Michael Bay blockbuster missed out on hoped-for Oscar nominations but did top list of movies pushing consumer products, featuring plugs for 55 brands including Budweiser, Armani and Yili milk

While rules on small screen product placement have led to the introduction of the letter “p” whenever something is about to be hawked in your direction, such selling is less rigorously policed at the cinema.

And while this might lead to seemingly endless audience eye-rolls in the summer season, the upside is the annual Brandcameo product placement awards, which takes great pleasure in rewarding the most obnoxiously stuffed films of the year.

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The latest batch of winning losers have just been announced and it’s no surprise to see Michael Bay’s Transformers: Age of Extinction in the lead. The robotic blockbuster boasted 55 separate brands, including Armani, Budweiser and Yili milk. Close behind was David Fincher’s Gone Girl with 48 and Ride Along with 37.

Other awards included the prize for overall product placement, which went to Apple whose brand cropped up in films such as The Lego Movie and Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Apple products appeared in nine of the 35 No 1 films in the US last year.

Stephen Hawking biopic The Theory of Everything picked up an award for product placement achievement in an Oscar-nominated film. One pivotal scene employed the detergent Tide after it was deemed more familiar to US audiences than Daz.