MAGNA: Global Ad Market Slowdown ‘Real But More Modest’

Distributed at 6am Dubai Time on June 16, 2025

Newly released data from IPG Mediabrands’ MAGNA shows that media owners’ net advertising revenues will reach $979 billion this year. That’s up by 4.9% over 2024 but reflects a slowing down from 10.3% growth in 2024.

Neutralizing the significant impact of cyclical events on ad spend in 2024 and in 2025, “the market slowdown is still real but more modest.”

According to MAGNA, non-cyclical ad spend and ad revenues slowed from 8.9% growth in 2024 to 6.2% growth in 2025.

“After a very robust year in 2024, MAGNA expected the global advertising market to moderate in 2025,” said Vincent Létang, EVP of Global Market Research at MAGNA. “However, given the less optimistic economic forecasts and reduced business confidence since our last update in December, we’ve adjusted our 2025 growth forecast slightly downward by 1.2 percentage points.”

As such, MAGNA is now projecting 4.9% growth from 2024, as stated above. “The moderation has been fairly mild to date, with digital media showing particularly strong in the first quarter,” Létang said. “We believe the marketing industry has learned from the COVID period and now understands the importance of consistent communication and balanced media strategies, especially amidst consumer uncertainty.”

Looking specifically at linear media, the advertising revenues of traditional media owners — including TV, radio, publishing, and out-of-home — are expected to erode by 3% to $264 billion, due to economic uncertainty.

Adjusted for the lack of U.S. elections and Olympics in 2025, global “TMO” revenues would be flat.

DOMESTIC DIGITAL DOMINANCE

The U.S. ad market will grow 4.6% to an all-time record of $398 billion, and rise by 6.9% on a non-cyclical basis. But, traditional media owners’ revenues will decline by 7.1% to $104 billion and slip by 1.2% on a non-cyclical basis. Cross platform National TV, which includes both linear and streaming sales, will erode by 0.8% to $46 billion, as linear declines of 5% will just offset streaming growth of 12.5%. Indeed, Digital Pure Players’ revenues will increase by 9.6% to $294 billion and jump by 10.1% on a non-cyclical basis.

This is slightly stronger (+0.3%) than MAGNA’s previous full year forecast, released in March 2025, following a stronger-than-expected start of the year (+9.1% in Q1, ex-cyclical) “despite the deterioration in investor confidence and consumer confidence that started in February, well before the tariffs episode early April.”

The continued struggle for traditional media owners is a global affair, Létang writes.

“MAGNA was always anticipating a deceleration in the global advertising market’s growth for 2025, following the exceptional performance of 2024,” he said. “Analysis of first-quarter financial reports confirmed weaker ad sales among traditional media owners (TMOs) amidst growing economic uncertainty. TMO ad revenues (radio and television broadcasters, newspaper and magazine publishers, out-of-home, and cinema) decreased by 1% year-over-year globally, with key markets experiencing declines of 2% to -4% (Germany, U.K., France and Canada). In contrast, digital pure players (DPPs) demonstrated remarkable resilience.”

The U.S. remains the largest advertising market in 2025, accounting for 41% of global ad spend, followed by China (17%), Japan, the U.K., and Germany. Together, these five largest ad markets concentrate 73% of global ad spend.

Audio is barely mentioned in the MAGNA report, and there’s little to cheer about: Audio sales will drop 2% to $15.9 billion, MAGNA says.