How to watch Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime performance

It’s so nice of the Eagles and Chiefs to schedule their football game around Kendrick Lamar’s televised concert!

The Pulitzer Prize-winning rapper will headline the Apple Music Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show this year in New Orleans, and fans are already trying to figure out what he has planned.

It’s not K.Dot’s first time performing for halftime — he joined Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, and other hip-hop legends for Super Bowl LVI as a guest artist. But it does mark his first time as a headliner. It will also be his first performance since winning big Sunday at the Grammys with five awards, including song and record of the year for his Drake diss track, “Not Like Us.”

Here’s what we know about the To Pimp a Butterfly artist’s performance and how to watch it.

The Super Bowl will be broadcast on Fox and available for streaming on services that include Hulu, NFL+, YouTube TV, Sling, DirecTV, Fubo, and Tubi.

When halftime starts will depend on how long the first half of the game lasts — sorry, non-footballers, there’s no set time. But kickoff on Sunday is at 6:30 p.m. and each half lasts about an hour and a half once you factor in delays, stoppages, and ad breaks (of which there will be many — Super Bowl ads are kind of a big deal).

All that to say Lamar will probably take the field around 8 p.m.

Lamar already announced that friend, labelmate, and frequent collaborator SZA will join him.

The popular R&B singer and Lamar have worked together multiple times over the years, including on their respective tracks, “30 for 30″ and “luther.” They’ll also be touring together this year starting in April (including a stop at Philadelphia’s Linc in May).

» READ MORE: Kendrick Lamar and SZA are coming to the Linc next summer

SZA announced her Super Bowl cameo last month in a video trailer featuring her dumping a Gatorade cooler over Lamar in slo-mo.

It’s unclear whether any other surprise guests are slated to drop by.

OK, time for some Swiftie clown theories.

Lamar and Swift are past collaborators and friends, with the rapper featured on Swift’s hit single “Bad Blood” — both the original from her 2014 album, 1989, and her 2023 Taylor’s Version. In a viral photo from the Grammys, Swift could be seen toasting to Lamar as he accepted one of his awards.

With Swift already expected to attend the Super Bowl to cheer on her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, some fans are hopeful that she’ll make a pitstop on the field. On TikTok, there are plenty of fan-made remixes with suggestions of how Lamar could smoothly transition from “Not Like Us” into “Bad Blood.”

But nothing official is set, and many of Swift’s fans believe the singer wouldn’t want to take the spotlight away from her boo.

That said, it’s not as though the couple hasn’t mixed work and personal life before. Last year, Kelce famously appeared as a dancer for one of Swift’s Eras Tour performances. Maybe it’s time for Swift to return the favor?

Time will tell if “Bad Blood” gets some halftime love.

Lil Wayne has been vocal about his desire to rep his hometown of New Orleans for this year’s Super Bowl halftime show. When he didn’t get it, the rapper shared with his fans that the decision to go with Lamar “broke” him and he was “hurt a whole lot” by organizers’ choice.

He went on to share that he had spoken to Lamar and was rooting for him.

“I’ve spoken to him, and I wished him all the best, and I told him he better kill it,” Wayne said. He recalled telling Lamar to “kill it.”

So will Weezy make an appearance? It’s not preposterous — Lamar is featured on Wayne’s 2018 track, “Mona Lisa.”

It’s all under wraps, but here’s what we do know: At his 2022 Super Bowl appearance, Lamar performed “M.A.A.D. City” and “Alright.” In more recent performances, Lamar has performed tracks including “Not Like Us” (multiple times at the same performance), “Swimming Pools (Drank),” “Humble,” and “DNA.”

With SZA already confirmed, the likelihood of the pair performing some of their existing songs together — like “Babylon,” “Easy Bake,” “Doves In the Wind,” and “luther” — seems high. Maybe they’ll even pull from their work together on Black Panther The Album.

Super Bowl halftime performances usually last about 12 to 15 minutes.

Other performers slated to perform throughout Super Bowl Sunday include NOLA musicians Trombone Shorty and Jon Batiste.

Trombone Shorty and the Christian singer Lauren Daigle will sing “America the Beautiful.” Batiste will perform the national anthem. Singer-songwriter Ledisi will perform “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” regarded as the Black national anthem.