Video Marketing Statistics (2026)

A data analysis of how many businesses use video, what it actually returns, why short clips win the ROI rankings, and how teams now make more video with smaller crews, screen recorders, and AI.

91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool in 2026, according to Wyzowl’s annual survey, and 82% of video marketers say it delivers a good return. That ROI figure fell from 93% a year earlier, even as usage held at a record. Short-form video is the format marketers rank first for return, at 48.6% in HubSpot’s State of Marketing. Audiences are moving the same way: YouTube alone now holds a record 14.2% of all US TV viewing, per Nielsen. Compare the tools behind the work in our video editing category.

Key takeaways

• 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, back at a joint all-time high, per Wyzowl’s 2026 report
• 82% of video marketers report a good ROI, down from 93% the year before, an 11-point fall in one year (Wyzowl)
• 48.6% of marketers rank short-form video among their top ROI formats, ahead of long-form (28.6%) and live streaming (25.1%), per HubSpot
• YouTube took a record 14.2% of US TV viewing in July 2026, with streaming at 49.0% of all TV time (Nielsen)
• 63% of video marketers have used AI video tools, up from 51% a year earlier (Wyzowl), while Wistia’s larger survey finds more than a third actively using AI
• In-house video teams rose from 36% to 54% of companies in two years, per Wistia
• US digital video ad spend will reach $81.9B in 2026, and social video ($31.9B) now outspends connected TV ($29.3B), per the IAB
• Videos under one minute keep 65% of viewers to the end, against 20% for videos over 20 minutes, per Vidyard’s analysis of 943,305 business videos
• 63% of consumers would rather learn about a product from a short video, versus 12% from text articles and 4% from webinars (Wyzowl)

How many businesses use video marketing in 2026?

Video is close to universal in marketing. 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool in 2026, a joint all-time high, and 93% of video marketers call it an important part of their strategy, per Wyzowl’s 2026 survey of 266 respondents. Among the holdouts, 67% plan to start using video this year.

1. 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, back to a joint all-time high after a small dip in 2025 (Wyzowl, 2026). The question is no longer whether to make video, but which videos earn their cost.
2. 93% of video marketers say video is an important part of their overall strategy (Wyzowl). That is a slight dip from the prior year.
3. 24% of non-users say video isn’t needed, and another 24% say it is too expensive (Wyzowl). Cost and perceived need tie as the top barriers. A further 19% say they simply lack the time.
4. 67% of marketers who don’t use video plan to start in 2026 (Wyzowl). Intent among holdouts is down just one point from last year.
5. 76% of companies make at least one video a month (Wistia State of Video 2026). Wistia surveyed 900+ professionals and analyzed over 13 million videos.
6. 83% of companies now share videos on social media (Wistia). Social distribution is the default, not an add-on.
7. Videos hosted on Wistia drew 2.5 billion plays in 2025, a 6% jump on the year before (Wistia).

A note on sample sizes: Wyzowl’s report has 12 consecutive years of data, but its 2026 edition rests on 266 respondents. Where it and Wistia disagree, we show both.

Does video marketing deliver a good ROI?

Most marketers say yes, but fewer than last year. 82% of video marketers say video has given them a good ROI, down from an all-time high of 93% a year earlier, per Wyzowl. In the same survey, 85% credit video with generating leads and 83% say it has directly increased sales.

8. 82% of marketers report a good ROI from video, down from 93% (Wyzowl). An 11-point fall in one year is the clearest warning sign in this year’s data.
9. 85% say video helped them generate leads, and 83% say it directly increased sales (Wyzowl). Another 82% say it increased web traffic.
10. 93% say video increased user understanding of their product or service (Wyzowl). The same share, 93%, credit it with higher brand awareness.
11. 57% say video has helped reduce support queries (Wyzowl). This is the cheapest return to capture. One clear how-to video answers the same ticket again and again.
12. 67% measure video ROI through views, but only 32% measure it through bottom-line sales (Wyzowl). 63% track engagement such as likes and shares, and 52% track leads or clicks. Most teams grade video on attention, not revenue.
13. 17% of marketers don’t track how much they spend on video (Wyzowl). A team that cannot name its cost cannot name its return.
14. Less than half of marketers connect their video platform to a CRM or email tool (Wistia).
15. Social engagement as a top success metric nearly doubled, from 12% to 22% in a single year (Wistia).

