Lyft Tests Home Masthead Ad Unit as Ads Business Doubles

Lyft's advertising business grew roughly 100% year over year in 2025, and the company is now pushing harder into rider screens with a new ad format called the "home masthead."

The unit gives brands full ownership of the Lyft home screen — the screen riders see before booking a ride, according to the company, which shared details with ADWEEK. Lyft has just started alpha testing (an early-stage trial with a small group of advertisers) the placement.

What does the masthead change?

The home masthead goes beyond the ad units Lyft already sells on the same screen. Those existing formats include:

• Sponsored vehicle designs on the app's embedded map, which brand a car icon riders see during matching
• A splash screen that can display an animation over the map before a ride is booked

The masthead is more expansive. It hands a brand the entire pre-booking surface rather than a slot within it. For advertisers, that means a rider cannot scroll past the message; they encounter it at the moment of highest intent, right before they request a car.

Who is buying it first?

Pluto TV is one of the initial sponsors of the home masthead. The streaming service is using the placement as part of its "Escape to Pluto TV" brand campaign, which promotes a redesign of the Pluto TV user experience.

Google is also among the early test partners, according to the company. Both brands are using the masthead alongside the sponsored vehicle designs and splash screens Lyft already offers.

Why the timing matters

The doubled advertising revenue signals that Lyft's media business has moved past the experimental phase. Ride-hailing apps sit on a valuable asset for marketers: a captive, logged-in audience with a defined transaction window, typically the few minutes between opening the app and confirming a ride.

A full-screen takeover of that moment is the logical next step. It lets advertisers run brand campaigns, not just performance offers, in an environment where attention is effectively guaranteed. The Pluto TV deal illustrates the use case — a redesign announcement needs broad awareness, and a pre-booking screen supplies it without competing content nearby.

The alpha stage means the format is not yet generally available. Pricing, measurement standards and rollout timing remain unconfirmed. But with the ads business doubling and two major brands already in the test pool, the home masthead looks set to become a standard part of the Lyft Ads catalogue — and a marker of how aggressively ride-hailing platforms will monetize the seconds before a ride is booked.