This is the Q4 2025 installment of our quarterly “Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.

This latest installment of our quarterly “Ad Spending Benchmarks” series helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.

Global ad spending has steadied after a turbulent year, setting the stage for modest acceleration in 2026. Digital is still the main engine, but traditional media’s rebound will add lift as markets stabilize.

This Forecast Mapbook makes it easier to see how our ad spending forecasts relate to one another. It visualizes those relationships to remove ambiguity around overlapping metrics and related data cuts.

The sources of ad spending growth are shifting as telecom and financial services surge, while retail and CPG slow but still dominate in scale. Every industry is leaning harder into digital, with social and display ads commanding more budget than ever.

This year, retail will underperform overall US ad spending growth for the first time since 2018 as advertisers cut budgets amid tariffs and economic uncertainty. But the outlook for 2026 is more optimistic.

This is the second installment of our biannual “UK Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.

As healthcare and pharma ad spend shifts to digital, discover the CTV, social, and search trends redefining media strategy in our latest forecast.

Asia-Pacific ad spending growth will decelerate in 2025 amid tariff pressures, with digital and mobile driving growth. China faces headwinds, India enjoys rapid growth, and retail media expands and reshapes ad strategies across the region.

This is the first installment of our annual “Canada Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.

US ad spend growth will grow a total of 11% in 2025, excluding political spending, per an updated Madison & Wall forecast cited by Mediapost. The figure is well above Madison & Wall’s previous estimate of 3.6% growth and follows 13% YoY growth in Q3. Even as total media ad spending continues to grow, growth doesn’t entirely negate the overall climate of uncertainty that will undoubtedly affect the ad industry in the year ahead. Slowing growth expected from Madison & Wall in 2026 and ongoing economic headwinds indicate that advertisers are still operating in an era of caution.

Reddit and mobile apps were the fastest-growing US ad channels in Q3, showing their emerging importance to advertisers. Ad spend on Reddit increased 46% YoY, per Sensor Tower’s Q3 Digital Market Index report, and mobile app ad spend grew 42%. Reddit is becoming a high ROI opportunity for early movers. Its growth suggests that highly engaged micro-communities (subreddits) are offering more precise targeting and less competition. That makes Reddit a strong testing ground for community-based and brand awareness campaigns for consumers who are actively looking to discover new content and products.

On today’s podcast episode, we discuss how advertisers are faring amid the current economic backdrop of tariffs, inflation, and a government shutdown; how the digital ad triopoly is changing; and the biggest ad spending milestones this year and in 2026. Join Senior Director of Podcasts and host Marcus Johnson, along with Senior Director of Forecasting Oscar Orozco and Principal Analyst Yory Wurmser. Listen everywhere, and watch on YouTube and Spotify.