The Six Big Advertising Trends that Will Shape Live Streaming in 2026

Millions of people are abandoning linear for streaming, with live sports causing the biggest shift of all. As audiences embrace streaming, advertisers follow. Here are the six major trends that will define this new phase of streaming.

Rethinking TV: Balancing Linear and Streaming for Long-Term Brand Growth

Brands must remain nimble in their thinking regarding linear vs. streaming, given how quickly the landscape is shifting. Sports illustrate this perfectly. A single event today can play out across broadcast, cable, and streaming, either simultaneously or individually. Thursday Night Football on Amazon, NBA games shared across multiple partners, or the UFC's exclusivity deal with Paramount—each example shows how the same content can reach audiences in different ways.

From Gut Feel to Growth Engine: A Data-Driven Blueprint for Content Strategy

The winners of the next decade won't be those who make the most content, they'll be those who plan it best. Strategic planning is no longer a static, once-a-year exercise. It's an ongoing, intelligence-driven dialogue between creativity and commerce. Organizations that embrace this mindset will do more than survive the next wave of disruption: they'll define it. By combining data discipline with creative ambition, they can transform content strategy from a gut-feel guessing game into a measurable, sustainable engine for growth.

How Sports Betting Apps Are Gamifying the TV Sports Viewing Experience

Sports apps are having a ripple effect across connected TV. Features like interactive stats and polls are blurring the line between content and participation. Broadcasters and streamers are racing to keep up, building experiences that reward every tap, scroll, and cheer with data-driven connections. You could call it the FanDuel effect; I think of it as the gamification of live sports.

Netflix-Amazon Deal: An Expected Step in a Broader Strategy

Netflix's decision to make its ad inventory available through Amazon DSP is notable, but not surprising. This move fits squarely within Netflix's larger strategy to maximize advertiser access across demand-side platforms. Rather than a unique or exclusive partnership, it is another step toward ensuring that Netflix inventory is available to as many buyers as possible, wherever they choose to transact.

CTV’s Measurement Revolution: Outcomes as the Unifying Force

"On the glass" viewing has shifted decisively toward connected TV, where advertisers expect more than reach—they expect results. CTV has opened the door to a new era of accountability, where ad exposure is directly linked to business outcomes. Sales data is the unifying force, proving how CTV investments drive real-world impact. With this clarity, marketers can finally move beyond guesswork and optimize every impression for measurable performance and scale.

How L-Band Advertising is Unlocking Non-Intrusive Monetization in Streaming

Consumers are willing to tolerate ads in exchange for lower subscription fees, but they expect those ads to be relevant, less frequent, and non-disruptive. By leveraging screen real estate in a subtle yet effective way, L-band ads offer a compelling solution for service providers seeking to balance monetization with viewer satisfaction.

Optimizing OTT Experiences: Five Streaming Strategies That Deliver Better QoE

This article explores practical, vendor-neutral strategies that OTT service providers can use to strengthen QoE across the entire delivery chain, from pre-delivery checks and multi-stage monitoring to client-side analytics and emerging innovations in automation and personalization.

Media Companies Show Signs of Technical Progress

After mostly "kicking AI tires" over the last 18 months, media executives are ready to commit and are looking for solutions that can help them find efficiencies, reduce manual work and automate some of the more labor-intensive processes that are causing a drag on their operation. The pivot towards realistic technological advancements signals that media companies are serious about adapting to the new reality of streaming, AI, and automation.

As AI Personalizes the Future, Local Ads Must Break Free from One-Size-Fits-All

As AI embeds itself deeper into the infrastructure of modern advertising, it's changing how we think about developing and tailoring the message itself. Ad creative can be dynamic, testable, and just as targeted as the rest of the campaign.

The Next Generation of Sports Fans Isn’t Where You Think They Are

Live sports remain one of the biggest draws in TV advertising as both TV and the sports fan evolve. We've reached a point where the next generation of sports fans may not even align with the image of the traditional cord cutter or streaming viewer when it comes to engaging with their teams. In fact, they may not even watch the games in full. These passionate fans are engaging with the content and conversation that happens around sports, and this shifting dynamic means advertisers need new strategies for reaching this audience. 

AI-Fueled Creative Resets Media Buying Expectations

With an explosion of creative technology like streaming digital video, AI-generated personalized commerce ads, and AI-driven campaign testing and measurement, the market is finally embracing creative as a major performance lever. Not only can advertisers make better creative, they can make more versions, test new creative strategies using real-time feedback, and understand exactly which creative elements drive outcomes.

From the Field to the Funnel: How Live Sports Power CTV and Retail Media’s Next Play

With cultural impact and unmatched reach, live sports are redefining how marketers build brands and measure outcomes on CTV.

Anatomy of a Low-Latency Origin Service

At the core of every streaming workflow is the origin server—the system that receives encoded video segments and playlist files from an encoder and makes them available to the distribution network. The origin acts as the authoritative source for the stream, ensuring that each request from a video player, whether for the latest HLS segment or an updated manifest, is served with accuracy and speed. Its performance directly impacts startup latency, playback stability, and the ability of a stream to scale to millions of concurrent viewers.

How CTV Measurement Can Drive Optimization

If advertisers don't embrace new approaches to measure CTV effectively, they miss the opportunity to drive real outcomes. CTV can not only be measured better, it can also be used to drive outcomes with several interesting innovations.

Global Growth, Local Limits: A New Playbook for ROI in Sports Broadcasting

For sports organizations to unlock growth, protect margins, and reach fans wherever they are, they need a new kind of playbook: one that puts flexibility, efficiency, and market-specific value at its core.

How AI is Transforming Content Discovery in Streaming

With AI and machine learning, computer vision, and natural-language processing, AI can analyze video at the frame level, identifying faces, logos, scenes, emotional tone, and spoken keywords. The result is metadata that's deeper, more dynamic, and far more actionable. For streaming providers, it's not just about fixing a bottleneck but about turning discovery into a competitive advantage.

Streaming Redefined: Why Zapping Time and Personalization Now Define Viewer Retention

Zapping time—how quickly a viewer can switch between content or launch playback—has become a critical metric. Fast zapping time reduces reported faults, enhances satisfaction, and decreases support costs. Whether on smart TVs or mobile apps, any perceptible lag can quickly drive users elsewhere.

The Next Evolution in Streaming Depends on Distribution

In the modern streaming ecosystem, the content owner often must now deliver the content to numerous streaming platforms while modifying the content in each case to meet the tangled web of unique needs associated with distributing their content on each streaming platform. 

The Rise of Ethical Impressions: When AdTech Meets Social Impact

Not every impression is created equal. Some sell sneakers, some drive subscriptions, and a growing number do something else entirely: serve society. These are what we might call ethical impressions, ad placements that deliver measurable business results while advancing social good. In an age where audiences demand more from brands and marketers demand more from their media dollars, ethical impressions are redefining success.