ANKARA, Turkiye: Apple still reigned supreme among the world’s most valuable brands in 2026, according to Brand Finance’s Global 500 2026 report set for release Tuesday, Anadolu Ajansi reported.
The iPhone maker was again world’s most valuable brand with an estimated brand value of US$607.6 billion, rising from last year’s US$574.5 billion, according to the list.
Apple was followed by Microsoft with US$565.3 billion and Google with US$433.1 billion. Last year, Microsoft’s value was around US$461.1 billion and Google’s was US$413 billion.
Amazon came in fourth among the most valuable brands with US$369.9 billion, followed by chipmaker Nvidia with US$184.3 billion, Chinese firm TikTok with US$153.3 billion, American retailer Walmart with US$141 billion, South Korea’s Samsung with US$119.2 billion, Facebook with US$107 billion, and Chinese State Grid Corporation (SGCC) with US$102.4 billion.
The list showed that US brands dominated the list with 192 firms, followed by 68 Chinese firms, 33 Japanese, 33 French, 26 German, and 25 UK-based brands.
Muhterem Ilguner, Turkiye director at Brand Finance, told Anadolu that global economic growth has been sluggish, but Brand Finance data showed a different picture.
“The value of the world’s 500 most valuable companies increased 10 per cent compared to the previous year, totaling US$10.4 trillion,” he said, noting that the growth of the world’s 500 most valuable brands exceeded the global economic growth of 3.2 per cent, citing UN data.
He noted that the US accounted for 53.4 per cent of the total brands on the list, while China had a 15 per cent share among the Global 500 2026, worth a total of US$1.6 trillion.
Ilguner said Germany had a 5.6 per cent share in the Global 500 this year worth US$580.2 billion, while Japan had a 4.7 per cent share worth US$490 billion and France had a four per cent share worth US$426.5 billion. In the meantime, Argentina had the lowest share with one brand worth US$6 billion.
The highest-ranking sector in terms of brand value was banking with 79 brands, totaling US$1.3 trillion in brand value, making up 12.5 per cent of the Global 500, followed by the media sector with 25 brands worth US$1.1 trillion, the electronics sector with 17 brands worth US$835.4 billion, the internet and software sector with 11 brands worth US$759.4 billion, and the retail sector with 40 brands worth US$707 billion.
The lowest value was seen in a mining and iron-steel brand worth US$5.5 billion, he said.
“The highest rise in brand value was seen in the UK-based fintech firm Revolut with a 239 per cent surge year-on-year, while Tesla saw the largest decline with 35.8 per cent,” he added.
“Turkish firms did not make the cut this year, and the value gap between the most valuable Turkish brand and the brand at the bottom of this list (worth US$5.2 billion) showed that it has been widening for the past 10 years,” he noted.
“While other countries are enriching themselves through brands, Turkiye needs to prioritise branding,” he added. – BERNAMA-ANADOLU
