Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity – statistics & facts

Over the decades, the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity has turned into a global event and an absolute benchmark for the advertising industry. In 2022, it received over 25 thousand entries from over 85 countries. The numbers were even higher before the pandemic: In 2018, those figures stood at 32.3 thousand and 90, respectively. The award portion features a plethora of categories, ranging from film craft to pharma. Among its many concurrent ceremonies, the Young Lions, dedicated to professionals under 30, is perhaps the most well-known – and coveted among the new kids on the advertising and marketing block.

However, after its 2020-2021 online-only edition due to COVID-19, the return to the French Riviera was not smooth. In 2022, Greenpeace activists occupied key event spots, including the opening ceremony, to voice their demands against partnerships between agencies and fossil fuels companies. In the 2023 edition, big tech's mass layoffs may impact the celebrations, at least partially curbing the enthusiasm with the ever-growing digital subsegment. Still, Cannes Lions brings together the sector's top contender while acting as a reminder of the business's soul in an industry where only one out of 10 brands express total confidence in applying creativity with commercial success, according to an early 2022 survey.

The evolution of the Lion: history and money

In 1954 the first International Advertising Film Festival took place in Venice. Fourteen countries and 187 entries competed for the lion-shaped trophy, inspired by the iconic feline statue in St Mark's Square. After being held in Italy and Monaco, the festival landed in Cannes, France, in 1984. Twenty years later, in 2004, the British firm that would later become the business-to-business (B2B) media company Ascential plc acquired the festival for more than 50 million U.S. dollars. Since then, the aura of extravagance and exclusivity continued, at least in part thanks to entry fees that can exceed 2.5 thousand euros as of 2023. The year prior, Ascential's marketing division, responsible for Cannes Lions, surpassed 42 million British pounds in event revenue, higher than in the two previous years combined, albeit still far from pre-pandemic heights.

The Lion kings: top creative winners and award-getters

Whereas part of the festival's income comes from the thousands of campaign entries competing for prizes in various categories, only a few parent companies receive several awards. In 2022, the top three countries with the highest number of lions were the United States, the United Kingdom, and Brazil, all with a long history of good performance at the event. The same year, WPP and Omnicom ranked among some of the holdings that impressed the Cannes jury the most with their work. Both groups accepted hundreds of awards. They also stood amidst the media groups with the highest revenues in 2022, surpassing 14 billion dollars each and suggesting that larger corporations can afford creative ads more systematically.
This text provides general information. Statista assumes no liability for the information given being complete or correct. Due to varying update cycles, statistics can display more up-to-date data than referenced in the text.
Published by J. G. Navarro, Feb 29, 2024

Key insights

Ascential plc's marketing division's event revenue
43m GBP
Countries with the highest number of Lions
U.S., UK, and Brazil
Number of Cannes Lions entries
27k
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