The outcomes marketers report most are soft ones: understanding and awareness. The outcome finance cares about, sales, is the one teams measure least (32%).

Is short-form or long-form video more effective?

Short-form wins on reported ROI, but length should follow intent. 48.6% of marketers rank short-form video among their top ROI formats, versus 28.6% for long-form, per HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing. Viewer data agrees on attention: videos under one minute keep 65% of viewers to the end, per Vidyard.

16. Short-form video (48.6%) leads every format for ROI, ahead of long-form video (28.6%) and live streaming (25.1%) (HubSpot). Case studies (16.5%) and interactive content (9.8%) trail far behind. HubSpot, which surveyed 1,500+ marketers, says the pattern holds across B2C, B2B, and nonprofit teams.
17. 60% of marketers used short-form video in 2025, more than any other format, with long-form video at 38% (HubSpot). Short-form is both the most used format and the top-rated one for ROI.
18. 71% of video marketers believe videos between 30 seconds and 2 minutes are most effective (Wyzowl).
19. Under one minute, 65% of viewers watch to the end. Over 20 minutes, only 20% do (Vidyard). The data comes from business videos created on Vidyard in 2024. Engagement falls at every runtime milestone.
20. Vidyard users still created 420% more videos over 20 minutes in 2024 (Vidyard). Long recordings serve later-stage sales: demos, Q&As, and proposals for buyers who already care.
21. Webinar replays of 31 to 45 minutes saw more than 2x the engagement of replays under 30 minutes (Wistia). Wistia also found videos between 30 and 60 minutes drive the most clicks on interactive elements. Long-form works once the viewer has chosen to be there.
22. Only 19% of Instagram’s audience favors long-form content over 60 seconds (Sprout Social). On feed-first platforms, short is the price of entry.

What it means

Use short video to earn attention and long video to serve intent. A social clip and a webinar replay do different jobs at different points in the funnel. Our webinar statistics cover the long end.

How much video do people watch in 2026?

More than ever, and more of it through streaming. Streaming reached 49.0% of all US TV time in July 2026, and YouTube alone took a record 14.2%, per Nielsen’s The Gauge. On phones, video made up around 75% of all mobile data traffic at the end of 2025, per Ericsson.

TV and streaming

23. YouTube took a record 14.2% of all US TV viewing in July 2026 (Nielsen). YouTube viewing rose 6% month over month, extending its lead as the largest media distributor in Nielsen’s ranking. A platform built on uploaded video now outdraws every TV network group.
24. YouTube’s share of TV has climbed from 12.5% in May 2025 to 13.8% in May 2026 (Nielsen, 2025; Nielsen, 2026). Nielsen called the May 2025 figure the highest share of TV for any streamer to that date.
25. Streaming passed broadcast and cable combined for the first time in May 2025, at 44.8% versus 44.2% (Nielsen). By July 2026 it had reached 49.0%.
26. 84% of US adults use YouTube, and 33% visit it several times a day (Pew Research Center, 2025). Pew surveyed 5,022 US adults.
27. Video accounted for around 75% of all mobile data traffic at the end of 2025 (Ericsson Mobility Report). Three of every four bytes on mobile networks are video.
28. Over 20 million videos are uploaded to YouTube every day (YouTube). Supply is not the bottleneck. Distribution is.

Short-form feeds

29. YouTube Shorts now averages 200 billion daily views (YouTube CEO letter, 2026; YouTube press).
30. 37% of US adults use TikTok, up from 21% in 2021, and 24% use it daily (Pew). Roughly half of adults aged 18 to 29 use TikTok daily, against 5% of those 65 and older.
31. Facebook video time spent rose 9% globally year over year in Q2 2026, and over 10% in the US and Canada (Meta Q2 2026 earnings call). Instagram time spent grew double digits on better Feed and Reels recommendations, and Instagram reached 2 billion daily actives.
32. Vertical HD video uploads to Wistia rose 24% year over year (Wistia).

For platform-by-platform social benchmarks, see our social media marketing statistics.

What do viewers want from brand videos?

Short, useful, and well made. 63% of consumers say a short video is how they would most like to learn about a product, versus 12% for text articles and 4% for webinars, per Wyzowl. In the same survey, 85% say a video has convinced them to buy, and 89% say video quality affects their trust in a brand.

