Chinese New Year is one of the most important and expensive festival on the marketing calendar across Asia. For many brands, it’s the single biggest seasonal media push of the year, and rightly commands a disproportionate share of Q1 budgets as advertisers compete for your attention and wallets in the run-up to the festive season.
With tight budgets and an environment of economic caution, brands in 2026 have been sceptical of formulaic festive storytelling, many show a clear shift from over-the-top symbolism and find refuge in restraint and every day stories that justify their budgets with both meaning and scale.
Below are some of the campaigns that stood out for their intent. They are worth a watch.
We will keep refreshing this list, so check back often.
Campaign: Kasih Tidak Pernah Lupa
Brand: Air Selangor
Malaysian utility company Air Selangor’s short film tells a tender story about caregiving for a loved one with dementia. The 7+ minute piece follows Mei as she cares for her husband, Lim, whose memory is slipping during the festive season. Everyday tasks, from hanging decorations to prepping food and welcoming guests, are shown through the added weight of her emotional and mental load.
The filmmaking is cinematic but grounded, with scenes focused on small, sincere moments between family. It’s touching without being sentimental, and gives an important, clear-eyed look at what living with dementia is really like without dramatising.
Campaign: Two Sides of Festivities
Brand: Zurich
Insurance firm Zurich Malaysia’s Lunar New Year film looks at the complexities of grieving at a time of celebration. Through the story of a couple trying to keep traditions alive while mourning, the film sits with emotions that are often pushed aside or left unspoken.
Created with creative agency Ensemble, moments of noise and colour are contrasted with quiet moments home, absence feel ever more present. By showing the joyful and the heavy sides of the festive season, the work underlines Zurich’s message that real care often means simply staying close when it hurts the most.
Campaign: Use sports to break the paradox
Brand: Nike
Created by Shanghai-based indie agency Water Creative, Nike's three-part series leans into hyperlocal Chinese humour, riffing on the awkward questions, side-eye comparisons, and gentle digs that surface when families get together over Lunar New Year.
In the first film (see above), salary talk goes sideways when a young woman answers that her “monthly” is 200K—only for the elders to not realise she’s talking about running mileage. The second takes the same one‑upmanship into the career arena, as kids trade titles like CFO and CEO until one claims the real flex: a dad who’s MVP on the court.
The final spot spins the classic “stop playing and go help with chores” scolding into something more playful, as a racket becomes an improvised tool for beating the dust out of rugs.
Campaign: Spin for Your Huat
Brand: Lau Pa Sat
Famed Singapore hawker centre Lau Pa Sat’s new integrated campaign invites diners to quite literally spin their way into the Year of the Horse. From interactive ang baos to zodiac readings, the experience is designed to feel playful and social-first.
At the centre is the Spin the Huat Challenge, an activation that turns family meals into fun, shareable moments. Custom Lazy Susans, printed with auspicious greetings, are placed on selected tables. The campaign wants diners to film POV-style videos from the perspective of a hawker dish—over-the-top, yet feels genuinely joyful rather than gimmicky.
Campaign: What really matters at the CNY table
Brand: Australian Pork
Partnering with Audra Morrice, judge of MasterChef Singapore and cookbook author, Australian Pork looks at what prosperity means in Singaporean homes. The three-part Instagram series stays close to everyday life, focusing on how families cook, share, and eat together.
To see how that plays out in real kitchens, Morrice makes surprise visits to the kitchens of three local food creators: Eric Youn, Daren Teo, and Shuang Yu. The campaign draws on unpolished, unscripted moments as they prepare their favourite dishes, talk through family traditions, and show how pork fits into their Lunar New Year.
Campaign: Happy New Year
Brand: Adidas
Adidas’ pays tribute to China’s next generation of footballers in a new spot. The film follows young players from local academies who trade holiday comforts for winter training. Now one of the largest markets in football, the sport's grassroots scene in China is quickly growing, fuelled by grassroots initiatives and school leagues.
Produced by TBWA Shanghai, the spot swaps melodrama for snowy drills, framing youth football as a place where
hard work, togetherness and long-term hope for China’s World Cup dreams come together.
Campaign: Glad I Met You
Brand: Apple
Apple’s Lunar New Year film tells the story of Lin Wei and a stray dog she names Little White. As the city gears up for the festive season, encounters between the pair slowly pull her out of her routine and back to a sense of emotional home. The 12-minute film is shot entirely on the iPhone 17 Pro.
