With AI push, Alphabet, Amazon and Meta together to acquire 54.7% of global ad market: WARC

Driven by artificial intelligence, Alphabet, Amazon and Meta are set to acquire more than half of the global ad market, with a combined market share of 54.7% excluding China this year, according to WARC’s Global Ad Forecast Q2 2025 update. Overall, the trio will contribute to $524.4 billion in adex, which is expected to rise to 56.2% in 2026, the report added.

WARC’s latest global projections are based on data aggregated from 100 markets worldwide and leverage a proprietary neural network which projects advertising investment patterns based on over two million data points.

Retail Media grows fastest; Video advertising to decline

Search is set to account for more than a fifth (21.5%) of the ad market this year, with spend rising 7.4% to $248.6bn despite regulatory threats; and 6.8% next year, by which time the market would be worth $265.5bn – equivalent to 21.5% of all spend, up from 21.2% in 2024.

Social media – the largest single advertising medium globally – is poised to account for a quarter (25.8%) of all ad spend this year, at a total of $298.3bn. A strong first quarter rise of 14.9% precedes an expected slowdown, with growth averaging 11.2% over the coming three quarters as tariffs begin to impact Asian brands disproportionately. The social market is still on track to grow 12.0% to $298.3bn this year.

Retail media is set to be fastest growing advertising medium this year (+14.4%), which accounts for an eighth (15.2%) of all global advertising spend this year. Amazon’s retail media ad business grew 21.0% to $13.3bn during the first quarter, accounting for a third (33.4%) of the global retail media market. WARC projects Amazon’s ad income will grow by 16.1% to $60.6bn this year. A further rise of 14.9% is forecast next year

Global video advertising spend is forecast to decline by 2.6% in 2025 to $183.9bn, equating to 15.9% of all spend this year. The contraction is driven by a continued decline in linear TV, which still represents over three-quarters of the total video market, but is expected to fall by 6.3% this year – a drop exacerbated by 2024 major sporting and political events. Notably, 2025 marks the first year that retail media will command a greater share of global ad spend than linear TV. However, video-on-demand advertising is forecast to rise by 13.2% to $39.9bn.

Slowdown in Global adex

According to WARC Media, global advertising spend is now on course to grow 6.2% this year to $1.16 trillion, a downgrade of half a percentage point from WARC’s March forecast as key sectors react to growing market volatility.

“Trade tensions are forcing major sectors to rethink their ad strategies. Automakers are cutting back amid rising costs and a pivot to performance media, while retailers tighten budgets as tariffs squeeze margins,” explains James McDonald, Director of Data, Intelligence & Forecasting at WARC.

Retail, auto brands to cut ad spends

Key sectors such as retail (-6.1%) and automotive (-4.0%) are set to cut ad spend this year, while ad spend growth across technology and CPG brands is muted compared to previous rates.

The automotive industry invested $56.8bn in advertising last year with almost a quarter (22.9%) going to premium video formats, but spend is expected to be down 4% this year as manufacturing stalls and key players pare back brand building. However, budgets are shifting from video towards digital platforms, with automotive spend on social ads surpassing linear TV for the first time in 2025. The sector should rebound next year with a 7.5% rise pushing spend to a total of $58.6bn.

Retail, with projected ad spend of $166.1bn this year (14.3% of the global ad market), faces a fall of 6.1% from 2024 levels. This largely reflects impending US trade tariffs on key goods and raw materials, which are poised to increase costs for global retailers, particularly those heavily reliant on Chinese imports such as Amazon and Walmart.

The tech and electronics sector is expected to spend $90.3bn on advertising this year. A YOY rise of 5.5% represents a cut from our +6.2% forecast in March: a sharp slowdown from the 24.3% rise recorded last year. Tariffs are driving the sector to adjust go-to-market strategies, shifting investments toward less-affected regions or different product lines to buffer against hardware margin erosion.

Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) companies experienced their weakest first quarter sales revenues since the pandemic. Further, with tariffs reaching as high as 145% for Chinese imports and additional tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico, CPG companies are facing major disruption to their established supply chains. WARC expects core CPG sectors, such as soft drinks (+7.1%), toiletries & cosmetics (+7.2%) and household & domestic (+4.2%) to record growth in advertising spend at a global level this year, though all see a significant slowdown from 2024.