U.S. ad spend is expected to grow this year, where projected upticks in connected TV and social video channels lead the pack and tentpole events provide a broad boost, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s 2026 ad spend and strategy outlook.
IAB’s 2026 Outlook Study is based on survey responses from about 200 U.S. buy-side ad investment decision-makers, primarily at brands and agencies.
Per the report, major events this year including the U.S. midterm elections, the Winter Olympics and the FIFA World Cup are poised to boost investment – together expected to drive $9 billion in incremental ad spend, according to Omnicom.
Overall, the digital advertising industry trade body’s latest outlook projects 9.5% year-over-year growth in U.S. ad spend this year, an acceleration compared to the 5.7% yoy increase seen in 2025 vs 2024. Excluding the major cyclical events, IAB expects lower annual U.S. ad investment gains between 7.1%-7.8%.
Digging in by channel, connected TV continues to be a key investment and growth channel with spending expected to increase 13.8% yoy. That represents an uptick from 11.4% ad spend growth CTV saw in 2025. CTV is only bested by the social media channel, where IAB anticipates 14.6% growth.
“Supported by ongoing audience consumption shifts, measurement capabilities, and a robust calendar of major cyclical events, Social and CTV are projected again to lead growth in 2026,” wrote the study authors.
Those major events are also projected to temper decline in traditional linear TV ad spend to 1.7%. While advertisers continue to pull back on the channel, the 2026 forecast marks a significant improvement compared to the 14.4% ad spend contraction for linear TV in 2025.
Aside from spend projections, IAB’s report also zeros in on strategic and technological shifts for brands and buyers in the year ahead.
In terms of what ad buyers are looking to get out of media investments in 2026, new customer acquisition remained the top objective (cited by 54%) but marked a notable 10-point decline from 2025.
The report and results indicate retention and driving repeat customers is increasingly important to agencies and brands. This media investment goal was cited by a quarter of buyers but that’s nearly doubled vs 2024 when just 13% cited repeat purchases as their ad spend objective.
IAB said this suggests “a rebalancing to counter rising acquisition costs” while also coinciding with increased focus on performance-driven campaigns and channels that can deliver robust measurement.
Creator and influencer ads or partnerships are the types of ads most buyers (57%) intend to put increased focus on in 2026 (up from 48% in 2025), while 45% are upping focus on shoppable ads and 39% plan to emphasize ads within live programming.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, artificial intelligence is also making its way into ad buyers strategies and processes.
On the technology, data and measurement front, AI accounted for five of the top six areas buyers are focused on for 2026.
That includes agentic AI, which has started to come into play for ad planning, buying and optimization, but results show there’s still a learning curve and the need for systems to adapt.
Per IAB, 96% of buyers are aware of agentic AI for ad buying and 66% are increasing focus on it for that purpose, alongside campaign execution, this year.
The third most-cited focus area by buyers for 2026 is cross-platform measurement (72%), which increased vs 64% in 2025.
The jump is notable and IAB’s report supports other separate recent findings from MediaOcean that suggested a need for more cross-platform unification and orchestration as advertisers and buyers simultaneously look to incorporate AI into core functions and put more emphasis on outcomes, or the ability to prove business results derived from ad spending.
“Cross-platform measurement has increased meaningfully, reflecting growing pressure to connect AI-driven activation with comparable, outcome-based measurement,” wrote IAB study authors.
And more ad buyers expect to strengthen focus on using generative AI in media campaigns in this year (78% vs 62% in 2025) – representing the top-cited area.
But while genAI use in media campaigns and agentic AI for ad buying and campaign execution are top of mind for ad buyers, understanding each of those are among the top five media investment challenges for ad buyers this year.
Per IAB, 40% of ad buyers say understanding agentic AI for buying and campaign execution is an investment challenge this year, while 38% say the same for understanding genAI use – the latter representing a marked 14-percentage point increase since 2024.
With complexities around agentic AI, just around 10% of agencies and brands plan to access or deploy capabilities using in-house tools only.
Per IAB, agencies prefer hybrid deployment models (42%) to support multiple clients, while brands favor third-party solutions for speed and control (30%) or to rely on external partners or agencies to handle (25%) agentic AI access and deployments.
“This split suggests agentic AI will scale through partnerships—agencies enabling cross-platform integration, brands pursuing faster, lower-risk adoption,” stated IAB’s report.
As for what’s up next? IAB says to expect AI to move into execution, where agentic systems will become more central to operational responsibilities.
“Success in 2026 will hinge on buyers’ ability to adapt strategies to AI-shaped consumer journeys—while pairing faster automation with stronger governance, measurement, and accountability,” the outlook concluded.