• by Wayne Friedman , June 12, 2023

Open programmatic platform advertising spending on global connected TV platforms took an estimated 5% dip to $3.2 billion in the first quarter this year, according to Pixalate -- the first year-over-year decline since at least 2019, when the data science company began monitoring programmatic advertising.

This year, eMarketer projects total U.S. CTV advertising revenue to increase 21% to $25.1 billion. Open programmatic CTV revenue is roughly half that of all CTV advertising per year.

The report did not reveal any private programmatic, direct, or other CTV advertising estimates.

Top-grossing CTV apps in the first quarter on Roku -- the biggest platform for open programmatic business with a 46% share -- include (in order): Hulu, Philo, Tubi, Pluto TV, and Sling. On Amazon's Fire TV: Philo, Tubi, Pluto TV, Hulu, and Sling.

The data shows sports content witnessed more than a 100% increase on both Roku and Fire TV in the first quarter versus the same period a year before.

The company notes that 98% of U.S. internet-connected households can be reached by CTV advertising -- up from 92% in the first quarter a year ago. 

Pixalate says invalid traffic -- including ad fraud -- on CTV sites remained at around 20% on a global basis.

Pixalate analyzes programmatic advertising across 70,000 programmatic-supported CTV apps, over 300 million CTV devices -- predominantly via buy-side open auction programmatic traffic sources. The research was conducted from January 1, 2020 through March 31, 2023.