Linear TV viewership and ad spend continues to fall as streaming gains momentum. But advertisers are still doubling down on premium linear placements like live sports and news, even as they wrestle with data gaps in CTV. The quality and context of ad placements often appear to matter more than sheer reach.
Paradoxical spend: iSpot’s Q1 2025 TV Ad Transparency Report found that despite a 4.25% year-over-year dip in TV impressions, actual ad spending on linear channels climbed to $12.34 billion. At the same time, streaming’s share of total TV ad impressions rose to nearly 14% in Q1 2025, up from only 6-8% in early 2023, proving a pattern of more ad dollars chasing fewer linear impressions.
Premium pursuit: The spending surge on linear, despite fewer eyeballs, shows a deliberate “flight to quality.” Advertisers are focusing budgets on high-engagement, premium inventory such as major live sports events and national news, which fetch higher costs per impression. Mark Myers, iSpot’s Chief Commercial Officer, said in a company release, “The rise in linear TV ad spend, even as impressions softened, shows that brands aren’t pulling back, they’re getting smarter—prioritizing precision, tailored placements and measurable outcomes.”
Streaming’s challenge: While streaming’s ascent is clear—advertisers earmark an average of 32% of upfront budgets for these platforms—real hurdles persist due to “data friction.” Many marketers lack key contextual performance and attribution data from streaming partners. iSpot found only 44% receive programmatic data and 48% get attribution data, which complicates spend optimization, though the industry is actively developing unified measurement standards for CTV.
Economic tides: Current economic uncertainties are also reshaping strategies across sectors like QSR, automotive, CPG, and finance, pushing them towards more targeted, high-impact placements. The environment reinforces a wider trend where over half of advertisers now put “outcomes” like sales lift and conversions above traditional metrics, according to iSpot’s survey. Campaigns that strategically directed more spend to CTV achieved substantially better results.
As advertisers increasingly look for robust cross-platform analytics, the future points to a hybrid model where the intrinsic value and context of each impression will be scrutinized more than ever.
