Native advertising has grown from a substantial share of U.S. digital display spending into a format closely tied to social and mobile consumption. The benchmarks below cover U.S. spending through a 2020 forecast, consumer and disclosure research from 2014–2015, and branded-content performance measured during January–December 2024.
Contents
- U.S. spending and market share
- Social and mobile formats
- What attracts consumers
- Disclosure practices
- Branded-content audience benchmarks
- Engagement and conversion benchmarks
U.S. spending and market share
The IAB Native Advertising Playbook 2.0 presents a U.S. digital-display series, including a 2020 forecast. It is a historical series reproduced in the 2019 playbook, not a current measurement of the 2026 market.
| Year | Native digital display spending | Share of U.S. digital display spending | Annual growth |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | $16.68 billion | 48.2% | 70.4% |
| 2017 | $24.50 billion | 54.2% | 46.9% |
| 2018 | $35.24 billion | 59.4% | 43.8% |
| 2019 | $43.90 billion | 62.7% | 24.6% |
| 2020 forecast | $52.75 billion | 64.8% | 20.2% forecast |
The series shows native ads moving from 48.2% of U.S. digital display spending in 2016 to 62.7% in 2019. The 2020 forecast placed native at 64.8% of display spending, with forecast spending of $52.75 billion. Growth was also forecast to moderate: the reported annual rate fell from 70.4% in 2016 to 24.6% in 2019, followed by a projected 20.2% in 2020.
The underlying spending figures and market-share estimates come from the IAB Native Advertising Playbook 2.0. Because the source labels 2020 as a forecast, those figures should be read as expectations from that period rather than as later observed results.
Social and mobile formats
The IAB playbook’s 2018 context points to a strongly mobile and social native-ad market. Almost three-quarters of U.S. native display ad spending went to social ads in 2018, while more than 90% of native display ad dollars went to mobile placements. In the same IAB 2019 playbook summary, native display ads represented 63% of total display ad spending.
The broader advertising environment showed similar momentum. Social media accounted for 25.2% of all digital ad revenue in fiscal 2017, and its share had increased 393% since 2013. U.S. mobile advertising revenue reached $88 billion in fiscal 2017, 105% higher than in 2013.
Publisher behavior in separately cited Polar research also reflected the mobile shift. In a 2014 survey, 79% of publishers were investing in native ads on mobile. The research reported mobile native-ad click-through rates 50% higher than desktop rates. It also found that people spent twice as long with sponsored content on tablets as on PCs and 2.5 times as long on mobile devices as on PCs.
These figures come from different research contexts and should not be combined into one performance estimate. The spending mix is a U.S. 2018 market view, the revenue figures cover fiscal 2017, and the publisher and device comparisons come from 2014 research. The IAB’s native advertising playbook is the source for the spending and format context; the publisher and device findings are reported by the IAB-Edelman study.
What attracts consumers
The IAB-Edelman study examined in-feed sponsored content among surveyed PC users and news readers in 2014. Relevance was the leading reported reason for interest: 90% of interest in sponsored content among surveyed PC users was sparked by content relevance. Among surveyed news readers, 82% cited the marketed site’s authoritativeness as a reason for interest, and 81% were attracted by trusted and familiar brands.
Credibility and presentation also mattered. A link to a credible information source drew 33% extra interest from news consumers in the study. Sixty percent of surveyed users said storytelling attracted them more than ads that were clearly selling. In a related IAB result from the same period, 54% of surveyed users reported increased favorability toward a website when sponsored content was relevant, while 86% of surveyed online news consumers said they understood why they saw advertisements.
Together, these results describe reported attitudes and motivations, not a universal click-through or conversion rate. They suggest that relevance, authority, trust, credible references, and story-led presentation were important conditions in the 2014 surveyed environments. The source is the IAB-Edelman study on in-feed sponsored content and the related IAB summary, Six things you need to know to get sponsored content right.
