A slowdown in streaming platform advertising has amounted to a 20% drop in national TV ad spend/on-air promotion, according to estimates from EDO Ad EnGage.

Nearly six months into the year, (January 1-June 23) national TV spend is at $312.8 million, from 110,900 airings resulting in 45.1 billion impressions. The year before for the same period, there were 110,500 airings and 48.7 billion impressions.

Year-over-year, a steeper 30% decline landed the business at $692.7 million in spending — with 242,200 airings (down 18%) with 99.9 billion impressions (also down 18%).

Analysts say streaming business growth has seen subscriber slowdown, with consumers making cutbacks in the average number of streaming platforms in homes. This has been coupled with lingering yearly net losses which has resulted in companies looking for cost savings — in content production and marketing.  

The most significant positive changes this year so far include a sharp increase for Warner Bros. Discovery’s relaunch of Max (formerly HBO Max) on May 23, as well as Amazon Prime Video and Tubi.

Max — a TV campaign which started in late April — is now at an estimated $64.5 million, according to EDO Ad EnGage, yielding 13.1 billion impressions over the period from 35,810 airings. 

Much of that advertising has been through on-air promotion on ad-supported linear TV Warner Bros. Discovery networks — TNT, Investigation Discovery, TBS, Discovery Channel, and Food Network.

A year ago over the same period, HBO Max had $37.6 million in estimated national TV spend. Sister streaming platform discovery+ was at $26.7 million.

Amazon Prime Video has doubled its spending — $40.1 million versus $19.5 million; Tubi is up $23.1 million ($5.3 million a year before).

At the same time there was lower spending for Peacock, Disney+, and AMC+

Peacock was down to $1.5 million in advertising (748 airings) from $31.1 million (1,530 airings) in 2022. A year ago NBCUniversal aired the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics in February.

Disney+ was also lower, at $14.9 million at 5,780 airings (versus $33.2 million a year ago, 8,020 airings). The Disney Bundle (Disney+ Hulu, and ESPN+) is $19.2 million (4,130 airings) this year so far versus the same six month period a year ago, at $22.4 million (6,640 airings).

AMC+ and its parent company, AMC Networks, which has seen massive senior executive changes over the past year, is at $2.3 million (4,320 airings), compared to $16.5 million with 8,310 airings for the first half of 2022.

A slowdown in streaming platform advertising has amounted to a 20% drop in national TV ad spend/on-air promotion, according to estimates from EDO Ad EnGage.