Yougov: WhatsApp is the most popular brand worldwide
Based on more than six million consumer surveys across 28 markets, the ranking shows which brands had the strongest brand image in 2025. Adidas once again secured 5th place as the top German brand.
WhatsApp has risen to become the most popular brand worldwide in the calendar year 2025. This is shown by the latest YouGov Best Brand Rankings 2026, which are based on over six million consumer surveys in 28 markets. The messenger service, which belongs to the Meta Group, achieved an average Index Net Score of 41.5, overtaking the South Korean electronics group Samsung, which landed in second place with 41.4.
YouTube, Google's video portal, ranked third in the observation period from January to December 2025 with a score of 41.1, down one place compared to the previous year. As in the previous year, Google itself is in 4th place with a score of 38.6.
Adidas remains the strongest German brand
The most popular German brand in this year's ranking is once again the sports outfitter Adidas. As in the previous year, Adidas achieved 5th place in the Top Global Brands with a score of 35.3, placing it directly ahead of its US competitor Nike, which came in 6th place (34.5).
Other German brands are also represented in the global top 50: The skincare brand Nivea from Beiersdorf in 12th place (30.5), Mercedes-Benz in 28th place (23.5), Bosch in 36th place (22.6), BMW in 37th place (22.4) and the sports outfitter Puma in 43rd place (20.9).
Felix Leiendecker, Head of Products Team DACH at YouGov, says: "The current trend towards a better balance between performance and brand marketing clearly shows that the brand is increasingly moving back to the center of corporate strategies and is taking on an increasingly central role for companies. This development makes it clear that companies are not only focused on short-term success and measurable results, but also regard long-term brand strengthening as an essential element of their marketing strategy."
Top 10 global brands at a glance
Streaming service Netflix from the USA achieved 7th place with an index score of 34.1, moving up one place compared to the previous year. The British disinfectant company Dettol (33.0) climbed to 8th place in the current ranking. The US dental and oral hygiene brand Colgate is ranked 9th (32.9), falling two places compared to the previous year. The last place in this year's top 10 was taken by Japanese car manufacturer Toyota with an index score of 32.3.
No longer part of last year's top 10 is the furniture group IKEA, which is ranked 14th this year.
Germany: Lego and dm lead the ranking
In the observation period from January 1 to December 31, 2025, Lego leads the Best Brand Ranking for Germany as the most popular brand (index score 50.3). It is followed by dm in second place with 50.2 and PayPal in third place with 48.6. Samsung (46.0) is in fourth place and Bosch (45.1) is in fifth place.
Rank 6 in the German ranking is held by WhatsApp (43.1), the overall winner in the global ranking. Seventh place goes to Adidas (41.8), eighth place to Nivea (41.1) and ninth place to Aldi (40.6). Finally, Google achieved tenth place with an index score of 39.6.
Lufthansa is the largest improver in Germany
The German airline Lufthansa was able to improve its image on the German market the most in 2025 compared to the previous year. The Index-Net score of the German top improver averaged 31.8 in the calendar year 2025, compared to 26.6 in the previous year 2024. Lufthansa thus achieved an annual average improvement of +5.2, the largest improvement of all around 1500 brands tracked in the YouGov BrandIndex for Germany.
The kitchen appliance manufacturer Ninja can boast the second largest improvement in brand image compared to the previous year (+5.0). It is followed by Lego (+3.2), Deutsche Bank (+3.0) and Netflix (+2.6) in fifth place.
Methodology of the ranking
The results of the YouGov Best Brand Rankings 2026 are based on over six million online interviews that YouGov conducted for the BrandIndex on a representative basis for the respective population. The brand rankings are based on the index values of the brands from the YouGov BrandIndex in the observation period January 1, 2025 to December 31, 2025.
The index value of a brand stands for its average performance in six different evaluation dimensions: General impression, quality, value for money, customer satisfaction, willingness to recommend and employer image. Positive and negative consumer ratings on the individual evaluation dimensions are offset against each other in advance (net score).
To qualify for the rankings, brands must be tracked in at least 10 of the 28 markets analyzed. The markets must be tracked across at least 8 sectors. The analyzed markets are: Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States and Vietnam.
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