Traditional TV and home video will continue to dominate the advertising space in Kenya and the broader East African region until 2026.

After that, the revenue from Internet advertising is projected to overtake the traditional TV according to a new study by Price Waterhouse Coopers.

 The PwC Entertainment & Media (E&A) Outlook report projects that the value of traditional TV and home video will be $430 million (Sh63.25 billion) in 2026.

However, internet advertising is expected to bridge the gap by 2026 to stand at $429 million (Sh63.11 billion).

Internet advertising is growing rapidly in Kenya, and by 2026 it will only be 1.2 million (176.8million) behind traditional television and home video.

This will open the door for internet advertising to dominate this market in the following years.

“While traditional TV and home video will maintain its position as the second-largest segment in Kenya’s E&M market over the forecast period, rapid gains in Internet advertising will mean that, by 2026, the former will be just US$1.2m larger than the latter, paving the way for Internet advertising to overtake this segment in later years,” E&M report shows.

The report further says that music and radio at Sh21.48 billion will overtake newspapers and consumer magazines currently estimated at Sh21.33 billion in advertising space by 2023, driven by gains in traditional radio advertising revenue.

Video games will also overtake newspapers and consumer magazines in the same year. Despite the shifts, Internet access will remain the largest segment in Kenya’s Entertainment and Media (E&M) market across the forecast period.

 “From an advertising perspective, it is the internet advertising segment which will see the largest gains in revenue terms across the five-year forecast period to 2026. This is a trend seen across South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya, and also at the global level,” notes PwC.

Across Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria, the Internet advertising sector will be driven by the mobile sub-segment, as is the case globally.

At a global level, mobile display will be the largest contributor to overall revenue added to the segment through to 2026, but in Nigeria and Kenya, it is mobile search that will see the largest gains.

The shift in revenue platforms is driven by data consumption, which is continuing to grow rapidly across the world, and African markets are no exception.

Mobile phones are the most popular format globally for data consumption, ahead of other devices category, which counts data consumed via devices such as smart TVs and games consoles, and the portable devices category, which includes laptops and tablets.