Online advertising spending in Central and Eastern Europe 2000-2024

In 2021, online ad spending in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) amounted to approximately 9.5 billion U.S. dollars. The segment’s revenue has steadily increased since 2000 when it stood at 10 million U.S. dollars. According to a forecast from June 2022, the figure was expected to fall by 29 percent in 2022. In 2024, it was forecast to reach over 7.8 billion U.S. dollars.

Digital advertising market share in CEE

Online advertising occupied nearly 49 percent of the total ad budget in CEE, which was measured at around 19.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2021. To compare, in the previous year, the market share was close to 44 percent. Czechia had the highest digital advertising share in the region (without considering Turkey), at over 61 percent in 2020. In contrast, within Bulgaria’s ad expenditure, ads on the internet occupied only 10 percent.

Leading digital advertising markets in CEE

In 2020, Russia, Czechia, and Poland had the highest spending on online ads in the CEE region (excluding Turkey). Advertisers across Russia invested nearly 5.2 billion euros in digital advertising that year. The fastest-growing markets were Ukraine and Slovakia, where the expenditure on online ads grew by 43 percent and 31.4 percent in 2021 relative to the previous year, respectively.