Five markets that will define global advertising in 2026

As 2026 gets going, where — and what — should marketers look to for a vision of the future?

Experts who spoke to The Current said this is the year of sports. Others pointed to the shift toward consented data, where consumers opt in, changing the market. And still, more speculate the reckoning for Big Tech is upon us.

While the defining trend varies by country, all point toward one global direction: Media fragmentation will likely become an even more pronounced geographical phenomenon, requiring increasingly nuanced campaign planning for the world’s top advertisers.

Here are the five markets whose transformations in 2026 will reshape how brands think about growth.

United States: Sports frenzy

The U.S. remains the primary engine of global ad spend, a fact turbocharged by the return of the FIFA World Cup to American soil.

Expect brands from all over the world to jump on this once-in-a-generation opportunity. Telemundo, the U.S. Spanish-language media rights holder, said last month that it already sold 90% of its World Cup ad inventory to the likes of Coca-Cola, Toyota, Diageo and more.

But the World Cup is only the pinnacle of a year punctuated by big sporting moments: Super Bowl ads are predictably already sold out, as are the Winter Olympics, due to “unprecedented demand,” according to NBCUniversal.

“For global marketers, the United States will be where big-event attention meets the world’s most advanced playbook for turning culture into commerce,” said Chris Beer, senior data journalist at GWI. The tournament “will create a single cultural moment that reaches far beyond sport,” Beer added.

How do you turn culture into commerce? Through technology. Advertisers’ enormous appetite for live sports follows streaming platforms’ investment in sports rights and the underlying ad tech infrastructure.

NBCU told The Current about its content flywheel strategy last year, whereby it uses audience data to guide viewers from sports to other genres like entertainment.

“It’s a very surgical approach, a very data-driven approach, but we think increasingly important to cater to the taste of these individual fans,” said Dave Kaplan, executive vice president of content analytics at NBCUniversal. And that’s in addition to NBCU’s new measurement tools and enablement of programmatic access to Olympics ad inventory.

It really does seem to be a case of “if you build it, they will come.”

India: GDPR-equivalent injects order in a fast-rising ad market

With ad revenue projected to hit $20.7 billion next year and a growth rate of 9.2%, India is among the world’s fastest-growing major ad markets.

“India is emerging as a growth engine for global ad spend, driven by strong domestic demand, digital adoption and infrastructure expansion,” said Alice Crossley, senior foresight analyst at The Future Laboratory.

But it’s not the same old story of massive social platforms and opaque search engines. What separates India’s growth drivers is its focus on the convergence of retail media and CTV. Media buyers told The Current that compared to upper-funnel channels like social, commerce platforms can now deliver stronger conversion rates and higher return on ad spend (ROAS). Now, advertisers are also using marketplace shopper data to extend audiences across over-the-top TV (OTT) and the open internet.

What’s new is the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, which came into force in late 2025. Inspired by Europe’s GDPR, it tightens rules around data collection and usage. Siddharth Dabhade, global chief business officer at Lemma, told The Current he expects the new regulations to “significantly strengthen both targeting and measurement by enforcing a transition to high-quality, consented data.”

Some experts suggest retail media could be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the DPDP Act, given the industry’s built-in reliance on consented data. That could lead to an ad market where commerce data, not just clicks and likes, increasingly defines audiences.

Europe: Regulation reshapes ad markets

The bloc’s concerted efforts to rein in Big Tech are arguably more coordinated than some countries’.

Google is facing two new antitrust probes opened late last year by the European Commission, bringing its historical tally to five. Meta, likewise, stares down a new investigation over its AI practices in WhatsApp, just as it appeared to resolve its long-standing feud with the commission by tweaking its “pay or consent” model.

This month, the social media giant will start offering European users options for reduced tracking alongside a paid, ad-free version of Facebook and Instagram.

And a new proposal, the “digital omnibus,” introduced in November, aims to make it easier for AI companies to train their models on Europeans’ data while also simplifying the EU’s notorious cookie banner. Companies may benefit from the clarity around how personal data may be used to train AI models and cookie consent banner requirements.

While it still needs approval by the European Parliament, the message is clear: Regulators, not Big Tech, are shaping advertising in Europe.

Could we see a world where tech giants effectively run significantly different businesses around the globe, due to differing regulatory environments? All eyes will be on Europe for an answer.

Australia: Protecting children online

Australian under-16s are now banned from social media platforms including Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. The move cements Australia’s government as the first in the world to stare down Big Tech and attempt to limit social media’s well-documented harmful effects on younger people.

Where will Australian kids pivot, as their platforms of choice get taken away? “We could see more time spent on video games for one. [That is] the type of media kids estimate they spend the most time on during weekends,” GWI’s Beer said.

Beyond disrupting social media platforms’ user pipelines, the effects will be felt by ad buyers. Agencies and advertisers will be expected to review their data practices, especially those involving minors, as one industry leader called the ban “just the start.”

Australian regulators were the first, but may not be the last. “Marketers must prepare for rapid international ripple effects,” wrote Ricky Sutton, founder of Future Media, in Mi3. They may already be here: This month, the U.K. saw its partial ban on junk food ads, a move aimed at tackling childhood obesity, come into force.

Saudi Arabia: Cultural evolution unlocks a whole new consumer set

“Saudi Arabia is one of the fastest-moving consumer stories in the world right now. In 2026, the pace of change and the size of the opportunity will be hard for global marketers to ignore,” Beer said.

A decade of reforms under Vision 2030 has reshaped what everyday life looks like for women, and that shift is creating new categories of demand, new decision-makers and new expectations for brands, Beer said.

Rises in metrics like female employment, workplace seniority, bank account and credit card ownership paint the picture of a whole new consumer set coming into the market, ready to spend.

Indeed, they already are: “Restaurant visits are up, cinemas have gone from nonexistent to mainstream, and 8 in 10 Saudi women use Snapchat — an unusually high level that speaks to local social dynamics,” Beer said.

The twist is that traditional gender views are also rebounding (29% say traditional roles matter, up from 21% in 2020), a reminder that change is contested.

“For marketers, that’s exactly why Saudi Arabia is one to watch,” according to Beer. “Its spending power is growing, but the cultural reality is more nuanced than you might think,” he said.