Everyone Complains About Nielsen. Upfronts Still Run on It.

Speaking at the CIMM conference in April, WPP’s Nicolas Grand offered a sly update on TV measurement’s long-running drama: If last year was a “currency fiesta,” this year looks more like a “currency siesta.”

His quip was on point. The push toward alternative currencies has slowed. Simply put, the TV and advertising industry isn’t moving off Nielsen.

That’s despite a steady drumbeat of criticism. NBCUniversal’s ad chief publicly questioned Nielsen’s accuracy. Another TV executive corroborated claims that the measurement company may be undercounting TV audiences by at least 20%. The Media Rating Council (MRC) warned the company to make major methodology changes or risk losing accreditation.

Even so, the industry’s inability to move off Nielsen underscores how difficult it is to replace the currency underpinning tens of billions in TV ad spending — leaving buyers and sellers inside a system that many agree is flawed, but few seem willing to abandon.

“The fundamental question is: Are advertisers and agencies ready to move off to alternative currencies this year more than last year?” said Grand, WPP’s executive director of research and investment analytics. “At the moment, [I don’t see] the same appetite that we saw from some networks to move off Nielsen.”

Horizon Media’s Samantha Rose sees a similar pause after last year’s “pretty dramatic” upheaval, when Nielsen shifted to its Big Data + Panel approach.

“It’s not perfect, and there’s been challenges and continued methodology changes, but it’s not as sweeping of an impact like it was last year, where it was that huge shift from panel to big data,” Rose, Horizon’s executive vice president and head of integrated investment and programmatic, told The Current.

The sell-side problem

The tension is sharper on the sell side. If Nielsen is undercounting audiences by 20%, advertisers could be effectively getting a lower CPM than expected — while networks are effectively discounting their own inventory.

In a rare public critique of the measurement company, NBCU Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships Mark Marshall accused Nielsen of devaluing TV networks with inaccurate metrics.

“Every media company is valued on a multiple of something, right?” Marshall told The Wall Street Journal. “If that revenue is understated due to incorrect measurement, then absolutely, the valuations of these media companies are being impacted. That is why a change needs to happen.”

Why no one is switching

Inertia, not innovation, is winning.

TV networks and agencies have struggled to move away from Nielsen as their primary currency for several reasons, from reliance on historical data to multiyear contracts staggered so they never expire at the same time.

Agencies have less incentive to move. They pay a fixed fee to Nielsen, whether they use it or not. That cost, along with agencies fracturing and complicating their own measurement stack, can make it tough to justify moving to more of a multicurrency world.

Networks, meanwhile, have more at stake. They pay significantly more — with estimates at $100 million or more annually, according to multiple sources — and are more motivated to reduce their dependence on Nielsen. But even there, momentum has stalled. Paramount is the only major network to temporarily defect from Nielsen before signing a multiyear deal in 2025.

Nielsen has recently signed long-term deals with several major players, including Netflix, TelevisaUnivision, Warner Bros. Discovery and Tubi. Seven of the top agencies also hold multiyear contracts with Nielsen.

The company is now facing an antitrust claim from measurement upstart TVision, which is seeking to invalidate all of the company’s contracts.

Alternatives are still waiting

That helps explain why alternatives like VideoAmp and Comscore are still waiting for a real breakthrough. Both recently indicated to The Current that they were unsure whether they’ll take meaningful share of national currency transactions this cycle. The buy and sell sides officially put deals into the system from June to September, before upfront deals activate in the fall.

VideoAmp is projecting $6 billion in currency and measurement transactions for 2026 — double its 2024 volume — but its leadership acknowledges the decision ultimately rests with the market.

“We don’t determine that,” Bryan Goski, VideoAmp’s CRO, said in January. “It will be up to the buyers and sellers if they want change or not.”

“If you had an option to change out your electricity provider, it’s not flipping a switch,” said Comscore’s executive vice president of commercial, Tara Gotch. “It is ripping out the wiring from your entire house and rewiring the house. And that’s not something that happens overnight or even in a year.”

Streaming as the disruptor

The NFL, which was at odds with Nielsen last fall, recently said the measurement company has made progress on transparency, according to the league’s chief data and analytics officer, Paul Ballew. He cautioned though that sentiment could shift within six to 12 months if Nielsen hasn’t resolved its issues.

WPP has forecasted that by the end of 2029 streaming will make up over 70% of ad supported impressions. Grand said this could get even higher depending on how quickly live sports move to streaming. He sees streaming as the force to alter the balance of power.

“Then we won’t be having currency debates anymore,” he said. “We’ll be talking about measurement with a capital M.”

Not everyone agrees on the timeline. Fox’s Kym Frank, the network’s senior vice president of research and data for ad sales, said that “2030 feels a little soon to be predicting the death of linear.”

Even as live sports move to streaming, key infrastructure — like dynamic ad insertion — still needs to scale before a new measurement model can take hold.

“I still have a lot of money on a linear-like rating and how that’s transacted. Currency is not going to go away,” said Mariel Estrada, Omnicom’s head of video currency, during the CIMM conference. “There’s still going to be a transaction between a buyer and a seller. What metrics we decide to use will be a discussion we have.”