33. 63% prefer a short video to learn about a product. 12% prefer text articles, 7% infographics, 5% sales calls, 4% ebooks or manuals, and 4% webinars (Wyzowl).
34. 96% of people have watched an explainer video to learn about a product or service (Wyzowl). Explainer videos are also the second most common type marketers make, at 68%, just behind social videos at 69%.
35. 85% have been convinced to buy by a video, and 80% have bought or downloaded an app after watching an app demo (Wyzowl).
36. 84% of consumers want to see more video from brands in 2026 (Wyzowl). Wyzowl says the figure has stayed consistent to within 8% for the last 8 years.
37. 89% say video quality affects their trust in a brand (Wyzowl). That is down from 91% last year and up from 87% in the 2024 report.
38. 52% of social users interact most with short-form video under 60 seconds on Instagram, and 48% say the same of Facebook (Sprout Social 2026 Content Strategy Report).
39. Yet video is just 24% of brand content published on Facebook (Sprout Social 2025 Content Benchmarks). On Instagram, single videos make up only 28% of brand posts.

Which video marketing platforms work best?

YouTube leads on both usage and results. 82% of businesses publish video to YouTube and 69% of video marketers rate it effective, the top marks on both counts in Wyzowl’s 2026 survey. LinkedIn is the B2B story: 81% of teams share video there, ahead of YouTube at 76%, per Wistia’s 2026 report.

Source: Wyzowl Video Marketing Statistics 2026, survey of 266 respondents fielded in late 2025.

40. 82% of businesses upload video to YouTube, and 69% of video marketers rate it effective (Wyzowl).
41. TikTok is used by 40% of video marketers but rated effective by just 29% (Wyzowl). Snapchat scores lowest at 8%, and X manages 16%.
42. 81% of teams share video on LinkedIn, ahead of YouTube at 76%. Fewer than a quarter share on TikTok (Wistia). Wistia calls LinkedIn B2B’s number one video channel.
43. Over half of LinkedIn users still gravitate toward text-based posts (Sprout Social), and are less likely to engage with video, per Sprout’s 2026 Content Strategy Report.

How do businesses produce their videos?

Mostly in-house, and more often by non-specialists. 59% of businesses create their videos entirely in-house, 10% rely only on external vendors, and 32% mix both, per Wyzowl. Wistia finds the share of companies with in-house video teams jumped from 36% to 54% in just two years.

44. 59% make video in-house, 10% use only external vendors, and 32% mix both (Wyzowl). Put another way, 42% still rely on outside creators in some capacity.
45. The share of companies with in-house video teams rose from 36% to 54% in two years (Wistia). Wistia credits marketers, content strategists, and subject-matter experts getting behind the camera or the screen recorder.
46. 51% mostly make live-action video, 23% animated, and 19% screen-recorded (Wyzowl). Nearly one in five video marketers now mainly makes screen recordings.
47. Testimonial videos are climbing: 17% of companies planned them in 2023, 37% in 2024, 38% in 2025, and 47% in 2026 (Wistia).
48. Almost 40% of companies spent under $5,000 producing video last year (Wistia).
49. 57% of teams spend more time creating video than promoting it. Only 20% spend more time promoting (Wistia). The production bottleneck has eased. The distribution habit has not caught up.

For in-house teams on small budgets, the editor matters more than the agency. See our reviews of Descript, CapCut, and DaVinci Resolve, or the shortlist for content creators.

How many marketers use AI video tools?

Somewhere between a third and two-thirds, depending on who asks. 63% of video marketers have used AI video tools, up from 51% a year earlier, per Wyzowl. Wistia’s larger survey finds more than a third already use AI in their video workflow, and 62% use it or plan to start soon.

Sources: Wyzowl, Wistia report and recap, HubSpot, IAB. “Has ever used” and “uses in the workflow” are different questions, which helps explain the gap.

50. 63% of video marketers have used AI video tools, up from 51% a year earlier (Wyzowl).
51. More than a third of teams already use AI in their video workflow, and nearly a quarter more plan to start soon (Wistia). Wistia finds teams use AI mostly in pre-production.
52. 44% of marketers use video or animation generators (HubSpot), and nearly 75% use AI for media creation, including video and images.
53. AI users are 82% more likely to add subtitles in multiple languages (Wistia), and daily video producers are 58% more likely to use AI. The clearest AI wins are captions, translation, and volume.
54. Adoption of Vidyard’s AI Avatars feature rose 12x in eight months after its April 2024 launch (Vidyard). This is the vendor’s own product data, not a market survey.
55. Synthesia says it is trusted by 90% of the Fortune 100 (Synthesia). Treat that as a vendor claim. If accurate, it shows AI-presenter video has reached the largest enterprises.
56. 21% of digital video ad buyers are already live with agentic AI, 20% are testing it, and 25% plan to use it (IAB, 2026). Another 28% are actively investigating.

