As early as September 2018, multiple sources had reported that Maroon 5 were to headline the Super Bowl LIII halftime show, but the NFL had not yet made an official announcement.

[10][11][12][13] In October 2018, it was reported that Pink and Rihanna had each declined an offer to headline, the former because the negotiation process was too lengthy for her taste and the latter due to her support of Colin Kaepernick.

[16] On January 13, 2019, the NFL officially announced that Maroon 5 would headline the show, joined by Scott and Big Boi, an Atlanta native and member of the hip-hop duo Outkast.

[17][18] In an interview, Maroon 5 lead singer Adam Levine explained that the band wanted to bring the halftime show "back to a time when it was a little more simple, when the focus was the connection to the songs.

[23] Maroon 5, Scott, and Big Boi faced criticism for their decision to perform at the halftime show, due to the alleged blacklisting of Colin Kaepernick by the NFL and its franchises for protesting police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem before games.

"[28] In an interview, Kaepernick's attorney, Mark Geragos, compared Maroon 5's participation to strikebreaking, and argued that if the band wanted to cross the "intellectual picket line", they needed to "own it", explaining that "if anything, it's a cop out when you start talking about, 'I'm not a politician, I'm just doing the music.'

"[19] In response to the controversy, Scott agreed to participate in the halftime show only if the NFL joined him in donating $500,000 to Dream Corps, an organization founded by Van Jones that supports social justice efforts.

"[8] Jake Nevins of The Guardian also gave the performance two out of five stars, writing "Adam Levine's torso can't save tedious affair.

"[40] Maeve McDermott of USA Today observed that the performance felt "safe" and "dialed-in", with "zero surprises and nothing that could add to the headache the league has already endured", and noting that Maroon 5's portions of the show relied heavily on early hits from their debut album rather than newer material (aside from "Girls Like You", "Sugar" and "Moves like Jagger").

Feeling that the guest artists were more exciting (although noting Scott's portion, due to the SpongeBob SquarePants introduction and crowd surfing exit, was the only "genuinely weird" moment of the show), she wrote that the choice of Maroon 5 as headliner was "misguided" for a Super Bowl held in Atlanta, the "nexus of hip-hop", and that the show was "distinctive only for how uncontroversial it was, how wholly a missed opportunity it represented, and how much of Levine's truly abysmal dance moves we were all forced to watch.

[41][42] However, fans of the animated show had mixed reaction, with many venting their anger on social media that Maroon 5 did not play the song "Sweet Victory" as requested by the online petition.