New Study Shows In-Game Ads Are King – They Score 20% Higher in Viewability Than the Average of Other Ads

Statistics show that in-game advertising tends to have higher viewability than all other forms of digital ads. This makes games potentially the best place for companies to invest their marketing and place ads on.

The Promising Frontier for Marketers

Anzu, a game ad platform, and Lumen Research, which is a company that studies global attention embarked on a study two years ago to determine the influence attention has on digital advertising.

The study focused specifically on in-game ads with the goal of evaluating the effect of advertisements on gamers. This is because, unlike other media where users block ads or skip them, games are known to be captivating, immersive, and lean-forward.

Someone needs to make an Ad Block for video games that blocks the constant in-game stores ad from your UI

— Factory Reset (@FactoryReeset) June 21, 2023

The research also investigated the relationship between attention and buy intent, as well as the opportunity that gaming presents as an attention-rich platform.

Researchers used eye-tracking technologies to gather data for the study, examining data from 25 Anzu investigations, 90 studies on in-game ad attentiveness, forced exposure testing, and more.

The tests were also done on different devices including mobile phones and desktops. The ads were switched between video format and banners, youtube skippable and non-skippable ads, and Facebook infeed, making it comprehensive.

According to Lumen’s dataset, the average viewability score across 42 observed digital ad formats, including YouTube advertisements and Facebook feeds, was 78 percent. However, in many instances, this was below 50 percent.

Meanwhile, Anzu’s in-game advertisement scored 98 percent in terms of viewability. Notably, not only with Anzu but across the board, it was discovered that game commercials had greater viewability rankings.

In addition to having a higher viewability, advertisements in games also have a somewhat longer viewing duration: 3.1 seconds.

In comparison, other digital advertising platforms only averaged 2.9 seconds. However, only 43% of the digital advertising formats and 19% of non-YouTube formats exceeded the 2-second threshold set by the industry.

Attention is King

According to an analysis by Double Verify, it is important to capture the consumer’s attention for a successful ad since they see about 4000 ads a day. Results from the analysis showed that two-thirds (66%) of consumers stated that they are more likely to pay attention if an ad captures their interest in the first five seconds.

With an average of 2.9, it shows that most companies fail to capture a consumer’s attention and deliver the message or drive purchases.

In the report, Lumen also noted that gamers have a higher attention span than other consumers. Resultantly, 6 in every 10 gamers who watched ads ended up making a purchase.

“With the average global ad blocking rate now estimated at 37 percent, 52 percent of all consumers not paying attention when ads come on the TV, and 65 percent of people skipping video ads at the first chance they get, unsurprisingly, advertisers are beginning to question the quality and value of ad delivery and media impressions,” said Anzu’s co-founder and CEO, Itamar Benedy.

“In contrast, gaming is a highly impactful channel, driving huge levels of attention which we previously have not seen within the digital ad space,” he added.

Aside from this research, statistics by Statista have revealed that in-game advertising has consistently increased the amount of revenue it generates. Moreover, this revenue will have reached $32.51bn by the end of this year and $46.06bn by the end of 2027.

Because of the incredible viewability of in-game ads, they may start to dominate the ad market even more in coming years as advertisers realize their value.

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