Digital Ads Benchmark Report Q2 2025

Methodology

The Tinuiti Digital Ads Benchmark Report is based on anonymized performance data from advertising programs under Tinuiti management, with annual digital ad spend under management totaling over $4 billion. Samples are restricted to those programs that have remained active and maintained a consistent strategy over the time periods studied. Unless otherwise noted, all figures are based on same-client growth. The trends and figures included are not meant to represent the official performance of any advertising platform or the experiences of every advertiser.

Note: The data below is from Q2 2025. Head here to see our most recent report.

About Tinuiti

Tinuiti is the largest independent performance marketing firm across Streaming TV and the Triopoly of Google, Facebook, and Amazon, with $4 billion in digital media under management and over 1,000 employees.

Overall Trends

US Advertisers Continued to Grow Investment Across Most Major Ad Platforms in Q2

Ad spend growth accelerated across Google paid search, Meta, Amazon Sponsored Products, and YouTube in the second quarter, in line with expectations as many platforms saw softer year-ago comparisons in Q2 than in Q1.

While tariffs are directly impacting the spend of some advertisers, in aggregate they have not significantly influenced ad investment to this point. Many brands have taken other measures such as renegotiating contracts and shifting production where possible to protect margin while maintaining ad budgets.

At least part of the reason ad spend has held up is the rollback of the most severe tariffs, with the once 145% rate on Chinese goods reduced to 30% in May, which clearly had a meaningful impact on China-based brands like Shein and Temu. Both Shein and Temu appeared to pause Google shopping ads entirely in mid-April, seemingly as a result of the end of the de minimis exemption. Shein reactivated a little over a month later once the tariff rate was revised to 30%, and Temu started to reappear sparingly in Google shopping Auction Insights reports at the end of June.

There remains significant uncertainty surrounding the ultimate shape of US tariffs and whether any rates established will be more than temporary given the administrations rapidly shifting policies over the last several months.

As was the case in Q1, uncertainty regarding US policy is already harming at least one platform in the form of TikTok, with spend down 20% year over year in Q2 for the median same-store advertiser. While advertisers are not walking away from TikTok, many are diversifying their social media investment to other platforms as the ultimate fate of the Chinese-owned video app remains in limbo.

While advertisers continue to grow investment in YouTube video campaigns, they are also increasingly accessing Google’s video inventory through Demand Gen campaigns, with about half of Demand Gen spend going to video in June. Demand Gen spend rose 23% year over year in Q2, as Google’s April cutoff to create new Video Action Campaigns pushed more spend into Demand Gen.

Elsewhere in the world of ad-supported streaming video, brand adoption of Prime Video ads continues to explode, with spend on the platform up 22% from Q1 to Q2. Competitive CPM rates and advanced audience targeting are making Prime Video ads attractive to both endemic brands that sell products directly on Amazon and non-endemic brands that don’t.
For query-driven ad formats such as Amazon Sponsored Products and Google paid search, ad pricing slowed in the second quarter and increases in click volume drove spend growth, as economic uncertainty did not appear to dampen consumer search demand. Amazon Sponsored Products click growth soared to 19%, the strongest growth observed for the format since Q4 2022, while Google paid search click growth was the highest it’s been since Q4 2023.

YouTube CPM fell just 1% year over year in Q2, the smallest decline for YouTube video campaigns since Q1 2022, as advertisers ran up against much weaker pricing comps in the second quarter. YouTube Shorts ads have grown significantly over the last couple of years, and while Shorts ads have seen a below-average CPM, they contributed 18% of segmented spending in Q2 2025, which was second only to skippable in-stream ads.

Paid Social

FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM, TIKTOK, SNAPCHAT, PINTEREST, AND REDDIT

Meta advertising spend accelerates in Q2 as impression growth rebounds

Facebook spend growth jumps in Q2 on strong impression growth

Instagram spend growth accelerates in the second quarter on easier comps

Advantage+ shopping campaigns continue to account for more than 1/3 of retail Meta ad spend

Reels ads grow to the highest Instagram ad impression share ever

Reels share of Facebook ad impressions holds steady in the second quarter

TikTok spend slips in Q2 as CPM drops 22% year over year

Snapchat spend growth rebounds to 51% in Q2 2025

Pinterest advertisers continue to ramp up investment on the platform

Same-store Reddit advertising spend soars 55% year over year in Q2

Investment in Reddit advertising jumped 55% year over year for the median advertiser active on the platform in both Q2 2024 and Q2 2025, an acceleration from 33% growth in the first quarter. In addition to strong growth among advertisers that have been on the platform for a while, the number of brands advertising on Reddit jumped 28% year over year in Q2, as Reddit continues to attract net new advertisers looking to tap into its distinct audience and diversify their social spend.