How big is screen recording and async video?

Large, and mostly driven by business use. When Atlassian agreed to buy Loom for about $975 million in 2023, Loom had more than 25 million users and its business users were recording almost 5 million videos a month, per Atlassian. Loom now says 400,000 companies use it, per its homepage.

57. Loom had more than 25 million users and over 200,000 customers when Atlassian agreed to buy it in 2023 (Atlassian). The deal price was approximately $975 million.
58. Almost 5 million Loom videos were created every month in 2023 (Atlassian). That is async video as a work habit, not a marketing campaign.
59. Loom now says millions of people across 400,000 companies choose it (Loom). “Companies” on the homepage and “customers” in the 2023 release are different measures, so we do not compute a growth rate.
60. Vidyard users created 943,305 videos in 2024, 88% more than the year before (Vidyard). This is first-party platform data, not a survey.
61. The average Vidyard user created 37 videos in 2024, up 241% (Vidyard).
62. Mid-market companies (600 to 5,000 employees) made 267 videos each on average in 2024; small companies of up to 30 employees made 144 (Vidyard). Small teams punch well above their size. Enterprises made the fewest videos per company.

Source: Vidyard 2025 Video in Business Benchmark Report, anonymized data from more than 940,000 videos created January 1 to December 15, 2024.

If you are choosing a recorder, compare the options in our screen recording category and our Loom review.

How much is spent on video advertising?

US digital video ad spend will reach $81.9 billion in 2026, up 11%, per the IAB. Social video, which includes YouTube, now leads at $31.9 billion, ahead of connected TV at $29.3 billion. Digital video will take 61% of all US TV and video ad spend, up from 38% in 2021.

Source: IAB 2026 Digital Video Ad Spend & Strategy Report, Part One (Guideline estimates).

63. US digital video ad spend will reach $81.9B in 2026, double the volume of five years ago (IAB). It was $39.0B in 2021. IAB says growth is now roughly half its 2022 peak as the market matures.
64. Digital video will take 61% of US TV and video ad spend in 2026, up from 58% in 2025 and 38% in 2021 (IAB). It is the first year digital passes 60%.
65. YouTube ads brought in $11,055 million in Q2 2026, up from $9,796 million a year earlier (Alphabet 10-Q). Alphabet credits direct response ads first, then brand ads.
66. 41% of marketers spent money on video ads this year, up from 36% last year (Wyzowl).
67. 92% of marketers plan to spend the same or more on video in 2026 (Wyzowl). But only 40% expect to spend more, while 46% hold budgets flat, per Wistia. HubSpot puts the share planning to increase video investment at 37.1%.
68. 48% of companies plan to increase their video promotion budgets this year (Wistia), and fewer than 10% are cutting them. Money is shifting from making video to getting it seen.

What to do with this data

• Default to short, useful video. 63% of consumers prefer a short video for learning about a product (Wyzowl), and 71% of marketers rate 30 seconds to 2 minutes as the most effective length. Start with explainers, demos, and how-tos before brand films.
• Measure cost and revenue, not just views. 17% of marketers don’t track video spend, and only 32% measure sales impact (Wyzowl). Connect your video host to your CRM before you make another video.
• Standardize on one editor and one recorder. With 54% of companies now running in-house video teams (Wistia), the tool your whole team adopts matters more than the one with the longest feature list. Compare options in our video editing and screen recording categories.
• Use AI for the repetitive work. Captions, translations, and cutdowns are where AI users pull ahead, being 82% more likely to ship multilingual subtitles (Wistia).
• Budget for distribution. 57% of teams spend more time creating than promoting (Wistia). Repurpose long recordings into clips rather than producing more from scratch.

Video adoption is settled at 91%. The variable now is return, and the 11-point drop in reported ROI says more video is not the answer by itself. The teams that win make short, useful video in-house with one well-adopted editor and recorder, then put the saved effort into distribution and measurement. That is the tools8020 thesis applied to video: fewer, better-chosen tools, used well. See how we score and shortlist tools on our about page, and the companion data on content marketing, social media marketing, and webinars.

