Results from AOP and Deloitte’s Q4 2024 Digital Publishers Revenue Index (DPRI) are in, and our top-line finding is, unfortunately, that overall revenues were flat at -0.02% year on year (YoY).
Given the array of challenges digital publishers are facing, the news could certainly be worse. But this story has become all too familiar, with the revenue needle barely moving throughout the post-pandemic period.
However, there are tentative signs that publishers may soon be free from these revenue doldrums. In recent years, plummeting display advertising revenues have cancelled out growth achieved across other revenue streams but, in Q4 2024 — for the first time since Q1 2023 — they didn’t budge. Fingers crossed that this continues.
Before we dive further into the results, a quick reminder: the DPRI Report represents the UK’s major publishing groups, thus its findings shouldn’t be seen as a barometer of the digital publishing sector at large.
[Q3 2024: Audio rising, video stalls, data is golden]
Display and subscription revenues level out, from opposite directions
As everyone in the digital publishing world knows, display advertising revenues have been in a long-term tailspin, with double-digit YoY declines a regular feature of DPRI reports.
However, Q4 2024’s results indicate the slump may be slowing, with display revenues declining by less than a percent. This may end up being a statistical blip, but any indication that digital publishers’ largest revenue driver is stabilising is a welcome one.
Subscriptions have also levelled, though in the opposite direction. Growth in subscription revenues has been gradually declining since Q3 2023, when it peaked at 11.7% YoY. In Q4 2024, growth sat at just 3.26%, its lowest point since we began reporting subscription revenues more than ten years ago.
After a decade of double-digit growth, it seems the subscription star is finally fading, but only after turning the distribution of publisher revenues on its head.
Subscriptions now make up 28% of the revenue share for premium publishers versus 36.5% for display advertising. It seems that subscriptions may not overtake display advertising as their prior growth trajectory had indicated (and a milestone I was personally rooting for, given what it would mean for publisher independence) but having more than a quarter of revenues coming directly from readers offers a welcome buffer against the tumult of the advertising market.
Massive upswing in share of publishers seeing revenue growth
One of the most encouraging findings from Q4 2024’s DPRI report is that, for the first time since Q3 2023, the majority (60%) of respondents reported revenue growth. This is a dramatic recovery from 30% the prior quarter, the lowest percentage we had ever seen, which followed a year of declines in the proportion of publishers seeing positive results.
There is, however, a wrinkle. If total revenues are flat, but the proportion of publishers seeing growth has increased, this means some of our respondents that were enjoying growth the prior quarter must have experienced downturns.
Regardless, a narrowing gap between haves and have-nots is far healthier for the industry than growth being isolated to a fortunate few. All we need now is for the total revenue pie to expand.
Multimedia revenues are fertile ground for green shoots of growth
If subscriptions have reached their zenith, where can publishers look to next for growth opportunities? Audio revenues have continued their rapid ascent, growing 43% YoY, though this becomes less impressive when you zoom out to see they make up just 3% of total revenues.
Still, every little helps, and the category’s rocketing growth — a twentyfold increase in revenues since we started tracking in 2020 — means we may be looking at the seeds of a future bumper crop.
Video also had a strong showing, with 16% YoY growth, though its journey has been more tumultuous than audio’s, with ups and downs equalling out to somewhat flat long-term growth.
However, video can’t be judged on revenue alone, as it’s also a tool to increase dwell times and engagement, both of which bolster wider advertising efforts; not to mention the fierce competition for online video that pits publishers against some of the world’s largest companies.
Overall, the Q4 2024 DPRI results are refreshingly stable. We’re not seeing wild swings in any direction, with display advertising, subscriptions, and the share of publishers enjoying revenue growth all settling into what may become a happy medium.
Hopefully we are seeing the first stones laid in reliable revenue foundations upon which emerging growth plans can be built.
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