Reddit advertisers spending nearly 10% as much on the platform as they do on Meta

The median advertiser active on both Reddit and Meta in Q2 2025 spent 9% as much on Reddit as on Meta for the quarter, while Pinterest and Snapchat advertisers spent 10% and 17% as much as on Meta, respectively. Despite recent year-over-year declines in spend for many TikTok advertisers, the median brand active on TikTok and Meta still spent 20% as much on TikTok as on Meta in the second quarter as it continues to be an important part of social media budgets for many.

Paid Search

GOOGLE AND MICROSOFT

Google search spending growth picks up on weaker comps and strength in shopping listings

Microsoft search spending growth holds steady, but click gains accelerate sharply

With major players pulling back, Google shopping ad clicks jump 18% year over year

Temu and Shein fall out of Google shopping auctions, while Amazon sharply cut back its presence

With US tariffs on China skyrocketing and the de minimis exemption set to expire just weeks later on May 2nd, Temu abruptly dropped out of US Google shopping auctions in early April with Shein following suit a few days later. Since May, Walmart has also seen a lower share of Google shopping impressions, but its drop has been less precipitous. After the US lowered the tariff rate on Chinese goods from 145% to 30% in mid-May, Shein returned to Google auctions, but Temu did not. Later, from May 21st through June 8th, Amazon also appeared to heavily cut its investment in shopping listings, but that timing does not coincide as neatly with developments with tariffs. In the last week of Q2, Temu did begin to pop back up in some shopping auctions, but its impression share against the median retailer was still effectively zero.

Amazon pullback on Google shopping listings is its largest since early days of COVID

Amazon’s share of Google shopping ad impressions against the median retailer fell 32 points from the week of May 12th to the week of May 26th, which was the largest two-week impression share drop for Amazon since March 10th 2020. At 29%, Amazon’s share of impressions during the week of May 26th was the lowest it has been since another unusual share drop which took place in February 2022. While Amazon has exposure to increased tariffs on Chinese goods, its pullback and return to full strength the week of June 9th occurred during a relatively stable period for tariff policy, so other considerations may have been at play.

Performance Max share of Google shopping spending bounces back, reaching 59%

After falling from Q4 2024 to Q1 2025, the share of Google shopping ad spending attributed to Performance Max campaigns picked back up in Q2. For advertisers running both PMax and standard Shopping campaigns, PMax accounted for 59% of shopping spending in Q2, up from 53% a quarter earlier. PMax also contributed 59% of revenue generated by Google shopping listings as return on ad spend for PMax was comparable to that of standard Shopping campaigns.

Advertisers generate comparable ROAS for PMax and standard Shopping campaigns in Q2

Although they produce impressions from a more diverse range of inventory, PMax campaigns have generated fairly comparable results to standard Shopping campaigns across key metrics. In Q2, ROAS for PMax was just 2% lower than that for standard Shopping campaigns for the median advertiser running both, while conversion rates were nearly equal. PMax has historically seen higher click-through rates than standard Shopping campaigns, however, and in Q2 that advantage was 18%.

PMax spend share for non-shopping search and display inventory nears all-time high

The share of Performance Max spending produced by non-shopping search and display inventory trended higher over Q2 2025. In June, this segment accounted for 28% of Pmax spending, just under an all-time of 29% during a spike in September 2024. Advertisers have seen less movement in the spend share for video ad inventory, which has held steady between 3.2% and 3.5% over the course of 2025.

Google O&O properties, including YouTube, generate 60% of PMax impressions outside of core search

For Performance Max impressions occurring outside of Google search, 55% were on Google owned and operated properties other than YouTube in Q2 2025, the same rate as a quarter earlier. Non-Google webpages produced 29% of PMax placement impressions in Q2 2025, a rate that has been down since early 2024 when Google began applying account-level placement exclusions to the Search partner network. Mobile apps contributed 11% of placement impressions in Q2, while YouTube video contributed 5%.

Google text ad spending growth decelerates as CPC increases slow

While Google shopping advertisers saw strong acceleration in click growth against weaker comps and with large competitors pulling back, advertisers running Google text ads saw click growth remain in negative territory in Q2 2025. Google text ad clicks fell 3% year over year in Q2, the same decline observed in Q1. Text CPC growth decelerated from 13% in Q1 to 9% in Q2, with spending growth coming in lower in Q2 at 5% year over year.

