Advertising industry insights and advisory firm Madison and Wall has published new analysis on the concentration of the US advertising industry, revealing a list of the top 50 advertising sellers, with Google, Meta and Amazon dominating.

Google is estimated to be the largest seller of advertising in the US, representing nearly 27% of the industry's ad revenue in 2023. Together, Google, Meta and Amazon, accounted for just over 51% of the US industry's total ad revenue, a significant increase from the previous year where they accounted for only 23% (primarily shared between Google and Meta at the time).

The concentration has broadened among the biggest, globally-oriented companies at the expense of smaller, single-country companies. The ten largest global platform owners (Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, TikTok, Apple, Snap, Yahoo, Pinterest, and Twitter/X) have seen significant growth. 37 companies generated more than $1 billion in ad revenue in 2023, with the top 50 accounting for around 88% of total US industry advertising revenue.

Madison and Wall's Brian Wieser wrote: "Even if smaller single-country companies are collectively losing share, there is a still a fairly diverse and fragmented group of large sellers of advertising in absolute terms, with 37 companies generating more than $1 billion in ad revenue last year on our estimates. Going a little deeper, the biggest 50 we have identified account for around 88% of total US industry advertising revenue."

The data excludes modern-day classified advertising businesses but includes estimates for advertising revenues for all major media owners on a pro forma basis, including announced but not completed M&A transactions.