News TV advertising decline eases to 7% in Jan-Jul 2026: TAM AdEx

Television advertising on news channels continued to remain under pressure in the first seven months of 2026, but the pace of decline moderated significantly, with ad volumes falling 7% year-on-year during January-July, according to data from TAM AdEx.

The decline compares with a sharper 15% fall recorded by the news genre in January-July 2025 over the corresponding period a year earlier, indicating that the advertising market may be showing signs of stabilisation even as broadcasters continue to face pressure on television ad spends.

TAM AdEx's analysis covers television commercial advertising and excludes programme promos and social advertisements. The agency monitors more than 600 television channels.

The moderation in the decline comes against a shifting advertiser mix on news television. Food and beverages emerged as the largest advertising sector during January-July 2026, accounting for 14% of total ad volumes in the news genre, replacing services, which had led the sector in the previous year.

Services accounted for 13% of ad volumes, followed by education at 10%. Building, industrial and land materials and equipment contributed 8%, while banking, finance and investment and automobiles each accounted for 7%.

Personal care and personal hygiene, personal healthcare and household products each contributed 6%, while personal accessories accounted for 5%. The top 10 sectors collectively represented 81% of news television advertising volumes during the period.

Education, BFSI and consumer categories gain ground

The movement in sector rankings points to a broadening of advertising demand across categories.

Education climbed to third place from fifth in the year-earlier period, while banking, finance and investment moved sharply higher to seventh place from ninth. Personal care and personal hygiene also improved its ranking, moving to seventh from eighth.

At the same time, personal healthcare slipped to eighth from fourth, while building, industrial and land materials and equipment fell to fourth from third.

The data suggests that news television continues to draw a mix of mass consumer categories and sectors seeking a relatively broad audience, with FMCG, education, financial services and automotive advertisers remaining prominent.

At the category level, retail outlets and jewellers emerged as the single largest category, accounting for 5% of news genre advertising volumes. It was followed by multiple courses at 4%.

Spices, vocational training institutes, e-commerce/media/entertainment/social media and cars each accounted for about 3% of advertising volumes. Toilet and floor cleaners and toilet soaps also remained among the leading categories, while cement and two-wheelers accounted for 2% each.

The category rankings also reveal significant movement compared with the previous year. Multiple courses moved up from sixth to second place, spices from 11th to third, vocational training institutes from ninth to fourth and e-commerce/media/entertainment/social media from 10th to fifth.

Two-wheelers saw one of the sharpest ranking improvements, moving from 15th to 10th.

In contrast, cars, toilet and floor cleaners, toilet soaps and cement slipped in the rankings compared with January-July 2025.

More than 3,400 advertisers active on news television

The advertiser base remained broad, with more than 3,400 advertisers present in the top advertiser universe tracked by TAM AdEx during January-July 2026.

Reckitt Benckiser (India) retained the top position, followed by Patanjali Ayurved and SBS Biotech. GCMMF (Amul) moved up to third from fifth, while LIC of India rose to fifth from eighth.

Godrej Consumer Products was ranked sixth, followed by Policybazaar Insurance Brokers at seventh.

Two new names entered the top 10. TVS Motor Company moved to eighth position from 29th in the previous year, while Mahashiya Di Hatti rose to ninth from 24th.

Lalithaa Jewellery Mart, which was sixth in January-July 2025, slipped to 10th.

The top 10 advertisers together accounted for about one-fifth of total advertising volumes on the news genre. Six of the 10 advertisers registered positive movement in their rankings during the period.

Policybazaar leads brands; ChatGPT enters top 10

At the brand level, Policybazaar.Com emerged as the leading brand on news television during January-July 2026.

It was followed by Lalithaa Jewellery, Harpic Power Plus 10x Total Clean, Ultratech Cement and Dettol Toilet Soaps.

Aaina Jibonor, Pet Saffa, Dettol Antiseptic Liquid and Muthoot Fin Loan Against Gold completed the list, while ChatGPT appeared at number 10.

TAM AdEx said more than 5,100 brands were present on television during the period. Three of the top 10 brands belonged to Reckitt Benckiser (India), underlining the continued importance of consumer and household product advertising on news channels.

The top 10 brands together accounted for 8% of television advertising volumes.

Spices, two-wheelers and life insurance among fastest-growing categories

While overall news genre advertising volumes declined, several individual categories registered strong growth.

Spices recorded a 30% increase in advertising volumes and had the highest increase in absolute ad secondages among the top growing categories. Multiple courses grew 19%, while two-wheelers recorded 33% growth.

Life insurance advertising increased 30%, while vocational training institutes grew 14%.

The strongest percentage growth came from sanitary napkins, whose advertising volumes increased 5.5 times during January-July 2026. E-commerce and other services grew 2.6 times, while solar products recorded 3.6 times growth.

Edible oil advertising rose 35%, while e-commerce/media/entertainment/social media increased 12%.

Overall, 145 or more categories registered positive growth during the period, even as the aggregate advertising volume for the news genre remained lower than the previous year.

Hindi news remains the dominant advertising destination

Hindi news continued to dominate the news television advertising market, accounting for 18% of total ad volumes during January-July 2026.

Bengali news followed with 14%, while Hindi regional news accounted for 12%. Tamil news and Telugu news each contributed 10%, followed by Kannada news at 9%.

Marathi and Malayalam news each accounted for 6%, while Assam news and Gujarati news contributed 5% each.

The top five news sub-genres collectively accounted for 59% of advertising volumes, highlighting the continued concentration of advertising around the country's largest language markets.

The data indicates that despite an overall contraction in news genre advertising, demand has not disappeared uniformly across the market. Instead, spending is shifting between sectors and categories, with consumer-facing businesses, education, financial services, mobility, e-commerce and emerging categories such as solar products finding greater representation.

The 7% decline in January-July 2026 also marks a substantial improvement over the 15% contraction recorded in the corresponding period of 2025, suggesting that the news television advertising market has moved from a sharper phase of contraction to a more moderate decline.

However, the concentration of 81% of ad volumes among the top 10 sectors and 20% among the top 10 advertisers also shows that a relatively narrow group of industries and large advertisers continues to account for a substantial portion of the market.