Video advertising has surged to 29 per cent of total online ad investment as marketers continue to navigate what industry leaders are describing as a more cautious and compressed planning environment.
Announced this morning at the IAB Australia Video State of the Nation Summit in Sydney, the latest report shows video spend climbed 19.8 per cent year-on-year to $5.4 billion in 2025, underscoring the channel’s resilience despite ongoing economic uncertainty.
The findings highlight that while nearly half of agency decision-makers cited the economy as their biggest concern, ahead of cross-channel measurement and artificial intelligence, investment in video remains strong.
Gai Le Roy, CEO of IAB Australia, said advertisers are continuing to prioritise video but with heightened expectations around accountability and performance.
“Advertisers are operating in a more cautious market, but they are not pulling back from investment in video advertising,” she said. “They do, however, have stronger expectations of media accountability and a continued need to balance brand and performance investment.”
According to her, that tension is shaping what the next phase of growth will look like.
As budgets come under pressure, advertisers are demanding clearer proof of effectiveness across an increasingly fragmented video ecosystem spanning BVOD, social platforms, ad-supported streaming and connected TV.
The report highlights a critical disconnect emerging in the market.
While nine in ten agencies now have a unified strategy for planning video campaigns across screens, a quarter still rarely or never unify how they measure effectiveness across those same environments.
For the Australian advertising market, this signals a shift away from channel-first thinking towards outcomes-led investment models. Driving sales and conversions has emerged as the top media investment goal for 2026, yet brand metrics remain the most commonly used measure of success—revealing a misalignment that could impact how budgets are allocated moving forward.
The pressure to close that gap is accelerating interest in more advanced measurement approaches, including market mix modelling, attribution and incrementality frameworks. Artificial intelligence is expected to play a central role here, particularly in analysing performance data and improving optimisation at scale.
Vikki Pearce, head of digital at Zenith and co-chair of the IAB Australia Video Council, said video’s ability to deliver both brand impact and business outcomes is what continues to underpin its growth.
“Video continues to earn its place as one of the most strategic parts of the media mix because it can genuinely do both jobs: build brands and drive outcomes,” she said. “What’s changing in 2026 is not the ambition, but the operating environment.”
According to IAB, that environment is becoming increasingly complex, with buyers navigating a proliferation of platforms, formats and buying models. From streaming and connected TV to live content and creator-led ecosystems, the expansion of video touchpoints is creating both opportunity and operational strain.
Ad-supported streaming is emerging as a key growth driver, with more than seven in ten buyers expecting to increase investment in the space this year. Programmatic connected TV is also gaining traction, while live streaming and creator partnerships are becoming more embedded in video strategies.
At the same time, retail media is converging rapidly with video.
More than half of advertisers are now using or testing retailer first-party data to target video campaigns, while the same proportion are experimenting with commerce integrations that link video ads directly to shopping outcomes.
Natalie Stanbury, director of research at IAB Australia, warned that inconsistent data inputs across environments remain a barrier to fully realising that potential.
“The research shows buyers are moving towards more advanced outcomes measurement, but the consistency of data signals still varies across video environments,” she said.
“That matters when advertisers are being asked to compare investment across BVOD, social video, AVOD and ad-supported streaming platforms.”
