CPV trends into 2026
A two-point trend honestly labeled beats a fabricated curve. Here is what the ledger holds and what it does not.
What the ledger holds today
Our earliest verified snapshots date to this site's launch quarter: in-stream $0.024 and the $0.018 to $0.058 spread at Q1 2026 Store Growers, Google Ads Benchmarks, Q1 2026, Shorts and CTV points at 2026 vintage Veefly, YouTube Advertising Cost, 2026 Veefly, YouTube Advertising Cost, 2026. Each quarterly re-verification adds a dated snapshot, and this page will plot the series once it has one; we do not backfill 2024 numbers we cannot source.
The two directions worth planning on
- Open-web online video deflates. Trade coverage documents soft open-market CPMs as supply keeps expanding AdExchanger, CTV Roundup coverage, 2025-2026. Cheap impressions drag the effective per-view cost of CPM buys down with them; the breakeven converter is how you exploit that.
- CTV counter-trends upward. Premium streaming supply is gated and demand keeps arriving, so CTV pricing firms while everything around it softens AdExchanger, CTV Roundup coverage, 2025-2026. Details: the CTV page.
Planning into 2027
Assume the spread persists rather than any point: verticals will keep paying 2-3x each other Store Growers, Google Ads Benchmarks, Q1 2026, short-form stays the cheap started view Veefly, YouTube Advertising Cost, 2026, and CTV stays the expensive completed view. Budget against bands, not points, with the planner; provenance for every figure sits in the ledger.
The CPV-vs-CPM decision this deflation reopens: views vs impressions.