Digital Out of Home in Canada: Accelerating Toward Integration and Maturity

Based on the IAB Canada DOOH Committee Fall 2025 Roundtable Discussion

Canada’s Digital Out of Home (DOOH) market continues to expand, driven by rising programmatic adoption, creative innovation, and growing cross-channel collaboration. According to IAB Canada’s 2024 Internet Advertising Revenue Survey, DOOH generated $153 million in 2024, a 6.7 percent year-over-year increase. Total digital ad revenues are projected to exceed $21 billion by the end of 2025, highlighting the channel’s growing influence in the country’s digital ecosystem.

Programmatic Adoption: Progress and Practicality

Programmatic buying has become a central part of the DOOH landscape, accounting for an estimated 40 to 50 percent of activity. Committee members acknowledge that the exact figure remains difficult to confirm due to differences in how agencies classify and measure programmatic versus direct campaigns. OOH-specialist agencies such as Talon and Billups continue to lead adoption, while larger full-service agencies weigh automation against practical considerations such as lead time, audience precision, and campaign efficiency.

To streamline operations, several agencies have re-centralized planning under unified teams that manage both direct and programmatic buys. As automation expands, the shift toward programmatic guaranteed deals and dynamic creative activations continues to shape Canada’s evolving DOOH market.

Creative Evolution: Promise and Execution

Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO) remains one of DOOH’s most promising opportunities, yet execution often lags intent. While dynamic creative is frequently discussed early in campaign planning, many activations still launch with static creative. Agencies are addressing this by developing creative templates and playbooks that help DCO remain active throughout a campaign.

Advertisers such as Captivate are embracing audience-driven creative in real time, delivering contextual messaging in offices and residential buildings. The company’s 2025 partnership with VIOOH expanded programmatic access to its Canadian inventory, enabling more data-driven and responsive campaigns. As urban centers recover, this kind of contextual creative continues to drive attention and engagement.

Connected Commerce: Early Steps, High Potential

Connected Commerce (also known as Retail Media) in Canada is still taking shape, hindered by infrastructure costs and limited scale. While international markets are rapidly integrating in-store screens into retail networks, Canada’s approach remains focused on e-commerce and product-level activations. That is beginning to change. Vistar Media’s integration with Stingray Advertising is linking in-store screens to programmatic systems, paving the way for more connected retail media strategies.

DOOH naturally complements retail marketing, especially in proximity to store locations. Structured test and learn programs will be critical in 2026 to prove incremental value and open the door to larger cross-channel budgets that connect DOOH, retail, and commerce.

Measurement: Building a Common Language

Measurement continues to be one of the most important factors in DOOH’s evolution. Canadian campaigns often rely on brand lift, foot-traffic attribution, and emerging attention metrics, supported by organizations such as COMMB and Broadsign. The IAB DOOH Measurement Guide (July 2025) establishes a foundation for industry-wide standardization with clear definitions, transparent reporting, and methodological consistency.

Attribution challenges remain, particularly for lower-funnel metrics. Awareness, engagement, and recall still define campaign success, but the opportunity lies in linking DOOH’s proven top-of-funnel strength to digital-style performance data. Tools like Vistar Verify, launched in Canada in 2024, are helping to create quality benchmarks and improve confidence in measurable outcomes.

Key takeaway: The opportunity lies in connecting DOOH’s proven awareness impact with more robust, digital-style metrics to better demonstrate mid- and lower-funnel contribution.

DOOH and Social: A New Creative Playground

The connection between DOOH and social media continues to grow. Video-driven platforms and influencer content are moving beyond personal devices into public environments through Social Out-of-Home (SOOH) campaigns. Pattison’s TTC influencer test and TikTok’s “Out of Phone” initiatives show how brands can bring social storytelling to real-world spaces.

The key creative challenge for advertisers is creative efficiency—making it simple to adapt social content for DOOH formats. As these integrations become easier to execute, DOOH will strengthen its position as both a broadcast and engagement platform.

Expanding Environments and Audience Reach

While roadside billboards remain foundational, advertisers are increasingly diversifying into airports, offices, and place-based venues. Airport networks continue to perform strongly, and the office sector has grown significantly as hybrid work stabilizes. These environments provide valuable segmentation opportunities and help advertisers balance wide reach with targeted frequency.

Priorities for 2026

The next stage of DOOH growth in Canada depends on collaboration, consistency, and creativity. Key priorities include:

  • Standardized Measurement Adoption: Broader implementation of frameworks outlined in the IAB DOOH Measurement Guide.
  • Strategist Education: Integrating DOOH early in the media planning process, rather than as a last-minute addition.
  • Connected Commerce Pilots: Testing and proving the incremental impact of DOOH across retail and digital ecosystems.
  • Dynamic Creative Scaling: Developing reusable assets and templates that make DCO easier to activate.
  • Joint Planning: Encouraging shared audience definitions and unified briefs across digital and OOH teams.

A Channel Coming into Focus

As DOOH becomes more deeply integrated into Canada’s advertising landscape, it is transforming from a static medium into a dynamic, data-informed channel that connects screens, audiences, and commerce. Consistent measurement, thoughtful creative execution, and stronger collaboration across disciplines will determine how quickly the medium reaches its full potential.

The future of Canadian DOOH will be defined by its ability to merge creativity with technology and by a shared understanding across agencies, advertisers, and publishers that Out of Home is now digital, adaptable, and measurable.

The IAB Canada DOOH Committee will continue to lead these conversations, working collaboratively to clarify definitions, educate the market, and help advertisers harness DOOH’s growing role in the omnichannel mix.

Thank you to our DOOH Committee Chairs Barbara Huggett (Captivate) and Scott Mitchell (Vistar Media) for leading an insightful Fall discussion with our committee members. If you’re interested in shaping the future of Digital Out of Home in Canada, we invite you to join IAB Canada and become part of the DOOH Committee to collaborate with industry leaders driving innovation and growth.