INDUSTRY NEWS
Global advertising
grows 11.9%
Global advertising
grows 11.9%
- News
- WARC: global advertising grows 11.9 percent in 2026
WARC raised its global advertising forecast on 7 October. Investment is expected to reach 1,343 billion dollars in 2026, growth of 11.9 percent. The Olympics, the football World Cup and the US midterm elections are highlighted as drivers, along with companies' investment in AI.
Growth by channel
Social media:394.6 billion dollars, up 21.3 percent. That is 29.4 percent of the total.
Search:295.7 billion dollars, up 14.2 percent.
Retail media:202.1 billion dollars, up 14.3 percent, and now bigger than TV.
TV:176.2 billion dollars, up 1.2 percent this year and expected to fall 1.8 percent in 2027.
Other channels:radio, newspapers, magazines and traditional display are declining.
1,343 bn dollars in global advertising in 2026
+11.9% growth this year
+21.3% for social media
59.7% to Alphabet, Amazon and Meta
Three companies take almost 60 percent
Alphabet, Amazon and Meta are expected to take 59.7 percent of advertising investment outside China this year. The share is expected to rise to 61.5 percent in 2028. At the same time growth is levelling off: 8.4 percent in 2027 and 7.9 percent in 2028.
Our take
The figures confirm what we see in the accounts: search and social media take an ever larger share of the budget. The concentration also means that much of the measurement and targeting happens on the platforms' terms.
First-party data and independent measurement become more important the more of the budget goes to the same three companies.
Read also aboutmeasurement and analyticsandGoogle Ads benchmarks for 2026.
Sources:WARC, 7 October 2026andRelevant Audience, 12 October 2026.
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