THE GREAT REALLOCATION: EVERY RUPEE OF GROWTH CAME FROM DIGITAL
Indian AdEx in 2025 continued to surprise. Not with exuberant growth, but with its ability to hold ground and progress steadily in an environment marked by macroeconomic uncertainty, regulatory disruptions and cautious advertiser sentiment.
At the total AdEx level, growth stood at 7% in 2025, taking the Indian advertising market to Rs 115,291 Crores (legacy definition) or by 12% to Rs 155,105 Crores (new expanded definition), adding incremental revenue of Rs 7,311 Crores (legacy) or Rs 16,156 Crores (new) over the previous year. While this growth rate is modest when compared to the high-growth years of the past decade, it once again underlines the resilience of the Indian advertising ecosystem.
Behind this aggregate number lies a fundamental structural reality that has been understated in prior PMAR reports: India has already crossed into majority-Digital advertising.
Two Ways to See India’s ADEX:
Legacy AdEx Definition (Continuity View):
Traditional AdEx declined by Rs 739 Crores while Digital AdEx grew by Rs 8,050 Crores, more than accounting for all net market growth. Under this lens, Digital reached 46% share in 2025, up from 42% in 2024. This reinforces a fundamental shift in how advertisers allocate budgets—from broad-based expansion across media to selective, channel-driven investment.
New AdEx Definition (Expanded Reality View):
When we include Quick Commerce advertising (Rs 4,000 Crores) and MSME Digital spends (Rs 35,814 Crores)—both of which are material, measurable, and Digital-first—total Digital AdEx in 2025 reached Rs 93,156 Crores, representing 60% share of the expanded Rs 155,105 Crores advertising economy. Traditional media contributed Rs 61,949 Crores (40% share).
Under the new definition:
- Digital grew from 55% share (2024) → 60% share (2025)
- Traditional declined from 45% share (2024) → 40% share (2025)
India is not ‘approaching’ a Digital majority—it has already arrived.
Key Insight:
Over the last decade, Traditional’s share has fallen from 85% (2016, legacy definition) → 54% (2025, legacy) or 40% (2025, new). Digital has risen from 15% (2016) → 46% (2025, legacy) or 60% (2025, new).
Under the expanded definition, India crossed Digital majority in 2024 and is now at 60% Digital share—a threshold most developed markets took another decade to reach.
Digital vs Traditional: Structure of the Market
Legacy AdEx Lens (Continuity with PMAR 2025):
In 2025, Traditional media (TV, Print, Radio, Cinema, OOH) together declined from Rs62,688 Crores in 2024 to Rs61,949 Crores, a -1% and a 4-point share erosion from 58% to 54% on the legacy AdEx definition. This marks the first absolute decline in Traditional AdEx in the post-pandemic recovery phase.
Digital media, by contrast, increased from Rs 45,292 Crores to Rs 53342 Crores, delivering 18% growth and lifting its share from 42% to 46% in a single year. The 2025 data clearly shows that Digital is now the sole growth engine of Indian advertising, with Traditional media collectively subtracting from market growth.
New AdEx Lens (Ground Reality):
When we incorporate Quick Commerce advertising (Rs 4,000 Crores, up 202% YoY) and MSME Digital spends (Rs 35,814 Crores, up 21% YoY), the picture becomes starker:
- Total Digital AdEx: Rs 93,156 Crores (60% share), up 22% from Rs 76,261 Crores in 2024
- Traditional AdEx: Rs 61,949 Crores (40% share), down -1% from Rs 62,688 Crores in 2024
India is not at the threshold of Digital majority—it crossed that threshold in 2024 (55%) and is now operating as a majority-Digital advertising market at 60% share.
This is not a forecast. It is the 2025 reality.
Why This Matters:
For the first time, PMAR explicitly reports that the vast majority of India’s incremental advertising investment, advertiser entry, and platform innovation is happening in Digital ecosystems—not just the ‘core Digital’ measured historically (Search, Social, Video, Display, Ecommerce), but also in Quick Commerce platforms (Blinkit, Zepto, Swiggy Instamart) and MSME-focused advertising.
Expanding Digital AdEx Scope: Q-Comm & MSME Spends
Beginning with the estimation of 2025 Actuals, we have expanded the Digital AdEx scope to explicitly include advertising spends on Quick Commerce (Q-Comm) platforms and by MSME advertisers. In today’s media environment, both segments represent meaningful and fast-growing contributors to digital advertising volumes.
