Ä¢¹½AV

Apple TV+ offers free weekend: A blend of traditional tactics and tech strategy aims to boost subscribers ahead of Severance Season 2.

We expect influencer marketing spending in the US to reach $9.29 billion in 2025, up 14.2% YoY. That growth rate will outpace both digital’s and social’s ad spend growth in the US—though influencer marketing’s share of marketing dollars will remain significantly smaller.

The average US adult will spend more than 8 hours per day on digital media this year, with about half of that time spent on mobile devices and more than a quarter on CTV.​

Smart TVs are used by 61.9% of US connected TV (CTV) households, making them the top CTV device by far, per Comscore CTV Intelligence. In second and third place are Amazon Fire TV (29.1%) and Roku (28.4%), respectively.

Walmart dominated the US retail landscape in 2024: The mass merchant’s ability to offer savings and convenience won over shoppers, and its growing ecommerce and advertising businesses are helping it make inroads against Amazon.

OTT video subscription revenues will hit $50.56 billion this year, an increase of 12.5% YoY, according to our forecast. Revenues will climb to $64.12 billion by the end of 2026.

As US smart TV ownership climbs to 70.6%, Nielsen is leveraging larger, more diverse data sets to refine its audience measurement for the 2024–2025 TV season. This strategic enhancement aims to deliver more accurate and actionable audience segmentation to better support media stakeholders.

What fueled interest: In February, we reported that YouTube was the top-watched streamer for 12 consecutive months; by midyear, YouTube racked up the best-ever US TV viewership month for a streaming platform. CEO Neal Mohan attributed much of the growth to sports content and CTV viewing.

The NFL Christmas Day games shattered streaming records: the Chiefs-Steelers matchup drew 24.1 million viewers, while the Ravens-Texans game attracted 24.3 million, making them the most-streamed NFL games in US history. The broadcasts drew the highest Christmas Day viewership among 18- to 34-year-olds since Nielsen began tracking in 2001, with 5.1 million US viewers in that demographic.

US omnichannel retail media ad spending grew 20.4% this year to $52.3 billion, per our forecast, making it the fastest-growing ad channel. But rapid growth comes with growing pains—as retail media networks (RMNs) not named Amazon or Walmart discovered this year.

US FAST viewers will rise 5.5% this year, accounting for 32.6% of the population and just under half (47.7%) of CTV viewers, per our forecast. Like with premium SVOD services, there’s fierce competition for viewers from digital players like Tubi, Pluto, Vizio WatchFree+, and others.

In 2024, retail media and CTV converged: First-party data enables precise targeting, while connected TV enhances ad personalization and tracks purchase behavior.

More people in the US use CTVs than watch traditional TV or use social media. CTV has become the primary gateway for popular OTT video streaming services, as well as a conduit for digital audio, gaming, and even accessing linear TV (via digital TV providers, formerly known as vMVPDs). This degree of success will mean limited topline CTV user growth going forward.

That translates to nearly 5 million consistent viewers, though this represents less than 5% of total live sports viewers in the US. Major events like the Olympics and NCAA finals attract approximately 10 times the viewership of a regular season pro-sports event. Why it matters: The growth has created new commercial opportunities.

Why marketers should understand the differences between CTV and OTT. Why it mattered:. Jargon often complicates the ad industry, and the growth of CTV in 2024 makes a universal dictionary to navigate the space even more crucial.

Digital ad spend tops $300 billion in 2024: Video dominates growth, driving display advertising's share and reshaping ad strategies through social and OTT.

US political ad spending will hit new highs amid the 2024 presidential election, with connected TV (CTV) driving the biggest gains. Despite the digital shift, traditional TV—long a mainstay of political advertising—will hold its own.

In 2024, YouTube’s US CTV audience surpassed Amazon Prime Video’s total US audience, per our forecast. In 2025, 68.8% of YouTube’s 248.6 million monthly viewers will watch on CTVs, which means its CTV audience will be just 19.0 million smaller than Netflix’s total audience across devices. That will put it in direct competition with more premium streaming services for CTV ad dollars.