Frequently asked questions

What percentage of businesses use video marketing?

91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool in 2026, a joint all-time high, per Wyzowl. Of the marketers who don’t use video yet, 67% plan to start this year. Wistia’s separate 2026 survey finds 76% of companies make at least one video a month.

What is the ROI of video marketing?

82% of video marketers say video gives them a good ROI, down from 93% a year earlier, per Wyzowl. 85% say it helped generate leads and 83% say it directly increased sales. Only 32% measure ROI through bottom-line sales, so most reported returns rest on views and engagement.

What is the best length for a marketing video?

For most marketing video, 30 seconds to 2 minutes: 71% of video marketers rate that range most effective (Wyzowl). Viewer data agrees. Videos under one minute keep 65% of viewers to the end, against 20% for videos over 20 minutes, per Vidyard. Longer webinars still work for committed viewers.

Is short-form video worth it for B2B?

Yes. 48.6% of marketers rank short-form video among their top ROI formats, and HubSpot says that holds across B2B, B2C, and nonprofits. For B2B distribution, 81% of teams share video on LinkedIn, per Wistia, ahead of YouTube at 76%. Keep clips short and captioned.

How many marketers use AI to make videos?

Between a third and two-thirds. 63% of video marketers have used AI video tools, up from 51% the year before (Wyzowl). Wistia finds more than a third use AI in their workflow today, and HubSpot reports 44% of marketers use video or animation generators.

How much US TV viewing happens on YouTube?

YouTube took a record 14.2% of all US TV viewing in July 2026, the largest share of any media distributor, per Nielsen. Streaming as a whole reached 49.0% of TV time that month. YouTube’s share was 12.5% in May 2025 and 13.8% in May 2026.

Do explainer videos work?

The audience data says yes. 96% of people have watched an explainer video to learn about a product or service, and 85% have been convinced to buy by a video, per Wyzowl. Explainers are also the second most common video type marketers make, at 68%, behind social videos.

How many people use Loom for screen recording?

Loom had more than 25 million users and over 200,000 customers when Atlassian agreed to buy it for about $975 million in 2023, per Atlassian. Its business users recorded almost 5 million videos a month. Loom now says 400,000 companies use it.

How we compiled these statistics

We drew every figure from 15 publishers across 22 source pages, including annual surveys (Wyzowl, HubSpot, Wistia), measurement data (Nielsen, Ericsson, Pew Research Center), ad-spend estimates (IAB), and company filings and official posts (Alphabet, Meta, YouTube, Atlassian). Every figure was retrieved from the publisher’s own page in October 2026; figures we could not trace to a primary page were dropped. Vendor claims are labeled as such, and where sources disagree, as on AI adoption and budget plans, we show the range.

Sources

• Wyzowl: Video Marketing Statistics 2026 (2026)
• HubSpot: 2026 State of Marketing, data from 1,500+ global marketers (2026)
• HubSpot: 2026 Marketing Statistics, Trends and Data (2026)
• Wistia: State of Video Report, Video Marketing Statistics for 2026 (2026)
• Wistia: Key Takeaways From the 2026 State of Video Webinar (2026)
• Nielsen: July 2026 Gauge, YouTube captures a record 14.2% of TV (2026)
• Nielsen: May 2026 Gauge, streaming hits 48.6% of TV (2026)
• Nielsen: Streaming eclipses combined broadcast and cable for the first time (2025)
• YouTube: The Future of YouTube, 2026 letter from CEO Neal Mohan (2026)
• YouTube: YouTube for Press, by the numbers (2026)
• Alphabet: Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 (2026)
• Meta: Second Quarter 2026 Results Conference Call transcript (2026)
• Pew Research Center: Americans’ Social Media Use 2025 (2025)
• Ericsson: Mobility Report, mobile network traffic update (2026)
• IAB: 2026 Digital Video Ad Spend and Strategy Report, Part One (2026)
• IAB: U.S. Digital Video Ad Spend to Surpass $80B in 2026 (2026)
• Vidyard: 2025 Video in Business Benchmark Report (2025)
• Sprout Social: Social Media Video Statistics To Know in 2026 (2026)
• Atlassian: Atlassian to Acquire Loom, investor release (2023)
• Atlassian: Welcoming Loom to the Atlassian team (2023)
• Loom: Homepage, company count (2026)
• Synthesia: Homepage, customer claim (2026)