US Mobile Advertising Growth (2020–2025)
With more people using smartphones year after year, the number of eyes on mobile ads is undoubtedly growing. For businesses, this translates to a potential increase in sales and revenue from investing in mobile advertising.
But just how big is the mobile ad market size?
Mobile advertising spend: 2020–2025
According to the latest data, mobile advertising spend in the US in 2024 is expected to reach $216.4 billion, as it crosses the $200 billion milestone for the first time. This will represent a 11.1% year-over-year increase in mobile ad spend, a slowdown from 2023’s 14.5% growth rate.
Mobile ad expenditure has been rising over the past few years. In 2020, this figure registered at $103.4 billion, before surging by 39.2% in 2021, to $144 billion. A year later, the mobile ad market size grew to $170.1 billion. In 2023, mobile ad expenditure totaled $194.8 billion.
US mobile advertising spend is expected to continue increasing in 2025—albeit at a slower rate. In 2025, there will be a slight deceleration to 8.9%, but expenditure is still expected to hit $235.7 billion.
If mobile ad spend does continue to grow according to experts’ forecast, this will mean that it is set to more than double in the years from 2020 to 2025. The overall increase of $132.2 billion marks a rise of 127.9% and an average annual growth rate of 18.4%.
Of the different mobile ad formats, search ads are expected to bring in the largest revenues. A recent study shows that expenditure on search ads on mobile is set to hit $113.2 billion by 2027. This is followed by video ads and banner ads, at $82.2 billion and $60.7 billion, respectively.
Drivers behind US mobile advertising growth
What’s driving the mobile advertising growth in the US? For starters, the large and growing number of internet users and mobile device owners. As many as 96.4% of US internet users today own smartphones.
That’s not all. On average, internet users spend nearly 3.5 hours every single day using the internet on their mobile devices, accounting for 49.6% of the total internet time, and every minute they’re connected on their mobile devices is brand exposure and sales potential.