With an audience of 3.6 billion players – yes, that’s billion – why does gaming comprise so little of advertising budgets? 

This topic was up for discussion at the 2026 IAB Playfronts event in New York City recently. The top takeways from the meeting included:

• To better optimize advertising with gaming, marketers need to consider:
  • Getting buy-in from senior leaders who aren’t familiar with gaming channels
  • Gaming’s fit into the overall media marketing plan
  • How results will be measured
• Mobile gaming is the mainstay of gaming advertising, and 62% of mobile gamers are Gen Z or millennials. In addition, 82% are heads of household and over half are parents. Mobile gamers are a highly desirable and engaged audience. However, marketers should be careful to not flood gamers with ads.
• With so many games available, the tendency is to believe that gamers stick to one game, so marketers pick a game with a preferred audience. However, this model no longer works, because gamers have so many options. Marketers are still trying to figure out the best way to select games for ads.
• Measurement of gaming ads is still under development. There still are no proven and consistent measurements available to help ensure success in gaming ads. Because games move across so many different titles, a measurement plan will need to move with them.
• Although it’s easy to say that gaming only gets a small fraction of ad budgets, is it really true? Is it possible that ad spend is simply hidden in other line items, like Twitch activations or social media? Is a partnership with a gaming creator part of a gaming budget or an influencer budget?

Gaming is still an emerging and developing platform. But it’s new and inexpensive, and marketers should consider how to best take advantage of it.