The World’s 100 Most Valuable Brands in 2018

According to Forbes, the world’s 100 most valuable brands are worth a staggering $2.15 trillion.

While that singular number is impressive, the publication’s 2018 rankings of global brands can be further broken down in other ways that are also quite intriguing. Let’s take a look at brands by individual brand value, as well as sorted by relevant industry.

Ranking the Most Valuable Brands in 2018

Today’s infographic comes to us from HowMuch.net and it showcases the 100 most valuable brands in the world, according to recent Forbes rankings.

Here are the brands with the most assessed value, along with their one-year change and industry.

Rank	Brand	Brand Value ($B)	1-Year Change	Industry
#1	Apple	$182.8	+8%	Technology
#2	Google	$132.1	+30%	Technology
#3	Microsoft	$104.9	+21%	Technology
#4	Facebook	$94.8	+29%	Technology
#5	Amazon	$70.9	+31%	Technology
#6	Coca-Cola	$57.3	+2%	Beverages
#7	Samsung	$47.6	+25%	Technology
#8	Disney	$47.5	+8%	Leisure
#9	Toyota	$44.7	+9%	Automotive
#10	AT&T	$41.9	+14%	Telecom

Apple remains the world’s most valuable brand at $182.8 billion, but there are four other tech companies hot on the iPhone maker’s heels – and each of them is growing brand value at a rapid pace.

Google (+30%), Microsoft (+21%), Facebook (+29%), and Amazon (31%) are all gaining at double-digit clips. At this point, each has lapped Coca-Cola, the highest ranked non-tech brand in the Top 10 at $57.3 billion.

Brands by Industry

The aforementioned top five brands are all focused on technology, but it’s important to recognize that this is also a part of a much wider trend.

Over the last decade, tech brands have gained consumer prominence to make the industry dominant both in terms of quantity of brands (20%) and total brand value (41%) on the Forbes 100 Most Valuable Brand list.

Industry	# of Brands	Total Brand Value ($B)
Total	100	$2,152.9
Technology	20	$872.6
Financial Services	13	$160.2
Automotive	12	$222.9
Consumer Goods	11	$124.7
Retail	9	$119.0
Luxury	6	$91.7
Beverages	4	$103.2
Diversified	4	$66.3
Telecom	3	$82.3
Restaurants	3	$65.0
Apparel	3	$49.0
Alcohol	3	$42.5
Leisure	2	$56.1
Media	2	$26.3
Transportation	2	$21.6
Tobacco	1	$26.6
Business Services	1	$14.8
Aerospace	1	$8.1

Only a handful of brands in consumer-facing industries like media, apparel, alcohol, and restaurants make the rankings.

Meanwhile, sectors that traditionally rely on heavy amounts of advertising – like consumer packaged goods and retail – have just 20 brands on the list between them. The highest ranked brand in either of those categories is Walmart at #26th with a brand value of $24.9 billion, which is about 1/3 of the brand value of online competitor Amazon.