The FTC-cited mobile Zomato field experiment provides a more concrete local-action comparison. During the 2014–2015 experiment, native advertising increased visits to an advertising restaurant’s information page by 41% versus no advertising and increased calls to the restaurant by 67% versus no advertising. The chance of clicking a native ad was 0.47% when the listing had no disclosure and 0.52% when the listing was distinguishable from organic results.
Those Zomato results describe one mobile field experiment and should not be generalized to every native placement, publisher, or advertiser. They are reported in Native Advertising, Sponsorship Disclosure and Consumer Deception: Evidence from Mobile Search-Ad Experiments.
Disclosure practices
The IAB’s 2015 snapshot of leading U.S. web properties evaluated how in-feed ads were labeled and visually distinguished. Primary disclosure statements appeared on 96% of the in-feed ads evaluated. A variation of the word “sponsored” appeared in 55% of disclosure statements, while 12% used other terms such as “Brought to you by” or “In partnership with.”
The brand sponsor was disclosed in some way on 87% of evaluated in-feed ads. Among disclosed sponsors, the most common presentation was the sponsor’s name without a logo, at 36%.
Visual cues were also common, but not universal. A visual border appeared on 60% of evaluated ads, and background shading appeared as a disclosure cue on 35%. A separate rollover link for more information appeared on 10%, while the AdChoices icon appeared on 1%.
The snapshot measures disclosure patterns on leading U.S. web properties evaluated in 2015. It is not a current compliance audit and does not establish that any one disclosure style performs better than another. The source is DISCLOSURE, DISCLOSED: How Leading Web Properties Disclose In-feed Ads.
Branded-content audience benchmarks
Pressboard’s benchmark provides a recent view of sponsored branded content, a native-adjacent subset rather than the entire native advertising market. For January–December 2024, Pressboard measured 819 publications, 10,280 branded-content campaigns, and 22,663 branded-content stories. The benchmark recorded 119,222,718 reads and 1,133,140 hours with branded content.
The average active time per branded-content story was 40 seconds. Average reads per story were 9,041, while average unique reads per story were 7,034. These are platform benchmark averages, so they describe the measured Pressboard inventory and should not be generalized to all publishers or campaigns.
The scale of the benchmark is useful context when interpreting the averages. It covers many publications, campaigns, stories, and reads, but its scope remains the branded-content activity measured by Pressboard during 2024. The full source is Pressboard Benchmarks – 2024 (full year).
Engagement and conversion benchmarks
The same Pressboard benchmark reported an average scroll depth of 44% per branded-content story. Its average engaged-read rate was 79%, with an engaged read defined as at least 10 seconds. The quality-read rate was 95.3%, defined by Pressboard as at least 3 seconds.
Pressboard reported an average branded-content conversion rate of 2.2% in the 2024 benchmark. For articles containing in-article links, the benchmark recorded 2,577,601 link clicks, and the article-read-to-link-click rate was 5.7% for those articles.
| 2024 Pressboard measure | Benchmark |
|---|---|
| Average active time per story | 40 seconds |
| Average scroll depth | 44% |
| Engaged-read rate, at least 10 seconds | 79% |
| Quality-read rate, at least 3 seconds | 95.3% |
| Average conversion rate | 2.2% |
| Read-to-link-click rate for articles with in-article links | 5.7% |
The definitions matter: a quality read requires at least 3 seconds, while an engaged read requires at least 10 seconds. The 5.7% link-click rate applies only to articles with in-article links, and the 2.2% conversion rate is an average for the measured branded-content benchmark. Neither figure is a guaranteed result for a particular native campaign.
For planning purposes, the historical IAB series shows the scale and channel direction of U.S. native digital display through a 2020 forecast, while the Pressboard benchmark supplies 2024 branded-content engagement measures. They come from different periods, sources, definitions, and populations. Comparing them directly as one continuous market series would overstate what the available evidence supports.