Manchester City and Puma have collaborated to allow City fans to design the club’s official third kit for the 2026-27 season in a groundbreaking first for a professional football club.
The winning AI design will be worn by City players on-pitch and sold to fans.
In a first-of-its-kind, the PUMA AI Creator tool is powered by DEEPOBJECTS, a leading co-creation platform that leverages generative AI to allow fans to design their dream kits using text prompting, customization tools and intuitive sliders.
By placing the tool in their hands, fans will be invited to channel their passion and originality to create bold patterns and unique kit designs.
PUMA AI Creator was first used by City players Ederson, Stefan Ortega and Rico Lewis who together designed a bespoke goalkeeper kit. Creatively inspired by the net of a football goal, this will be the first-ever AI manufactured football kit to be worn on-pitch later this season.
‘It’s the first time I’ve designed a shirt together with Stefan and Rico and I’m so happy I’ll get to see our shirt on the pitch,’ Ederson said. ‘It looks amazing and not just because I designed it. The colours are nice, they remind me of the colours of Brazil,’
Fans can submit designs to the competition until December 20th when, along with the fan ratings, PUMA and Manchester City kit experts will shortlist their top ten designs. Public voting will then open in January, as fans will be asked to vote for the kit they want to see on-pitch.
Manchester City and Puma will allow fans to design the club’s new third kit for 2026-27
City goalkeeper Ederson helped to design a goalkeeper kit which will be worn on-pitch
The PUMA AI Creator tool leverages generative AI to allow fans to design their dream kits
‘PUMA AI Creator is one of the ways we see emerging technology bringing fans closer to the game they love,” said Ivan Dashkov, Head of Emerging Marketing Tech at PUMA. ‘I was showing a friend of mine from a different club and she was like “Oh, this is the kit I want my club to wear” and she started making kits for her club. Fans might come in and start making kits for their own teams and obviously we’re focused on Man City but it’s cool that people can come in and play with this tool in different ways,’ added Dashkov.
Nuria Tarre, Chief Marketing & Fan Experience Officer for City Football Group said: ‘This is not the first time that we’ve co-created with fans. Even when we changed our badge several years ago, we opened it up for fans to vote and we’ve done other competitions. There’s always a possibility that fans from other clubs want to have fun with it. Hopefully it’s a minority. We truly believe that the concept of fandom globally can extend across clubs so as long as they feel engaged to trial this, for us it’s a good level of engagement.
Ederson was amongst the City stars that helped to test out the PUMA AI Creator
PUMA AI Creator officially launches on Monday December 9th and will be open for fans to submit kit designs until Friday December 20th
The top ten designs will be unveiled for voting in January ahead of the final decision
‘If this works really well, I think we will try to repeat it – can we make limited edition kits? Let’s dream even bigger. Don’t you want to give fans the opportunity to ultimately have their own designed kit? Those are all hypotheses. We’re at the beginning of a journey, technology is opening doors and we’re just embracing it and hopefully it will open plenty of opportunities.’
PUMA AI Creator officially launches on Monday December 9th and will be open for fans to submit kit designs until Friday December 20th. The top ten designs will then be unveiled for voting in January. PUMA AI Creator can be accessed via www.aicreator.puma.com
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