Perspective: Media inflation vs media market growth

Without the benefit of an Olympics or Australian Federal Election, 2026 doesn’t have a home run for event-led growth. MAGNA tipped 2025 total media growth before revising the figure down to just over 5% mid-year, in line with most other predictors. Early 2026 estimates are predicting similar growth of around 5% across the entire media market.

The missing picture is understanding the effect of media cost inflation versus real growth in demand. The World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) Outlook predicted that the rise in the actual cost to buy media – whether by placement, reach or click – will rise by around 5% in 2025. The same as the widely accepted growth of the total media market in 2025.

Far from illustrating no market growth, it shows a very tough path ahead for media on the wrong side of the structural realignment of the media industry. 2026 promises to be grim at best for already ailing media channels. Not all digital media channels are immune – digital display spends are plateauing as advertisers rapidly adopt video, audio and secure their competitive positions in paid search.

A perfect storm has been brewing over the effective measurement of digital media performance for years. That storm is about to break in 2026. Relying on attribution reporting using third-party tracking excludes the performance of roughly 45% of an advertiser’s media investment sitting outside Chrome – unacceptable when digital media’s share of Australia’s total media pie is forecast to reach 75% in 2026.