86% of media planners would move more linear TV budget to CTV if they had show-level targeting and reporting - and 65% would also shift dollars from programmatic video, 63% from display
NEW YORK -May 14, 2026 - Gracenote, the content intelligence business unit of Nielsen, today released a new report ahead of upfronts, TV Audiences Have Shifted. Ad Dollars Have Not: The Need for Content Intelligence in the CTV Era. The findings reveal that 86% of U.S. media planners would move more linear budget to CTV if show-level targeting and reporting were available.
The reallocation would not stop at traditional TV. Sixty-five percent say they would also consider shifting spend from programmatic video and 63% from display, suggesting richer content intelligence could help CTV win a greater share of digital ad spend across the broader media mix.
The report spotlights a major blind spot in connected TV: what Gracenote defines as the CTV Data Gap. While advertisers have embraced CTV's audience targeting, the market still lacks a standardized view of the programming attributes behind each ad impression. Without that content layer, buyers lose confidence at every stage - from planning to post-campaign reporting. This uncertainty makes decision-makers hesitant to fund CTV at scale.
Buyers aren't asking for more complexity - they're asking for the same transparency they've relied on for decades in linear TV, said Ryan Moore, Chief Business Officer at Gracenote. Bringing show-level visibility to CTV gives the channel a clearer path to bigger budgets, not just from linear but across the digital video ecosystem. When buyers have the insight to validate placement quality and prove impact, CTV becomes more accountable and competitive.
The Gracenote Content Graph helps close this gap by giving advertisers a source-validated view of CTV inventory, including descriptors such as genre, rating and language, along with program-level metadata and unique content identifiers. This infrastructure enables more precise targeting, stronger brand safety controls and post-campaign proof of performance that buyers can trust.
A recent activation shows the value of this approach. In Q1 2026, a Dos Equis campaign executed by dentsu X through Index Exchange's SSP used Gracenote CTV Content Intelligence to reach college football fans with precision. The solution delivered 100% of impressions within targeted college football content, including 84% during live College Football Playoff games, while keeping CPMs 7% under benchmark.
Additional findings from the report include:
89% of media planners anticipate shifting more budget from linear TV to CTV over the next 12 to 24 months, underscoring CTV's continued momentum.
100% of programmatic traders say show-level transparency is very or extremely important for ensuring brand safety and inventory quality in CTV.
95% of programmatic traders agree that the absence of show-level signals prevents them from advocating for more CTV budget during planning.
80% of traders would shift budget from audience-targeted to contextually targeted CTV with actionable content signals.
47% of media planners cite limited show- or content-level data as a primary barrier to moving more spend into CTV.
Advertisers, agencies and media partners can download the full report here.
Methodology The survey was fielded online March 5-23, 2026, among 500 U.S. media professionals from media agencies and brand advertisers. Respondents included media planners and strategists (n=206), linear TV buyers (n=213) and programmatic/digital video traders (n=81). Additional findings cited in this release are drawn from the complete survey dataset, available on request.
About Gracenote Gracenote is the content intelligence business unit of Nielsen. We standardize the way the global media and entertainment ecosystem indexes content and associated metadata, allowing it to flow between creators, distributors, platforms and advertisers. By providing unmatched depth across 50M titles and 80K channels and catalogs, we power the modern search, discovery and navigation experiences that connect people to the TV, movies, music and sports they love - in 70 languages across 80 countries. For more information, visit Gracenote.com or follow us on LinkedIn.
Media Contact Mark Yamada
mark.yamada@nielsen.com
More from Nielsen
15/05/2026
86% of media planners would move more linear TV budget to CTV if they had show-level targeting and reporting - and 65% would also shift dollars from programmati...
14/05/2026
Car ad spend rises sharply in March as more auto buyers turn to electric, hybrid...
07/05/2026
Alysa Liu and Shohei Ohtani Help Drive Viewership as 91 of the Top 100 Broadcast...
28/04/2026
Triton Digital's Podcast Metrics Demos+ Data Integration Enables Comprehensi...
27/04/2026
Available for current Nielsen ONE Ads customers, this new capability predicts sa...
22/04/2026
The nation unites around football team's World Cup dream
Warsaw, Poland, 20.04.26: Nielsen, a global leader in audience measurement, data, and media intell...
22/04/2026
Warsaw, Poland, 22.04.26: Nielsen, a global leader in audience measurement, data...
22/04/2026
New market intelligence offering gives businesses a clearer view of local consum...
21/04/2026
Advertising strategies shift as competition grows for a large, active and qualit...
18/04/2026
The first signs of spring in March led to Poles spending significantly less time in front of their screens, leading to a sharp 22-minute drop in average viewing...
16/04/2026
The integration accelerates demographic audience delivery across local markets a...
15/04/2026
NBCU-Versant notches 13.1% of TV viewing in February, its best since August 2024...
