Mobile Ad Spending In The U.S. Expected To Grow 65 Percent In 2011 To $1.2 Billion

Erick Schonfeld

Erick Schonfeld is a technology journalist and the executive producer of DEMO. He is also a partner at bMuse, a product incubator in New York City. Schonfeld is the former Editor in Chief of TechCrunch. At TechCrunch, he oversaw the editorial content of the site, helped to program the Disrupt conferences and CrunchUps, produced TCTV shows, and wrote daily... → Learn More

Tuesday, October 4th, 2011
mobile ad spend

Spending on mobile ads is expected to reach $1.23 billion this year, according to a revised estimate from eMarketer, which represents a 65 percent increase from 2010. The estimate is slightly up from the $1.1 billion number eMarketer put out a year ago.

The estimates for future years out are also up. They are as follows:

Mobile ad spending

2010: $743 million
2011: $1.2 billion
2012: $1.8 billion
2013: $2.5 billion
2014: $3.4 billion
2015: $4.4 billion

These numbers include display, search, text ads, and even video ads (which are the fastest growing mobile ad unit). Mobile video ads are expected to generate $57.6 million this year, and grow at a 69 percent compound annual rate through 2015, when they are estimated to reach $395.6 million. Next year, mobile display and mobile search will be about even thanks to the growth in app advertising. Each will represent almost $600 million in ad spending in 2012.