Where I see CTV for B2B going in 2026

Is 2026 going to be the year of CTV for B2B? I think there’ll be a bigger push to invest but that aggressive brands will still have plenty of opportunity to separate themselves from more cautious competitors – particularly if the macroeconomy remains shaky.

Some particular developments I see taking shape over the next 12 months:

• Amazon’s DSP will make a huge push into CTV space to eat up market share that The Trade Desk has enjoyed for years. More budget is already rumored to be migrating from TTD into ADSP, and CTV will get a big chunk of that.

• Netflix will become the standout walled garden CTV platform by making aggressive investments into building out its platform and inking new strategic partnership.

• CTV fraud will push advertisers to more “trusted” platforms. In 2025, too many advertisers didn’t take the time to understand whether their ads were showing to people or bots. The idea of investing in CTV just to be there won’t cut it in 2026, so B2B marketers will lean on more established platforms.

• SMB B2B brands will pour more resources into improving their CRM setups. A richer 1PD environment will fuel more – and more successful – CTV initiatives.

• A push into implementing CAPI in CTV will benefit privacy-focused B2B brands like banking and fintech.

Quick Hits

IAB releases guidelines for CTV as a performance channel — The TL;DR here is that CTV is becoming recognized as a performance-driving channel – but brands need to incorporate CAPI to better piece together measurement and business outcomes.

Comscore’s annual report shows ad-supported CTV growth is booming — Hours of content consumed and total households watching CTV continued to climb in 2025. Nearly 100 million American households now access streaming TV, with an average of nearly five hours a day of content streamed.

Linear ad spend projected to fall an average of 7% annually through 2027 — With ad-supported CTV continuing to rise, TV dollars are projected to steadily move away from linear options.

eMarketer Looks at the Trends That Will Shape the TV Market in 2026

Arielle Feger - eMarketing.com

2025 brought a number of big shifts on the TV landscape, but two in eMarketer’s look-ahead article caught my eye.

One: there are more people in the U.S. who refuse to pay for live TV than those who choose to pay for it.

Two: ad-free streaming prices are exploding, which will lead more people to ad-supported packages and open up more CTV inventory for advertisers. That dynamic may keep prices relatively stable while other, more DR-focused channels keep raising costs.

Yahoo DSP launches CTV offering

Will Russo - Campaign Live

Remember Yahoo? It might not be the biggest news on its face, but the platform’s Expect Results campaign has built partnerships with LinkedIn and Netflix, among others. The more respected players enter the CTV game, the quicker the bar will get raised on transparency and functionality, so this is a good signal for a maturing channel.

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