Spending on CTV: Hulu ($3.63 billion), YouTube ($2.89 billion), and Roku ($2.19 billion) lead the US CTV ad market this year. Don’t expect that to change right away.
- Verna said Hulu’s lead is “solid,” likely attributed to how long the platform has operated on an ad-supported model.
- YouTube is worth watching for CTV advertisers. About half (45%) of all viewership now happens on TV screens, according to internal figures, signaling a pivot from smartphones toward CTV. If advertisers aren’t thinking about YouTube the way they think about TV advertising, they may want to reconsider.
Changing the channels: “I don’t think the [CTV ad spend] leaderboard is necessarily going to shift, at least not dramatically. But there are a lot of players that are coming into the ad-supported space,” said Verna.
- Disney+ and Netflix both launched ad-supported tiers last year. Verna expects those platforms to be major players, but it will take several years before they build up their ad businesses.
- Amazon is considering an ad tier for Prime Video, which could lead to an explosion in CTV ad spend from brands looking to take advantage of Amazon’s retail media data.
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Free ad-supported TV platforms like Amazon’s Freevee are expanding in viewership and content.
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