Created by TBWA Media Arts Lab, Shanghai, the film blends live action and handcrafted stop-motion, using the phone’s zoom and lens range to move between busy streets and intimate interiors without feeling like a tech demo. It’s part of Apple’s long-running CNY film series.
Campaign: Spring Repeats, Yet It’s Always New
Brand: Lululemon
Lululemon’s latest chapter of its ongoing ‘Be Spring’ platform brings together Yo-Yo Ma, actor and brand ambassador Zhu Yilong, and ice-dancing duo Junfei Ren and Jianing Xing. Together, they explore how renewal emerges from repeated practice. The film continues a narrative first set in motion in 2023 and expanded in 2024 through a collaboration with Michelle Yeoh and dancers from the stage production Wing Chun.
This year’s iteration is framed around the idea of returning to one’s beginnings with Yo-Yo Ma’s longstanding relationship with Bach’s Prelude from Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major serving as a metaphor for progression and inner transformation.
Campaign: Spark Every Moment and Let Us Come Together This Chinese New Year
Brand: Coca-Cola
Created with WPP Open X and led by Ogilvy Shanghai, with support from WPP Media, Hogarth and VML Commerce, Coca-Cola's new campaign encourages youths to create joyful, inclusive festive moments that bring different generations together.
Timed to the Year of the Horse, the platform recognises how younger audiences increasingly experiences CNY through digital interactions. Coca-Cola taps into this by encouraging Gen Z to introduce playful, inclusive ideas that bridge on- and offline celebration. The spot shows how they become the ones who keep familial bonds alive in new ways.
Rimowa’s pairs award-winning actor and longtime brand collaborator Greg Hsu with Peking Opera artist Geng Qiaoyun in a film inspired by tangma, rooted in classical Chinese opera.
Directed by Dorothea Sing Zhang, daughter of Peking Opera maestro Geng, the 35-second spot uses tangma as a metaphor for travel. The film opens on a traditional opera stage as Geng performs a tangma sequence with Hsu watching, then moves fluidly between stage and journey scenes to frame travel as an inner journey as much as an outward passage.
RHB’s latest spotlights dignity, labour, and women’s independence. Conceptualised by The Shout Group, the story draws from the real-life journey of Yap Sue Yii and Malaysian social enterprise Komuniti Tukang Jahit, which has grown from a small tailoring initiative into a network empowering hundreds of women from B40 households with skills training and fair income opportunities.
Campaign: Burst of Luck
Brand: Gov.sg
Gov.sg’s Chinese New Year campaign trades in fireworks for a narrative that navigates family ties. Developed with the Ministry of Digital Development and Information and creative agency DSTNCT, the short film follows the comedic chaos of a reunion dinner that unravels after an unexpected mishap forces them to actually look up and pull together.
Directed by Cheng Chai Hong, the films leans into sharp, situational humour rather than soft-focus sentimentality. At its centre is an exasperated matriarch, whose wish for togetherness is repeatedly tested until the night’s chaos gently nudges everyone toward the same. The film comes to a simple conclusion: the most meaningful gift is being truly present with one another
Campaign: 纸为你 (Crafted With Love)
Brand: Marrybrown
Marrybrown's film is a tribute to the delicate art of paper cutting, exploring the ways tradition quietly bind families together. The title itself is a poetic play on words, meaning both “Paper for You” and “Only for You."
Created by Dentsu Creative Malaysia, the 2:41 focuses on how this craft represents symbols of blessing and good fortune. The narrative traces the evolving relationship between a grandmother and her granddaughter through years of closeness, distance, and reunion. As one generation teaches the next, each paper cut represents bonding, shared values, and blessings that feels deeply familiar to local families.
Campaign: 心结 The Promise
Brand: Prudential
Created by Naga DDB Tribal, Prudential Malaysia's short film looks at wealth through the lens of relationships rather than bank balances. The narrative follows a young man unsure if he’s ready to marry and provide for his girlfriend. Through conversations with the God of Prosperity, realises that wealth is something measured in shared journeys and commitment, not just finances. The film borrows the visual language of a serial drama, using close, dialogue-heavy scenes and steady, domestic pacing to build emotional tension around a seemingly ordinary conversation.
Source: Campaign Asia-Pacific
