WPP Media has released its latest This Year Next Year (TYNY) Global End-of-Year forecast, stating that global advertising revenue has been set to reach $1.14 trillion in 2025, reflecting 8.8% growth excluding U.S. political advertising. The outlook for 2026 has also been lifted, with 7.1% growth projected. Over the next five years, the industry has been expected to maintain a CAGR of 6.3%, driven by favourable trade tariff outcomes and escalating AI investment.
The report has outlined a phase of “creative destruction,” as streaming has continued to gain ground over linear TV, retail media has captured budget from traditional digital channels, and AI-powered answer engines have begun reshaping search. Creator-led content has continued to displace professionally produced media, prompting shifts in legacy structures across the industry.
WPP has added new forecast categories, such as gaming, financial services media networks and travel media networks, while redefining “search” as “Intelligence” to reflect evolving monetisation models across platforms. Commerce has been projected to reach $178.2 billion in 2025, surpassing global TV advertising for the first time, though the report has indicated possible pressure from AI-driven interfaces on retail media revenues.
Content-driven advertising has remained the largest global category at $663.5 billion, holding a 58% share of total spend. Gaming has been the fastest-growing content channel, expanding 29.5% to $8.5 billion in 2025 but contributing only 0.7% to overall revenue. Newspaper advertising has stabilised at $31.4 billion before an expected decline, while DOOH has been forecast to represent 43.9% of total OOH revenue by 2030, also reaching $31.4 billion and achieving near parity with traditional formats.
The coverage has expanded to include the top 15 global markets for the first time. Additionally, WPP has introduced the Future of Advertising Intelligence Framework, designed to evaluate companies based on data assets, AI and tech capabilities, distribution, commerce integration and content and media strengths. The framework has suggested that advertising will evolve to become “Personalized, Pervasive and Proactive,” with a full release planned at CES in January 2026.
