Marketing Spend Statistics & Budget Benchmarks (2026)
This page focuses on the budget and channel benchmarks that matter when agencies scope work, defend pricing, and interpret buyer pressure. The goal is not to publish another bloated 50-stat list. It is to keep the benchmark set current, sourced, and actually useful.
Key Takeaways
- •Gartner says marketing budgets stayed flat at 7.7% of company revenue in 2025, and 59% of CMOs still say that is not enough to execute strategy.
- •Digital channels now account for 61.1% of total marketing spend, with 69% of digital budgets flowing to paid online channels.
- •Search, display, and social remain the biggest digital allocations at 13.9%, 12.5%, and 12.2% of digital spend.
- •WARC projects the global ad market at $1.17 trillion in 2025, with 90.3% of ad dollars going to online-only platforms.
- •Agency operators should watch the squeeze: 39% of CMOs plan to cut agency budgets, and 22% say gen AI has reduced their reliance on external agencies.
Table of Contents
Budget Levels and Budget Pressure
The first benchmark agencies need is not channel mix. It is how much room buyers have to spend at all. Gartner’s CMO spend data is the cleanest public benchmark for that question because it ties budgets directly to company revenue and purchasing pressure.
7.7%
Gartner says marketing budgets remained flat at 7.7% of company revenue in 2025.
That means the budget reset from the earlier 9.1% level has not bounced back. Agencies should treat this as the current budget environment buyers are working within, not as a temporary dip that will automatically reverse.
59%
Nearly six in ten CMOs say they still do not have enough budget to execute strategy.
Gartner reports 59% of CMOs say they have insufficient budget for 2025. That matters to agencies because pricing pressure and scope compression are often reflections of buyer-side budget constraints, not just procurement tactics.
30.6%
Paid media now accounts for 30.6% of the average marketing budget.
Gartner puts paid media at 30.6% of marketing budgets, or 2.4% of company revenue. The signal for agencies is that buyers are still protecting performance-oriented spend, even while broader budget growth is stalled.
39% / 22%
Agency budgets are under direct pressure from cost cutting and gen AI expectations.
Gartner says 39% of CMOs plan to cut agency budgets, and 22% say gen AI has enabled less reliance on external agencies for creativity and strategy building. The implication is not that agencies disappear. It is that agencies need to defend value more clearly than before.
Budget pressure is now structural enough that agencies should assume more scrutiny on scope, attribution, and pricing model design. The buying environment is not as forgiving as generic growth-era advice assumes.
Digital Allocation and Channel Mix
The second layer is where that spend is going. Gartner’s 2025 channel-allocation release is especially useful because it breaks digital budgets down in a way that agencies can apply directly to planning, forecasting, and proposal framing.
61.1%
Digital channels now account for 61.1% of total marketing spend.
That is the headline benchmark for channel mix in 2025. Agencies should read it as a baseline expectation: digital is not a side budget anymore, it is the majority allocation across most sectors.
69%
Paid online channels take 69% of total digital spend.
Gartner’s split shows that even inside digital budgets, paid channels dominate. That is useful context for agencies building service mixes around paid search, paid social, display, and retail media rather than assuming digital budgets are evenly distributed.
13.9% / 12.5% / 12.2%
Search, digital display, and social are the three largest digital allocations.
Gartner says paid search now takes 13.9% of total digital spend, digital display 12.5%, and social 12.2%. That mix is a better planning benchmark than vague “invest more in digital” advice because it shows how buyers are actually allocating money across paid channels.
7.4%
Email still claims 7.4% of digital spend and ranks as the top channel for customer loyalty.
Gartner notes that owned and earned allocations broadly declined year over year, but email was the exception. For agencies, this is a reminder that owned channels still matter when buyers are under pressure to improve efficiency and retention.
The digital mix is still heavily paid-led, but email’s resilience shows that efficient owned channels get more important when budgets flatten. Agencies that can connect acquisition and retention work will usually have a stronger budget defense.
Market Shifts and High-Efficiency Channels
Public channel-allocation data gets more useful when paired with broader ad-market direction. WARC helps on the macro side, while Litmus provides a cleaner benchmark for why certain owned channels keep holding budget.
$1.17T / 90.3%
WARC projects the global ad market at $1.17 trillion in 2025, with 90.3% going to online-only platforms.
That combination matters more than the topline alone. Growth is still there, but the concentration of dollars in online-only environments means agencies need stronger digital planning, measurement, and platform literacy just to stay aligned with the market.
$177.7B -> $201.6B
WARC says retail media will reach $177.7 billion in 2025 and $201.6 billion in 2026.
WARC also says that would make retail media equivalent to 16.3% of all global ad spend. Agencies that manage performance budgets need to treat retail media as an established planning line, not an experimental add-on.
Source: WARC Retail Media Radar: Q1 2025
35%
Litmus says 35% of companies see email ROI of 36:1 or more.
That does not mean every email program performs at that level, but it does explain why email keeps holding budget even when broader owned and earned allocations are under pressure. Efficient lifecycle channels remain easier to defend in flat-budget environments.
Source: Litmus, State of Email Reports
The macro picture is not just “spend more on digital.” It is “spend is concentrating into a smaller set of high-accountability environments.” Agencies that can tie paid and owned channels to clear outcomes will be in the best position as budget pressure continues.
Methodology Notes
- •This page removes generic filler and homepage-level citations from the prior version. The benchmark set is smaller now because the weaker claims were not worth keeping.
- •Gartner provides the strongest public budget-allocation data on this page, while WARC adds macro ad-market direction and Litmus adds owned-channel efficiency context.
- •Most budget figures here reflect 2025 survey data because that is the latest defensible public benchmark set available at the time of review. The page title remains 2026 because agencies use these figures for current planning.
- •Budget and channel data on this page describes the buyer environment agencies sell into. It should not be mistaken for direct agency revenue or profitability benchmarks.
Related Resources
Agency Pricing Statistics
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Open resourceHow Much Does a Marketing Agency Cost?
Translate these budget benchmarks into practical fee expectations and scope decisions.
Open resourceAgency Pricing Models
Position retainers, projects, and performance pricing against the current spend environment.
Open resourceNeed the full benchmark library?
Browse the statistics hub for the canonical benchmark pages and the broader topic library.