May Video Rankings: Video Ads Pass the 10B Mark
Online video ads continued to break records in May. The latest comScore U.S. online video rankings are out, and while the number of video viewers dropped just a hair (180.5 million, compared to 181 million in April), as did the number of videos viewed (36.6 billion, compared to nearly 37 billion in April), the number of ads viewed rose from 9.5 billion in April to 10.1 billion in May. This marks the first time the number of video ads viewed has crossed the 10 billion mark. The average U.S. online video viewer, by the way, watched 21.9 hours of video in May, up a tiny bit from 21.8 hours in April.
May's video leader was, naturally, Google sites (which include YouTube). Google served 151.7 million unique users an average of 462.7 minutes of video. Next up was Yahoo sites, which served 57.8 million viewers an average of 77.7 minutes of video.
The number three spot went to Vevo (48.3 million), followed by Microsoft sites (44.4 million), and Facebook (44.3 million). Completing the top ten were AOL, Viacom Digital, News Distribution Network, Amazon sites, and Hulu. Those were the same top ten properties as in April, although in slightly different order.
The real story, though, is in ads. While video views have held steady or dropped for months now, video impressions continue to rise -- and rise dramatically. Hulu was again the ad leader, showing 1.7 billion ads to 9.8 percent of the population, averaging 55.5 ads per viewer. Following Hulu were Google sites (1.4 billion), BrightRoll (1.1 billion), Adap.tv (966.2 million), TubeMogul (896.9 million), Specific Media (751.5 million), Tremor Video (725.9 million), SpotXchange (615.3 million), Auditude (569.9 million), and ESPN (490.1 million). Those are also the same top ten finishers as in April.
In May, 84.5 percent of the U.S. online audience viewed videos. The average video length was 6.5 minutes, while the average ad was 0.4 minutes.
Vevo was again the most-viewed YouTube partner channel, followed by Warner Music, Machinima, Maker Studios, and FullScreen.
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