Historically, PMAR reporting did not publish these spends separately within Digital AdEx. This is the first year that Q-Comm share of AdEx and digital spends by MSMEs have been systematically estimated and incorporated. For like-to-like comparison, corresponding estimates have also been developed retrospectively for 2023 and 2024.
Key Insights:
- Q-Comm has scaled explosively from Rs 300 Crores (2023) to Rs 4,000 Crores (2025), reflecting rapid platform expansion and heavy reliance on digital customer acquisition. Platforms like Blinkit, Zepto, and Swiggy Instamart are seeing spends at rapidly growing levels.
- MSME digital spends now exceed Rs 35,000 Crores, representing a broad base of small and medium advertisers using digital platforms for targeted, performance-led advertising. This is 38% of Digital AdEx—a segment larger than all of Print or nearly as large as Linear TV.
- Total Digital (expanded view) reached Rs 93,156 Crores in 2025, growing 22% YoY and representing 60% of total Indian advertising under the new definition.
Concentration of Growth & Advertiser Behaviour
The incremental Rs 7,311 Crores (legacy definition) / Rs 16,156 Crores (new definition) in 2025 was not driven by a broad base of new advertisers but by higher spends from existing, typically larger advertisers, especially on Digital platforms. The simultaneous decline in Traditional AdEx and rise in Digital suggests that budgets are being reallocated, rather than total marketing investment being aggressively scaled up.
This pattern aligns with heightened emphasis on ROI, measurability, and budget discipline. As a result, advertisers are prioritising channels that offer clearer attribution and performance signals, particularly:
- Performance-led Digital (Search, Social, Ecommerce)
- Retail Media and Q-Comm platforms
- Highly targeted formats with transparent measurement
Strategic Insight: A Market in Maturity Transition
The evidence indicates that India is entering an early maturity phase: absolute spends are still rising, but growth rates are normalising, and capital is being deployed with greater discipline. This pattern mirrors early maturity cycles in more developed markets, where the focus shifts from ‘how much to spend’ to ‘how well to allocate.’
For advertisers, this has four implications:
- Market share gains will increasingly come from allocation efficiency, not spend escalation.
- Weak or undifferentiated media strategies will underperform, even at higher spend levels.
- Clear, evidence-backed channel roles must replace legacy, habit-driven plans.
- Strategic planning capability—the ability to design systems of media rather than isolated buys—will become a core competitive advantage.
Global Context: India vs World
As per WARC, global advertising expenditure continued its expansion in 2025, crossing the US$1.19 trillion mark, growing 8.9% over 2024. While this represents a moderation compared to stronger growth in 2024, the market added nearly $100 billion in incremental spend.
Key Insights:
- India’s media mix remains more balanced (Traditional 54% vs 21% globally), indicating continued strength of legacy media.
- Digital dominates globally (79%), while India’s digital share is lower at 46%, but growing at a much faster pace (18% vs 13% globally).
- India is outpacing global digital growth, while Traditional decline is milder in India (-1%) compared to global (-4%).
- India remains a relatively small contributor (~1% of global AdEx) but continues to be a high-growth, emerging ad market.
NOTE: On the expanded definition that includes Q-Comm and MSME Digital spends, India’s Digital share rises from 46% to 60%. This narrows the apparent gap with the global 79% Digital share and reinforces that India is already majority-Digital by spend even though Traditional remains structurally stronger here than in most mature markets.
2026 Forecast: Measured, Uneven, Digitally Led
With growth remaining largely flat around 12% over 2023–2025 under the expanded AdEx definition, overall AdEx in 2026 is forecast to grow to around Rs 1,74,605 Crores, implying roughly 12–13% nominal growth over the 2025 base of Rs 1,55,104 Crores. Under the legacy core-definition lens (excluding Q-Comm and MSME), growth is more muted at about 9%, taking AdEx from Rs 1,15,290 Crores to roughly Rs 1,25,629 Crores, reinforcing that much of the incremental market is now being created in newer Digital ecosystems rather than legacy media alone.
Traditional media is expected to grow only about 1% in value terms on the legacy series, from Rs 61,949 Crores to about Rs 62,629 Crores, taking its share down further even as absolute spends remain broadly stable. Within this, Linear TV is forecast to stay flat in value at roughly Rs 32,855 Crores, while Print edges up about 3% and other Traditional media such as Cinema, Outdoor and Radio move in a narrow band of –5 to +5%, essentially confirming a low-growth, yield-management phase for the Traditional cluster.
