YouTube Takes 44% of Streamers' Ad Exposure Time, Comscore Finds

YouTube accounted for 44% of streaming services' ad exposure time in August 2026, excluding YouTube TV, according to Comscore's new Score Report. That single platform also represented roughly 10% of ad exposure time across streaming, broadcast and cable TV combined. Tubi ranked a distant second among streamers with a 12% share, or roughly 3% across traditional TV and streaming.

Comscore built the report on its Comscore TV measurement currency product and automatic content recognition technology. The metric combines viewing time and ad loads — a deliberate contrast with Nielsen's The Gauge, which reports total watch time.

"We're calling it share of ad time, but essentially add up every minute of advertising that a consumer is exposed to across broadcast, cable and streaming in a broadcast month, and then we're calculating the share that goes to each of those channels and then individual platforms, all the way down to the local market level as well," said Kevin Burns, chief of staff and interim chief revenue officer at Comscore.

Why does streaming still trail traditional TV?

Despite streaming's dominance in Nielsen's watch-time data, traditional TV holds the larger share of ad exposure time in Comscore's report. The gap is narrowing. A year ago, streaming's share sat at 16%, while broadcast held 47% and cable 37%, Burns said. Streaming's share then stuck at 19% for five months before "Legendary February" — NBCUniversal's name for the single-month combination of the Super Bowl, Winter Olympics and NBA All-Star Game — lifted it to 21%.

Sports also moves individual platforms. In June, Peacock, Tubi and Fox One each recorded share increases, likely thanks to the World Cup, according to a Comscore spokesperson. Netflix held the third-largest streamer share in June, but that slot keeps changing hands: Amazon Prime Video held it the month before, Peacock seized it in July, and Hulu grabbed it in August. YouTube and Tubi have held the top two slots throughout.

What does this change for practitioners? Comscore has created a second currency of competitive comparison, one where ad load counts as much as audience. A company touting its Score Report ranking is, in effect, telling advertisers it delivers the most ad minutes per viewer.

Burns frames the company's role narrowly: "Our goal is not to declare winners or declare this is the one right thing to do. We're a measurement company. We like to think of ourselves as the scorekeeper and not a commentator in the booth. And so the goal really is to present the data and allow folks to draw their own conditions."

The numbers that shaped the week

• $2.7 billion: Netflix's expected ad revenue for 2026, down from its previous forecast of $3 billion.
• 6%: Share of Netflix employees the company announced it is laying off.
• 27 million: U.S. creator-led businesses newly eligible for small business loans after a classification change from the Small Business Administration.
• -6.7%: Year-over-year decline in basic cable ad revenue in 2025.
• 20%: Share of U.S. adults who regularly get news via TikTok.

"There's a lot of waste if you buy Thursday Night Football, and it's only really benefiting you when [a game is played] in those specific regions that your product is sold," said Horizon Media's Adam Schwartz.

Also on the radar

Amazon's Thursday Night Football pitch is pulling more ad dollars: Prime Video has charted a 6% increase in TNF advertisers so far this season, and since 2022 it has brought over 80 brands new to TNF. Ruggable has shifted about 10% of its overall spend from performance channels into brand channels since last August, including influencers and connected television, and plans to grow that spend by another 15% to 20% next year.

Netflix fired chief content officer Bela Bajaria amid weaker audience engagement, according to Puck, and hired former Disney and Fox executive Peter Rice as her replacement, according to CNBC. Fox added Omnicom, Stagwell and Simulmedia to the companies using AI agents to execute ad deals, according to Adweek. The Supreme Court has begun hearing oral arguments on whether the Video Protection Privacy Act applies to online companies like Meta sharing data for advertising, according to The Washington Post. Whether a high Score Report ranking will shape upfront negotiations remains open — but streamers now have one more table where ad load, not just reach, is the score being kept.