Which Streaming Service Showed the Most Ads to Start 2024?
New data from AdImpact shows how many ad impressions each streamer accounted for in 2023, and the winner might be surprising.
With the price of streaming subscriptions rising seemingly without reprieve, customers are increasingly willing to subscribe to ad-supported streaming plans to save money. Data shared by Antenna in January showed that in November 2023, new subscriptions to paid, ad-supported streaming plans outpaced ad-free sign-ups for the first time. New data from AdImpact shows which streamers showed ads to the most viewers in the first quarter of 2024, which has implications both for customers and streaming providers alike.
Key Facts:
- Paramount+ delivered the most ad impressions in the first quarter with 6.37 billion, aided by its broadcast of Super Bowl LVIII.
- Prime Video had the fewest impressions of any service other than Fox Nation in its first quarter of offering ads during playback.
- Streamer ad loads may increase as providers look for enhanced profitability.
Ad impression numbers are achieved by combining a number of factors, including streaming hours and total subscribers. An impression simply describes how many times an ad is viewed or engaged within a given period and/or on a specific platform, and AdImpact breaks down which streamers delivered the most impressions during the first three months of 2024. The data show that Paramount+ was the clear leader as the only streamer to breach 6 billion impressions. The streamer was no doubt aided by a record-breaking presentation of Super Bowl LVIII in February.
Max was also likely aided by an influx of live sports, as the first quarter saw the beginning of the 2024 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. This was the first year in which Max offered livestreams of games appearing on TNT, TBS and truTV in its Bleacher Report Sports Add-On, and the data indicates that it likely brought a substatial influx of viewers to the streamer.
One streamer clearly stands out as punching well above its weight in terms of ad impressions: Fox Nation. That service revealed in February that it had 2 million subscribers, so its ability to deliver 1.2 billion ad impressions in the first quarter shows that its customer base, while comparatively small is quite dedicated to the platform and its content.
Prime Video was affected by seasonality, as its ad impressions from the fourth quarter of 2023 were 300 million more than its number in Q1 2024 when it tallied 2.09 billion impressions. With the conclusion of its “Thursday Night Football” broadcasts for the season during Q4 of last year, and not rolling out ads during playback for its hundreds of millions of customers until the end of January, the Amazon streamer saw a decline in Q1.
| Streamer | Last Reported Customer Count | Ad Impressions in Q1 2024 | Impressions per Customer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Disney+ | 150.2M | 3.3 B | 21.9 |
| Fox Nation | 2M | 1.2 B | 600 |
| Hulu | 48.5M | 4.3 B | 88.6 |
| Max | 97.7M ^ | 5.9 B | 60.3 |
| Paramount+ | 71.2M | 6.37 B | 89.4 |
| Peacock | 34M | 2.28 B | 67.1 |
| Prime Video | 200M+ | 2.09B | 10.45 |
{^} Max subscriber total includes discovery+ customers, as Warner Bros. Discovery does not report subscriber totals for the two services separately.
Bundles also did a good job of delivering ads during the first quarter, which is a lesson that all streamers will want to pay attention to going forward. The Hulu/Disney+ Bundle accounted for 1.1 billion impressions as Disney integrated content from the two streamers on one platform for the first time. The Hulu, Disney+, and ESPN+ Trio Bundle peaked at 254.8 million impressions in Q1.
“Our analysis shows a seasonal variance among streaming providers, with impressions at their highest around the holiday season which is typically a peak time for viewership and subscription,” commented Don Norton, General Manager, Data Solutions, AdImpact. “Bundles have also grown in prominence as the streaming market evolves, and we expect this to continue with the coming joint sports venture and as streamers face pressure to maintain subscribers amid cost-cutting measures by consumers.”
Will Streamers Start Upping Their Ad Loads?
With the increased focus on streamers becoming profitable by Wall Street investors, executives are likely eyeing Hulu’s 88.6 impressions per customer during the quarter and wondering if it’s time to increase the amount of ads they show per hour. Most streamers try to limit ad exposure to 4-5 minutes per hour of playback, but customers could see that number start to rise.
A survey from May 2023 shows that Hulu shows the most ads per hour of any service, around 7.3 minutes per hour on average. Disney is on its way to achieving streaming profitability in 2024, and more streamers might identify the high ad impression per customer figure that Hulu is able to generate as a key part of Disney’s profit equation.
Services have kept ad loads low to try and differentiate on-demand content with ads from linear TV, which offers around 15 minutes of ads per hour on major broadcast and cable networks. But as streamers are faced with increasing pressure to pull their services into the black, they may see increased ad loads as a companion to password-sharing crackdowns and other measures intended to generate more paying customers.
Hulu
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