This year’s annual Adobe Creative Trends Forecast found that the top trends for 2025 reflect a desire for both escapism and reality, with creators leaning into imaginative and surreal new visuals, humorous perspectives and immersive experiences, with retrofuturism capturing the convergence between the two.
According to Mastercard, spending on travel and experiences increased by 65 per cent between 2019 and 2023.
Years of digital world-building, especially in gaming, have fuelled consumer appetite for dreamlike images. Generative AI is now being seen more in traditionally produced commercial projects.
Humour has long been the media’s secret sauce, and this trend hasn’t altered, with 90 per cent of consumers more likely to remember funny ads over serious ones.
Representing the next wave of comedic perspectives in brand messaging, the use of humour should be used to make content more engaging and memorable. Brands are discovering that memes and other funny posts are shared more often than serious posts on social platforms and are responding by crafting humorous posts to reach larger audiences.
The report found that by embracing a casual, playful tone, companies are building more personal connections with consumers, making their brands feel more relatable and human. This trend allows creators to approach serious issues without being heavy-handed or divisive, boosting engagement with sharable experiences that are at once joyful and meaningful.
Turbocharged by AI, a retrofuturism trend blends futuristic components with historical and vintage elements, pulling styles from ancient Rome, the Roaring Twenties, the groovy seventies and beyond, to create a nostalgic yet modern aesthetic. Generative AI has played a key role in popularising this style by making it easier to experiment and combine elements from different eras. But as this aesthetic has gained mainstream engagement, we are seeing a surge of traditionally produced (non-AI) commercial projects in this style as well.
The report found that the juxtaposition of past and future is also capturing the attention of Gen Zers, who are increasingly showing interest in a past they didn’t experience firsthand.
Following a demand for multisensorial experiences, consumers are increasingly engaging with immersive art installations and theme parks to experiential shopping.
An example is the Barbie marketing phenomenon that encompassed a blockbuster movie, real-world events, and a variety of themed “Barbie-core” experiences.
