• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, August 25, 2024

Programmatic advertising in mobile apps surged in Q2, totaling $6.4 billion in ad spend, according to Global Mobile Ad Spend Trends: IAB Categories & Subcategories, a study by Pixalate.

The company analyzed over 50 billion open programmatic ad transactions across 5.1 million mobile apps in the Google Play store and Apple App Store during the quarter.

The video gaming category captured 63% of open programmatic ad spending for a total of $4 billion worldwide, leading in all regions. Health Living, meanwhile, grew its share of open programmatic.

Video gaming is the biggest winner in the U.S. in terms of percentage growth:

• Video Gaming—63%
• Music and Audio—10%
• Technology & Computing—8%
• Hobbies & Interests—4%
• News and Politics—3%
• Sports—2%
• Books and Literature—1%
• Healthy Living—2%
• Business and Finance—1%
• Family and Relationships—1%
• Other—6%

Here are the top 10 sellers through which video gaming appear:

• Verve Group—10.3%
• Magnite—9.6%
• InMobi—7.5%
• PubMatic—7.1%
• Google AdExchange—7%
• Digital Turbine—5.7%
• Equativ—5.3%
• Xandr Monetize—4%
• Nexxen—3.8%
• e-Planning—3.8%

Meanwhile, 22.5% of ad impressions for the music and Audio category go through Google AdExchange. In addition, 17.9% in the Technology & Computing vertical go through the Verve Group. 

Now this is a limited report: You might well wonder what it means if you don't happen to be in the video gaming business. But it illustrates that programmatic ad spending is healthy in the app space.