• by Wayne Friedman , January 9, 2025

Total TV station revenue -- advertising and retransmission business -- will sink 7% to $37.6 billion, according to estimates from S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Much of the decline will come from typical off-year advertising declines from high political and advertising spending in 2024.

S&P Global Market Intelligence estimates TV stations pulled in a collective $40.4 billion.

Just looking at U.S. broadcast station ad revenue -- TV and radio -- S&P estimates 2025 will see a decline of 9.3% to $32.83 billion.

In November, BIA Advisory Services projected that for all 2025, all local TV-based advertising efforts will drop 20% to $21.3 billion. Taking out political advertising, core local TV advertising is estimated to rise 3.6% to $21 billion next year.

BIA estimates include over-the-air (OTA), TV digital media (websites, social media), and local connected TV/OTT ad revenues.

Other industry retransmission revenues could amount to around $15 billion in 2025.

Last May, Rick Ducey, managing director of BIA, said: “BIA forecasts that local TV stations will receive $14.3 billion in retransmission fees (aka subscriber fees) in 2024. Since these agreements run for several years, even as the pay cable universe shrinks, we still expect retransmission revenues to grow to $15.6 billion by 2027.”