Marketers Choose YouTube: The Platform Has Become the Leader in Advertising Investment Growth

The media landscape is undergoing a profound transformation. Traditional linear television continues to lose ground as audiences fragment across connected TV (CTV) and streaming services.

Marketers Choose YouTube: The Platform Has Become the Leader in Advertising Investment Growth At the same time, advertising budgets are flowing steadily into streaming platforms, where viewers actually spend their time. According to a major new study by DoubleVerify (DV), YouTube has emerged as the clear frontrunner in this shift.

The data is striking. In DV’s 2026 Global Insights report, titled Must-CTV: Streaming’s Shift From Promise to Performance, 70% of marketers reported increasing their investment in YouTube over the past year.

The platform outpaced its closest streaming rivals: 65% of marketers boosted spending on Netflix, 59% on Prime Video, and 48% on Samsung streaming environments.

Marketers Choose YouTube: The Platform Has Become the Leader in Advertising Investment Growth These figures come from a comprehensive survey of more than 2,000 marketers and 22,000 consumers across more than 20 global markets, backed by DoubleVerify’s proprietary measurement data from billions of ad impressions.

The study underscores a broader industry trend: streaming is no longer an experimental channel — it has become a core, performance-driven pillar of the modern media mix.

Why is YouTube winning the battle for advertising dollars? The answer lies in a simple but powerful combination of scale, engagement, and accountability. Consumers are spending hours each day on the platform, watching everything from short-form clips to long-form videos, music, gaming, and educational content.

Unlike the rigid, one-size-fits-all schedule of traditional broadcast TV, YouTube offers an always-on, on-demand experience that aligns perfectly with today’s fragmented viewing habits.

Marketers are drawn to more than just eyeballs. YouTube delivers measurable business outcomes. Advanced analytics, precise targeting, and transparent performance metrics allow advertisers to connect content consumption directly to real results — whether that’s brand awareness, website traffic, or direct sales. In an era when every dollar must prove its value, this level of accountability is a game-changer.

Marketers Choose YouTube: The Platform Has Become the Leader in Advertising Investment Growth Collette Spagnolo, VP of Marketing, Integrated Marketing & Analytics at DoubleVerify, captured the sentiment perfectly: “Globally, streaming TV has become a core part of the modern media mix. Marketers are recognising the value of platforms where consumers are spending more of their viewing time, particularly environments that can deliver both scale and measurable business outcomes.”

Traditional television, by contrast, feels increasingly outdated. Its fixed ad breaks, limited targeting capabilities, and declining reach make it harder to justify in boardroom budget discussions. Why invest in a “set-it-and-forget-it” TV schedule when you can reach highly engaged audiences on YouTube — where every impression can be tracked, optimized, and tied to tangible ROI?

The numbers tell the story: streaming platforms overall are seeing accelerated investment precisely because they solve the fragmentation problem that has plagued linear TV for years. YouTube’s leadership in ad-spend growth reflects its unique ability to combine massive scale with the flexibility and measurability that modern marketers demand.

As the industry moves from the “promise” of streaming to proven “performance,” one thing is clear: YouTube isn’t just another video platform — it has become the strategic centerpiece of forward-thinking advertising strategies worldwide. For brands looking to stay relevant in 2026 and beyond, the message is simple: if your audience is on YouTube, your budget should be there too.

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