glass?

Last year’s trio of AI-generated holiday spots by everyone’s favourite fizzy pop beverage provider were, well, something of a humbug. Criticised for their awkward visual flows, these soulless facsimiles weren’t exactly brimming with nostalgia and warmth. Coca-Cola, however, has ploughed on (it’s Christmas, allow me another pun please) undeterred.

Partnering with San Francisco-based studios Secret Level and Silverside AI to produce a brand-new, globally distributed version of the iconic trucks advertisement, Coca-Cola’s 2025 Christmas advert retreads the hallowed ‘Holidays Are Coming’ ads, leaning into GenAI for its visuals and production workflow.

It’s hard to know exactly 'how much’ AI was used here, but the new film uses OpenAI Sora, Google Veo 3, Luma AI and a tiny team refined over 70,000 video clips in just one month, producing multiple versions for different markets.

Coca-Cola’s head of generative AI, Pratik Thakar, calls this approach a “transformational leap” and insists that human artistry (especially in the music) remains central.

While the ad scored high marks (5.9/6) in System1’s brand-growth index, there’s been much decrying of the toll on human labour time the ad’s production process took, not to mention the visuals still not ‘popping’ for many.

Our take

There has been an undoubted step up in the visuals this year, but going into it knowing it is AI makes it hard not to bring in your own personal biases, and even over-scrutiny to the Christmas table. So take this comment with a pinch of cinnamon.

For me, it’s certainly not a turkey, but hardly a cracker either. My bugbear was a weird one: I thought the animals could’ve been more imaginatively rendered, with a little more ‘character’, but otherwise the visual spectacle felt like an upping of the ante. Visually, there is a little blurring on the pans, which feels a little petty to point out, and surely something AI will master in no time, given a broader timeline.

The proper comparison should be to other CGI ads, and frankly, Disney’s effort this year and last tops it fairly concisely. There’s just more of ‘soul’ to those ads, and less of an 'uncanny valley' feel.

I think AI will improve in all these areas, and given Coca-Cola’s steadfast dedication to the medium, it seems its ads will be something of a year-on-year yardstick of AI’s progress, or otherwise.

For now, though, there’s something more functional rather than lovable about the effort. I’ve long gotten over the inevitability of AI in ads, but I don’t see that it’ll be as necessary, or practical, as many fear.