The 2026 midterm cycle is already rewriting the record books. Total political ad spend is now projected to hit $10+ billion, surpassing even the 2024 presidential cycle and running roughly $1 billion ahead of where 2022 stood at this same point. High-stakes Senate races in Texas, Ohio, and Maine are driving early concentration, California's gubernatorial primary has become the most expensive non-presidential race in state history, and the heaviest spending period—August through November—is still ahead. The inventory math is already getting uncomfortable for buyers and sellers alike.
Against that backdrop, MediaRadar recently hosted a webinar, Inside the $10B Political Advertising Opportunity. The questions that came in cut right to what's actually keeping people up at night: CTV's role as a performance channel, the transparency gap on digital spend, how redistricting complicates planning and where the next wave of dollars is going. Below is a guide to those questions—and our team’s answers to cut through the noise.
Outside of TV, where do you see the next wave of candidate spend going?
CTV, CTV, CTV. The precision targeting and scale it offers are unmatched. Beyond that, digital audio has grown cycle over cycle and continues to earn its place in political media plans — with a caveat on scale. It works best for statewide races or mayoral campaigns in large DMAs, where you can actually reach enough of the right voters to move the needle. Smaller down-ballot races will struggle to justify the investment.
CTV is being talked about as a performance channel, not just an awareness play. What data supports that?
CTV's view-completion rates speak for themselves: unskippable formats are delivering 90-95%+ VCR, and political buyers are paying premium rates to access it. MediaRadar's own analysis confirms campaigns are treating CTV as performance media — using it for audience precision, frequency control, and measurable outcomes rather than broad reach alone.
On live sports specifically, MediaRadar tracks weekly ad spend and creative across NFL, MLB, and college football on streaming platforms including Amazon Prime, YouTube, and Hulu. What the data shows: advertisers are aggressively competing for limited live sports ad inventory as media rights continue migrating from linear to CTV.
Frequency caps on CTV have been a persistent challenge. Is that still a factor in budget decisions?
Frequency works differently across CTV and linear — and for political campaigns, that difference is actually an advantage, not a liability. CTV gives campaigns precise control over how often a voter household sees a message. You dial it up or down depending on the goal: lighter frequency for awareness, heavier for persuasion. In the final two weeks for GOTV, 10-20+ exposures are not uncommon.
Linear doesn't offer that control — you're at the mercy of the network and the market.
What MediaRadar's political intelligence shows is that campaigns are shifting to CTV specifically because of frequency control and measurable outcomes — treating it as a performance channel where budget decisions can be optimized in real time, not just set and forgotten like a linear buy. The frequency "problem" on CTV is largely a management question, and campaigns with the right data and tools are using it as a competitive edge, not a reason to stay on linear.
How does MediaRadar estimate CTV spending, given how fragmented the ecosystem is?
CTV is inherently fragmented, which is exactly the problem MediaRadar has been working to solve. Rather than relying solely on estimated or modeled data, MediaRadar tracks spend, occurrences, and creative metadata directly across streaming platforms — covering originals, licensed content, and live sports. CTV coverage spans FAST channels, streaming libraries, and live sports across major platforms, with vMVPD and OEM inventory coming soon — which speaks directly to the transparency gap around glass companies like Samsung, LG, and Vizio.
That OEM gap is real and unlikely to close on its own. Those platforms have no legal obligation to disclose buy-level data, and there's no regulatory framework pushing them toward transparency. If CTV political buys were ever mandated to be filed the way broadcast buys are, it would fundamentally reshape how political advertising is bought, measured, and competed for — but that's a policy question, not an industry trend. In the meantime, MediaRadar's continued expansion into previously opaque CTV environments is narrowing that blind spot, giving political advertisers more visibility into where dollars are landing across the streaming landscape than has ever been available before.
Digital political agencies aren't required to file spend through the NAB. How do you track them, and do you have visibility into who's placing CTV and programmatic buys?
This is one of the most honest challenges in political media — and worth naming directly. There's no public filing requirement for digital political spend, and CTV buyers in particular — whether through DSPs, OEMs like Samsung, LG, or Vizio, or programmatic platforms — are not required to disclose who's placing those buys. The firms handling linear are often not the same firms handling CTV, with few exceptions, so relationships and networking remain essential on that front.
Where MediaRadar helps is getting ahead of the spend before it's obvious to everyone else. Traditional competitive intelligence tells you what's already aired — by the time you see the ads, the money is gone. MediaRadar tracks early ad buys before they air, giving sellers the ability to identify active campaigns before they finalize their media plans and engage buyers before competitors do.
Rather than chasing spend, MediaRadar turns scattered signals into a clear picture of where political budgets are forming, shifting, and about to accelerate — including PAC and issue group activity, which account for over half of total political ad spend. It won't solve the full transparency gap on digital, but it closes it meaningfully — especially for sellers who need to get to the right buyer first.
How should redistricting factor into political media planning?
Until maps are drawn and confirmed, planning has real limits. Once they are, redistricting becomes primarily a targeting and messaging challenge — each redrawn district will reflect a specific demographic and partisan composition, which should directly shape creative, placements, and spend allocation.
MediaRadar tracks spend at the DMA level across more than 35 markets projected to see $50M+ in political investment this cycle. As new district maps are finalized, sellers and campaigns can quickly identify where budgets are concentrating and move before inventory tightens. The defining theme of 2026 is timing plus data visibility — and redistricting only raises the stakes on both.
How can digital publishers outside CTV capture political ad spend, given how heavily the industry skews toward localized linear and CTV formats?
Pre-roll, OLV, and display are still meaningful parts of a balanced omni-channel political buy. The key for publishers is making the case with audience data, not just inventory. Lead with who your audience is: daily visitors, demographics, and local market coverage. Local news publishers in particular have a strong case to make — campaigns are trying to reach specific voters in specific districts, and a publisher with documented local reach can speak directly to that need.
Radio data shows strong effectiveness numbers — so why is it only capturing around 3% of political spend?
Simply put: scale and targeting. Terrestrial radio reaches a narrower and older audience, and campaigns prioritizing voter precision and measurable outcomes will always follow the data — which increasingly points elsewhere.
Radio operators can be a competitive alternative when TV prices spike, making it a situational buy rather than a strategic anchor. For most campaigns, it's a supplemental line item at best — useful in specific markets or for specific demographics, but not where incremental dollars are going as CTV and digital audio continue to grow.
Any recommendations for print advertising placements?
For local newspapers in major markets with competitive races, lock in full-page or above-the-fold placements leading into Election Day. That premium real estate goes fast once campaigns are in full sprint.
The 2026 cycle is unlike anything we've seen in a midterm—and the decisions that will determine who wins the best inventory, the best budgets, and the best buyers are being made right now, not in October. Whether you're on the buy side trying to stretch every dollar or on the sell side looking to get ahead of demand, the edge goes to whoever has better data, faster.
MediaRadar tracks political ad spend, creative, and competitive activity across 30+ channels— giving buyers and sellers the intelligence to move before the market does. Want to see what we're tracking in your market?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR | Mike Muller
As Sales Director of Political Intelligence at MediaRadar, Mike Muller helps political campaigns and advocacy organizations leverage media intelligence, audience insights, and cross-platform advertising strategies to maximize campaign impact and performance throughout the election cycle.