MENA Just Became the World's Fastest Growing Digital Ad Market. Here Is What That Means for Commerce Brands.
June 8, 2026
The numbers are in. MENA's digital advertising market reached $8.185 billion in 2025, growing 17.8% year on year. That makes it the fastest growing digital ad region on the planet — ahead of North America at 13.9%, Europe at 11.0%, APAC at 10.4%, and LATAM at 6.4%.
For context, MENA has grown 2.5 times in five years, adding nearly $4.9 billion in absolute digital ad spend since 2020. That trajectory is not a spike. It is a structural shift — and for brands operating in this market, the implications run much deeper than a headline percentage.
I have spent fifteen years working inside this market, first at OMD, then building ad products at noon and Careem. What the IAB data confirms this year is something I have watched build up close: the region is not just growing, it is maturing. The channels that are growing fastest are the ones closest to commerce, closest to outcomes, and closest to proof. That shift changes everything about how smart brands should be allocating their investment.
The Market at a Glance
Total MENA digital ad spend crossed $8.185 billion in 2025, up from $6.95 billion in 2024 and $5.8 billion in 2023. Growth held at high double digits despite 2023's geopolitical headwinds — the market rebounded sharply in 2024 and maintained above-trend momentum through 2025.
The IAB notes that the real underlying growth trajectory sits at approximately 17%, with 2023's dip driven by a temporary Q4 slowdown rather than any structural deterioration. The rebound confirmed that the demand was always there. The market was waiting, not weakening.
Social Still Dominates - But the Shape Is Changing
Social commands 60.2% of all digital ad spend in MENA. No other region comes close. LATAM is next at 53.3%, followed by APAC at 42.9%, North America at 32.7%, and Europe at 30.9%.
That dominance is real, but the pace of share gain has slowed considerably. Between 2020 and 2022, social added 6.8 percentage points of share. Between 2023 and 2025, it added just 1 percentage point. Social is not losing ground — it is simply maturing as other formats accelerate.
Within social, the more significant story is the pivot to video. Social crossed the tipping point in 2023: video now accounts for more than 50% of all social ad spend, up from just 36.6% in 2020. In 2025, social video grew 23.6% while social banner and native grew 12.8%.
For commerce brands running social campaigns, this matters. Budget allocation calibrated for a banner-first social environment needs rethinking. The platform is video first now. Creative strategy needs to follow.
Search Is Outperforming the Market — and Evolving Fast
Search grew 23.1% in 2025, making it the fastest growing of the four main format categories. Total search spend reached $1.354 billion, up from $1.1 billion in 2024. Since 2020, search has grown 2.6 times.
MENA still underindexes on search relative to other regions. Search accounts for just 16.5% of digital ad spend here, compared to 40.8% in North America and 41.2% in Europe. That gap points to significant headroom — particularly as search evolves to incorporate retail media, shopping formats, outcome products, and early AI monetisation.
This is no longer just a traditional search story. The category is being reshaped by commerce search, product listings, and new buying behaviours that sit at the intersection of discovery and purchase. Brands that treat search purely as a top-of-funnel tool are leaving money on the table.
Retail Media Is the Commerce Story of 2025
The most significant data point for commerce operators and brand leaders is this: retail media in MENA surged 40.5% in 2025, reaching $323 million — up from $230 million in 2024 and $138 million in 2023.
To put that growth rate in perspective, the IAB benchmarks it against European retail media during its own early development phase in 2021 and 2022, when growth rates sat between 45% and 30%. MENA is tracking that curve almost exactly, which suggests the region is now in the early acceleration phase of retail media maturity.
Retail media here covers on-site display, sponsored search and product listings, branded landing pages, checkout advertising, and associated trade marketing investment. For brands selling through marketplace and retail platforms in the region, this growth reflects a genuine shift in how budgets are being allocated. Procurement-led trade investment and performance-focused digital spend are converging.
Brands that navigate that convergence intelligently will gain share. The opportunity is real — and the window to move early is still open.
Video Is Reshaping the Entire Ecosystem
Video's influence extends well beyond social. Within display, video grew 13.1% while non-video display grew just 1.7%. Video now accounts for 75% of all display ad spend outside social — up from 66.7% in 2020, with a CAGR of 14.5% over five years.
Connected TV is the fastest growing video format in the market. CTV spend reached $386 million in 2025, up 25.7% from $307 million in 2024. It currently represents 31% of all video spend outside social. New SVOD platforms with ad-supported tiers and the growth of broadcast video on demand are creating fresh inventory that did not exist two years ago. For commerce brands, CTV is an early-mover opportunity that is still wide open.
The Country Picture: GCC Consolidates, Egypt Accelerates
Saudi Arabia and the UAE continue to anchor the regional market. KSA holds approximately 46.1% of total MENA digital ad spend and grew 18.9% in 2025. UAE grew 17.7%. Egypt was the regional outperformer, growing 23.1% in constant USD terms, driven by economic and fiscal stabilisation that restored advertiser confidence sharply.
Four Forces Shaping What Comes Next
The IAB identifies four macro factors that will define the market going forward: geopolitics, AI, inventory expansion, and the financialisation of marketing.
The financialisation point is the one I watch most closely. CMOs are moving into CFO language. Outcome metrics — revenue contribution, ROAS, category share, margin impact — are becoming the standard by which media investment is judged. Channels and strategies that cannot demonstrate bottom-line impact will gradually lose budget to those that can. That shift is already happening. It will accelerate.
AI is reshaping every stage of the advertising workflow — from audience intelligence and creative production through to media buying, optimisation, and measurement. Brands that adopt intelligently will hold a structural advantage over those that react late.
What This Means for Commerce Brands in MENA
The IAB's 2025 data tells a clear story. The MENA digital ad market is growing at pace, but the growth is not uniform. The channels growing fastest — retail media, search, social video, CTV — share a common characteristic: they are measurable, outcome-oriented, and commerce-proximate.
Brands that allocate budgets based on reach and awareness logic alone are swimming against the current. The market is moving toward intelligence-led, outcome-driven investment. That means understanding where to compete on the shelf before competing for the screen. It means treating search spend as a commerce tool, not just a discovery tool. And it means building the measurement infrastructure to connect media investment to actual business growth.
The $8.185 billion market is large. The opportunity for brands that operate with precision inside it is larger still.