Digital, by contrast, continues to be the only true growth engine. On the core Digital definition (Search, Social, Video, Display, Ecommerce, and CTV), AdEx is projected to grow about 18%, from Rs 53,342 Crores in 2025 to roughly Rs 63,000 Crores in 2026, taking Digital and Traditional to rough parity at 50:50 in the legacy series. Under the expanded definition, Total Digital (Core + Q-Comm + MSME) is forecast to reach about Rs 1,11,976 Crores in 2026, up 20% from Rs 93,156 Crores in 2025, lifting Digital’s share of the expanded market from 60% to about 64%.
The most aggressive growth is expected from the newer Digital engines.
Quick Commerce advertising is forecast to expand from about Rs 4,000 Crores to roughly Rs 6,000 Crores (around 50% growth), while MSME Digital spends are projected to grow about 20% from Rs 35,814 Crores to around Rs 42,976 Crores, together adding over Rs 9,000 Crores of incremental Digital AdEx in a single year.
Large Screen, viewed as TV + CTV, is expected to grow modestly from about Rs 38,855 Crores to roughly Rs 40,855 Crores (around 5% growth), with CTV alone forecast to grow by about one-third to Rs 8,000 Crores, further tilting video planning toward measurable, IP-delivered environments.
The strategic implication is clear: 2026 will be another year where Digital absorbs the majority of incremental AdEx, especially when Q-Comm, MSME and CTV are included, while Traditional media must work harder for every rupee. For planners, that means treating the legacy AdEx series as the continuity baseline, but anchoring growth thinking and system design on the expanded definition—where India is already a 60%+ Digital market and moving toward 2/3rd of AdEx being Digital by 2027.
TV IS DEAD. LONG LIVE LARGE SCREEN: THE LTV+CTV MANDATE
All medium-wise AdEx and share metrics in this section are based on the legacy AdEx definition (excluding Q-Comm and MSME) to maintain continuity with PMAR 2025.
From Volume to Value: Attention as the Core Constraint
For much of the last decade, Indian AdEx growth could be explained by two levers: more brands entering media and existing brands buying more inventory, especially on TV and Digital. By 2025, both levers are hitting natural limits: advertiser participation is no longer expanding uniformly, and audiences are fragmenting across platforms, devices, and formats. In this environment, attention—not inventory—becomes the scarce asset.
Digital’s 18% growth and TV’s -5% decline in 2025 (legacy AdEx definition) occurred alongside declines in TV volumes (down 10%) and a shift within Digital toward performance formats. This shows advertisers moving away from pure volume-based planning (GRP tonnage, impressions) toward environments where attention is deeper, more measurable, and closer to outcomes. The planning problem is no longer ‘How do I buy more?’ but ‘Where does each incremental rupee buy the most meaningful attention?’
The Large Screen Thesis: Linear TV Declines, CTV Accelerates
It would be incorrect to interpret TV’s decline as a collapse of large-screen advertising.
Television’s 2025 trajectory—AdEx down 5%, volumes down 10%, share down from 32% to 28% (legacy AdEx definition) —confirms that Linear TV on its own is in structural decline. However, when we examine advertising from a Large Screen perspective by combining Linear TV (LTV) with Connected TV (CTV), the picture changes meaningfully.
CTV Definition Expansion:
It is important to clarify that in our earlier CTV estimates published during 2025, we had included only OTT CTV advertising and had excluded YT (YouTube) CTV. Given that YT on Connected TV has become a high-demand and high-delivery platform for advertisers, we have expanded our CTV definition to include both OTT CTV and YouTube CTV. For comparability, this expanded definition has been applied retrospectively to 2024 as well.
Scale, Growth and Market Role
Legacy AdEx View (Core Digital):
Digital advertising expenditure rose from Rs 45,292 Crores in 2024 → Rs 53,342 Crores in 2025, an absolute increase of `8,050 Crores and a growth rate of 18%. This was more than twice the overall market growth rate of 7%, lifting Digital’s share of total AdEx from 42% → 46% in a single year. Over the last decade, Digital’s share has climbed from 15% in 2016 to 46% in 2025, making it the central pillar of India’s advertising economy.
Crucially, every rupee of net market growth in 2025 came from Digital: while Digital added Rs 8,050 Crores, Traditional media collectively shrank by Rs 739 Crores. Under this legacy definition, Digital delivered 110% of total market growth.
This makes Digital not just the fastest-growing medium but the sole growth engine of Indian AdEx.