15/04/2026
New data reveals older Kiwis are financially resilient, loyal to local products,...
14/04/2026
Ruiz has helped fuel growth for both client-side and media companies, including, most recently, TelevisaUnivision.
He will spearhead transformation, innovatio...
08/04/2026
New Gracenote study finds behavioral change well underway, but trust in AI-gener...
03/04/2026
New York April 2, 2026 TelevisaUnivision, the world's leading Spanish-la...
31/03/2026
Rebel Sport leads ad investment as brands compete for a large, active and qualit...
25/03/2026
The company expands leadership team under Chief Revenue Officer Amilcar Perez
S...
25/03/2026
Winter Olympic Games Opening Ceremony features in top 10 programmes of the month...
20/03/2026
After a series of increases, February brought the first slowdown in time spent in front of TV sets in a long time. While traditional television was losing viewi...
16/03/2026
NEW YORK - March 16, 2026 - A E Global Media and Nielsen today announced a new,...
12/03/2026
Cost pressures, switching intent and demand for savings and credit products are ...
12/03/2026
For the first time, Nielsen breaks out demographic information about FAST and AV...
06/03/2026
Nielsen Highlights Women's Sports Viewership Milestones Ahead of International Women's Day on March 8
New York March 5, 2026 According to Nielsen&#...
03/03/2026
Nielsen's DMA data gives Magellan AI users a standardized way to measure th...
02/03/2026
Harvey Norman tops New Zealand's biggest ad spenders as retail leads and telcos and beverages surge Auckland March 3, 2026 - Nielsen's New Zealand'...
27/02/2026
NEW YORK - February 26, 2026 - An estimated 32.6 million people watched President Donald J. Trump deliver the 2026 State of the Union address on Tuesday, Februa...
25/02/2026
This new offering helps solve for the need to move beyond traditional audience d...
25/02/2026
Gold-standard Gracenote content metadata will power Samsung's LLM-enabled entertainment search discovery experiences and more
NEW YORK February 25, 202...
24/02/2026
Disney Captures 11.9% of TV in January, Boosted by ESPN's ( 82%) College Foo...
20/02/2026
NEW YORK - February 10, 2026 - An estimated 125.6* million viewers watched Super Bowl LX on Sunday, February 8, according to Nielsen's Big Data Panel meas...
20/02/2026
NEW YORK - February 19, 2026 - Nielsen today shared updated and final Super Bowl...
19/02/2026
WBD edges above Polsat in only change in the top 10 content distributor rankings...
19/02/2026
Airlines and cruise operators ramp up spend as New Zealanders plan, compare and book online
Auckland, February 19, 2026 - New Nielsen Ad Intel data shows adver...
19/02/2026
The beginning of the new year brought a clear revival in front of television screens. The winter aura meant that Poles spent an average of 5% more time watching...
19/02/2026
New data also shows news content on FAST channels up 58% as streaming catalogs c...
17/02/2026
Cable Surges 9% on Strength of College Football Playoffs and News, while NFL Delivers Top 15 Broadcast Telecasts
ESPN (+82%) and FOX News Channel (+17%) Combin...
11/02/2026
NEW YORK - February 10, 2026 - An estimated 124.9 million viewers watched Super Bowl LX on Sunday, February 8, according to Nielsen's Big Data Panel measu...
10/02/2026
NEW YORK February 10, 2026 Nielsen's Gracenote, the global leader in entertainment metadata, today announced the continuation of its partnership with Go...
09/02/2026
Harvey Norman tops Australia's biggest ad spenders as finance and travel surge
Sydney February 9, 2026 - Nielsen's Biggest Ad Spenders of 2025 Report...
06/02/2026
Despite most never having strapped on skis or skates, Aussies are keen for some ...
05/02/2026
During this period, streaming comprised the majority of ad supported TV (45.6%),...
04/02/2026
Pilot To Launch with Super Bowl LX on February 8 and Continue with High Profile Live Events, Entertainment and Sports
Nielsen to Use State of the Art Wearable...
29/01/2026
Bluey' Wins Second Consecutive Top Streaming Title of the Year with 45 Billi...
28/01/2026
Airlines, cruise and tour operators double down on ad spend as Australians' prioritise travel
Sydney January 28, 2026 - New Nielsen Ad Intel data shows a...
27/01/2026
Nielsen will continue to drive growth and provide local audience measurement
in...
23/01/2026
Multi-year deal utilizes Nielsen's full suite of local audience marketing in...
23/01/2026
New York, NY January 21, 2026 - Neptune BidCo US Inc. (the Issuer or the Co...
22/01/2026
Strategic hire marks latest milestone in Gracenote's continued expansion into CTV advertising & monetization
New York - January 21, 2026 - Nielsen's Gr...
86% of media planners would move more linear TV budget to CTV if they had show-level targeting and reporting - and 65% would also shift dollars from programmatic video, 63% from display
