Uber Advertising has launched "Journey Takeover," a new premium ad format that turns an entire ride into an immersive brand experience, debuting with The Coca-Cola Company as its inaugural partner. The move is designed to monetize the "captive attention" of riders by weaving brand stories directly into the trip from start to destination.
Your ride, sponsored by: The format combines three ad components into a single narrative experience. It starts with a fully branded map interface, replaces the standard car icon with a custom animated one, and serves up a sequence of destination-aware video ads at key moments during the trip. For its launch campaign, Coca-Cola's creative was tailored by region, with users seeing everything from animated Christmas caravans to Santa's sleigh acting as their virtual ride.
A captive audience: The strategy hinges on monetizing rider attention during a trip, a period Uber considers highly valuable. "People open Uber when they’re already headed somewhere that matters," said Kristi Argyilan, Global Head of Uber Advertising, in the official announcement. She noted that existing Journey Ads see an average global view time of over 100 seconds, calling the moving map icon "one of the most attention-grabbing spaces in the app."
An exclusive journey: Don't expect every ride to be a branded bonanza. Uber is positioning Journey Takeovers as a high-end, direct-sold offering available only through its in-house Creative Studio. This contrasts with its standard Journey Ads, which were opened to programmatic buyers in 2024, signaling a tiered strategy for its advertising business.
Journey Takeover further blurs the line between utility and advertising, transforming the functional Uber app into a storytelling canvas as the company continues to build out its billion-dollar ad-tech ambitions. The launch comes as Uber deepens its data offerings for brands, recently launching Uber Intelligence, a data clean room platform powered by LiveRamp.