Growth in Google CPCs for advertiser brand keywords remains relatively high, but down from Q1

Google advertisers running text ads on their own brand names saw the average CPC for those ads rise 19% year over year in Q1 2025 even as non-brand CPCs were up just 3% year over year. In Q2, brand CPC growth still significantly outpaced non-brand CPC growth, but the gap was narrower. Non-brand CPC growth remained at 3% year over year in Q2, while brand CPC growth decelerated to 13%.

Commerce Media

AMAZON AND WALMART

Amazon Sponsored Products spend growth accelerates in the second quarter on strong click growth

Investment in Amazon’s flagship search format rose 18% year over year in Q2, accelerating from 11% in Q1 as advertisers ran up against weaker year-ago comparisons in the second quarter. Click growth jumped to 19%, the highest growth observed for the format since way back in Q4 2022. Average CPC continues to hold roughly steady year over year, with a 1% decline in Q2 following 1% growth in Q1.

Amazon ad spend on Sponsored Brands dips 5% year over year in Q2

Amazon Sponsored Brands ads are largely trending counter to how Sponsored Products ads are trending, with Sponsored Brands CPC up 18% year over year and clicks down 20% year over year in the second quarter. This marks the fifth straight quarter of double-digit CPC growth for Sponsored Brands, including Sponsored Brands video units. Sales and spend both fell 5% compared to Q2 2024 as advertisers maintained steady ROAS year over year.

Amazon Sponsored Display spend once again drops year over year

Participating endemic advertisers now spend 37% of Amazon investment on the DSP

Investment in the Amazon DSP jumps 33% in the second quarter

Walmart Sponsored Products spend up 45% year over year on strong click growth

Clicks on Walmart Sponsored Products increased 26% year over year in Q2, the biggest increase observed since Q2 2023. This is also the first quarter in which click growth outpaced CPC growth since Q2 2023, as spend growth had largely been tracking in line with increases in ad pricing since Q3 2024. Sales attributed to Walmart Sponsored Products rose 31% year over year in Q2, lagging the 45% growth in spend on the format.

Advertisers are leaning into Walmart Sponsored Videos and Sponsored Brands

Among brands targeting Walmart Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Videos, 85% of Walmart search investment goes to Sponsored Products. Sponsored Videos, which were widely launched in the back half of 2023, now account for 8% of all spend, with the remaining 7% going to Sponsored Brands. While not all Walmart search advertisers invest in all three formats, the share that do is growing over time.

CPC for Walmart Sponsored Videos and Sponsored Brands continues to outpace Sponsored Products

Participating brands spend 38% of Walmart self-serve advertising on display formats

Offsite placements account for the lion’s share of Walmart self-serve display spend in Q2

Video and Display

YOUTUBE, PRIME VIDEO, NETFLIX, GDN, AND MORE

YouTube video ad spending up 9% year over year

Spending on YouTube video ad campaigns was up 9% year over year in Q2 2025, up from 5% growth a quarter earlier. Impressions for these campaigns rose 10% year over year, while average CPM fell 1%. While YouTube video campaigns are still the primary way advertisers buy YouTube inventory, impressions on the platform are increasingly purchased through other Google campaign types like Performance Max and particularly Demand Gen campaigns. In April, Google removed the ability to create new Video Action Campaigns, while any that remain in July will be converted to Demand Gen campaigns automatically.

TV screens contribute a majority of YouTube video ad spending

As the primary viewing device across YouTube services, TV screens accounted for 55% of YouTube video ad spending in Q2 2025, up from 37% of spend in Q2 2024. The bulk of those share gains came from phones, which saw a decline in spend share from 46% in Q2 2024 to 31% in Q2 2025. While total spending on YouTube video ad campaigns was up 9% year over year in Q2 2025, TV screen spending was up just under 62%.

Shorts ads contribute second largest share of segmented YouTube video ad spend

Video contributing roughly half of Google Demand Gen spending

Video Action Campaign transition helps drive spike in Google Demand Gen adoption

Same-site spending growth for Google Demand Gen campaigns jumps to 23%

Google Display Network spending growth slows on weaker CPM gains

Streaming spending outside of YouTube up 14%, while CPM growth remains flat

Increased adoption and same-site growth continues to drive Prime Video ad spend higher

Prime Video and Max see an increase in CPM relative to average, while Netflix and Disney+ see declines

TV screens account for 64% of traditional streaming ad buy spending and 45% for RTB purchases