New AdEx View (Expanded Digital):
When we included Q-Comm (Rs 4,000 Crores) and MSME (Rs 35,814 Crores), Total Digital AdEx reached Rs 93,156 Crores in 2025, growing 22% from Rs 76,261 Crores in 2024. This represents 60% of the expanded Rs 155,105 Crores advertising economy, up from 55% in 2024.
Under the new definition:
- Digital added Rs 16,895 Crores in absolute terms
- Traditional declined by Rs 739 Crores (share declining from 45% → 40%)
- Digital delivered 105% of total market growth, more than offsetting Traditional’s decline
For planners, Digital can no longer be treated as a tactical or incremental layer; it is now the structural anchor around which other media must be organised.
The market has fundamentally inverted: Digital is the default, the spine, the control layer. Traditional media—TV, Print, OOH, Radio—are now the ‘incremental layers’ that brands add for defined, testable roles (high-impact Attention, credibility, locality, premium reach) on top of a Digital-first planning infrastructure.
Key Insight:
Digital delivered 110% of total market growth in 2025 under the legacy definition (Rs 8,050 Crores out of Rs 7,311 Crores net growth) and 105% under the new definition (Rs 16,895 Crores out of Rs 16,156 Crores net growth), more than offsetting Traditional’s decline.
India is now a 60% Digital advertising market.
SECTION 7: 4% GROWTH WHEN TRADITIONAL FELL 1%: OOH’S OUTLIER STATUS
*Note: All medium-wise AdEx and share metrics in this section are based on the legacy AdEx definition (excluding Q-Comm and MSME) to maintain continuity with PMAR 2025.
OOH ADEX and Share: Growth Continues, Share Holds
OOH was the only Traditional medium to post healthy growth in 2025, expanding by around 4% even as total Traditional ADEX declined. Its share held firm, signalling that brands continue to value physical presence in cities and on key travel corridors, especially as urban mobility normalised post-pandemic.
SUMMARY: THE NEW CATEGORY HIERARCHY
2025 data confirms a fundamental restructuring of India’s category-media ecosystem:
- FMCG’s reallocation (Traditional -Rs 779 Crores) signals the end of blanket mass coverage, replaced by precision impact allocation
- Retail Media E-Commerce and Q-Comm’s explosion (Rs 14,257 Crores combined, +Rs 4,864 Crores) establishes performance-commerce ecosystems as mandatory for conversion-driven categories
- Auto’s resilience (Traditional +Rs 281 Crores) proves multi-medium orchestration still wins high-involvement decision journeys
- BFSI and Real Estate’s trust-locality focus (OOH Real Estate +Rs 199 Crores, Print BFSI +Rs 92 Crores) confirms credibility channels remain irreplaceable for high-value services
- MSME’s dominance (Rs 35,814 Crores, 21% growth) reveals the parallel performance-first universe driving Digital’s structural evolution
- Mid-tier caution (Education -Rs 78 Crores, Retail flat) reflects broader macro pressures forcing tactical, window-based deployment over continuity
The strategic imperative for 2026 is category-specific mix design: FMCG requires precision reallocation systems, Auto demands multi-medium orchestration, BFSI and Real Estate need trust-locality integration, MSMEs optimize for performance velocity, and mid-tier categories survive on tactical surgical strikes. Madison’s GPS and MbrAIn position category analysis as the foundation layer: understand each category’s macro drivers, consumer behaviour shifts, and media ROI patterns, then design role-based systems where every rupee is allocated based on category-specific evidence, not industry-wide defaults.
Note: Certain macro and consumer metrics are sourced from multiple external reports (Kantar, IBEF, RBI, NITI and other authoritative publications).
CONCLUSION: CONDITIONAL OPTIMISM FOR 2027 AND BEYOND
The outlook to 2027 is conditionally optimistic.
What matters more than the market’s growth rate is strategic position. A brand growing 12% in a 6% market through system‑driven advantage is healthier than one growing 8% in a 10% market on brute spend. 2023–2025 already proved this: Auto, BFSI and E‑Commerce gained share by engineering systems; parts of FMCG lost share while maintaining or even increasing budgets.
Three truths define the path forward.
- Underlying health exceeds headline numbers: Q‑Comm, MSME, CTV, Retail Media and policy shifts create real structural upside.
- Majority‑Digital India demands operational transformation in system design, measurement and organisation; statistics alone won’t deliver value.
- AI‑native systems will compound advantage; by 2027, the gap between early adopters and those stuck in pilots will be hard to close.
The provocation stands: rewrite your advantage with systems, or risk being written out of relevance.
