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Audiences for Spanish-language television are growing, and advertisers are taking notice.
In recent years, the U.S. Hispanic population has seen significant growth in its TV audience, experts say, becoming one of the most valuable demographic groups for media companies and advertisers. And as these consumers diversify the way they consume shows and other content, there has been an increase in specialty ads targeting them, with major networks like Telemundo and Univision attracting more attention and ad dollars.
Hispanic consumers currently make up about 20% of the U.S. population and hold more than $4.1 trillion in spending power, according to Nielsen. The Hispanic population accounted for about 70% of overall U.S. growth between 2022 and 2023, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.
This growing population “drives and defines” modern media consumption, according to Stacie de Armas, senior vice president of Inclusive Insights at Nielsen.
“Hispanics are an audience that is surpassing or progressing outside of the linear television model,” de Armas told CNBC. “But this migration is not about abandoning television or television content, but rather about where it is distributed and where they consume it.”
The Nielsen report finds that Hispanic consumers lead in streaming consumption, accounting for nearly 56% of their total TV time, compared to just 46% for the rest of the country. Although Nielsen noted an overall decline in traditional linear TV viewership, distribution platforms like streaming far eclipse broadcast and cable — and Hispanic consumers are first in line, de Armas said.
Because the population is younger, she said, Latino audiences often consume content on the go while remaining strongly loyal to the brands and networks that carry their favorite content.
“The Hispanic television audience as a whole, and particularly the majority Spanish-speaking audience, still has a strong connection to television, and yet, at the same time, a very strong connection to streaming content as a whole,” de Armas said.
Report finds Hispanic audiences spend more time with YouTube, Netflix And Disney than the rest of the population.
According to new data from iSpot, the top Spanish-language networks in the third quarter were Univision, which saw a 10.2% year-over-year increase in household ad impressions, and Telemundo, which saw a 7.6% year-over-year increase in impressions.
In a report released Monday by McKinsey & Company, Telemundo reported that Latin American consumer power far exceeds the average and that the population is 14% more engaged with digital media and streaming indices.
And when it comes to sports spending, which remains a major driver for media companies and advertisers, Latino fans spend 50% more than non-Latinos, when adjusted for income.
“Latinos are essential to the future of sports fandom in America – on the field, in the stands and on every screen,” said Mónica Gil, Telemundo’s chief administrative and marketing officer. “As the McKinsey report confirms, Latinos are driving a third of the industry’s growth: they are spending more, broadcasting more, and engaging more deeply than ever before.”
The NFL, the most valuable and profitable sports league in the United States, is also pursuing Spanish-speaking viewers, part of a broader push by streamers toward sports and capitalizing on Hispanic audiences. The league expanded its efforts by announcing late last month that Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny would headline next year’s Super Bowl halftime show.
According to the Latino Donor Collaborative, Bad Bunny has been the most streamed artist in the world for the past three years, with the potential to generate a massive streaming spike for the Super Bowl this year.
Brands are also noticing this growth. On Wednesday, ad-supported streaming platform Fawesome announced that it was expanding its Spanish-language content partnerships to reflect the demand it’s seeing from the population.
“This initiative marks a major step in improving content offerings for one of the fastest-growing streaming demographics we’ve seen on our platforms,” said David Di Lorenzo, senior vice president of content acquisitions and partnerships at Future Today, Fawesome’s parent company.
Expand advertising reach
As the population grows and interacts with various forms of media, advertisers become interested.
According to iSpot, Spanish-language programs now account for 4.7% of TV advertising reach, up from 4.4% in the third quarter of last year, thanks to Univision’s growth. Univision said its streaming platform, ViX, saw double-digit year-over-year growth and surpassed 10 million subscribers worldwide. But the channel is currently in a contractual dispute with YouTube TV, which dropped the Spanish-language channel earlier this month.
A report from advertising data firm EDO found similar growth, noting that Spanish-language television generated 30% higher ad engagement than its English counterpart across more than 1 million ad broadcasts and $2 billion in spend.
This growth encompasses all genres, from entertainment to news to live sports.
“Our data shows how powerful Spanish-language TV is in driving engagement and consideration, helping brands grow with this critical audience,” Kevin Krim, CEO of EDO, said in a statement.
Growing with the audience will prove crucial, experts say. The EDO report highlighted the strength of certain culturally resonant campaigns, such as Walmart‘s back-to-school ads, featuring Stephanie Beatriz, outperformed department store primetime averages by 96%.
Nielsen’s De Armas said Hispanic audiences are also turning to content creation and creating environments in which they don’t see themselves represented.
“Latinos aren’t seeing themselves in all of these spaces, they’re not hearing about the conversations that they want to hear about, and so they’re creating content to reflect a lot of that,” de Armas said. “It’s a bit of a white space, actually, which is a huge opportunity for brands looking to engage with Hispanic consumers around their products or services.”
But the growth in advertising and media consumption for Hispanic consumers is also not new, de Armas said. Although the numbers are recently at record highs, she said people have been at the forefront of transforming the broader environment for much longer.
“We need to look to this audience not only considering that they are pioneers, but also considering that, consistently, this community has been ahead in the adoption of digital and in new ways of consuming content,” de Armas said.
This sentiment was echoed by Christopher Chávez, director of the Center for Latin American and Latino Studies and professor of advertising at the University of Oregon.
Chávez said he feels like this market is “still being discovered” with similar conversations over the past few decades.
“It seems like every time there’s one of these big demographic moments in terms of the census, people start paying attention to the purchasing power aspect,” he said. “But I think a lot of advertisers are interested in this market.”
He nevertheless says he is surprised that the lack of representation of the population in the mainstream media and in politics does not reflect its meteoric growth.
In addition to political uncertainty around President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and recent raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Chávez said the “strong antipathy” toward Latinos in the political environment stands in stark contrast to their economic growth.
“At best, advertising is a distorted picture of reality, but there is a certain congruence in that the world you are looking at in advertising somehow reflects what it looks like on the outside,” Chávez said. “I think we’re getting to that moment, and it’s probably still the case, but particularly with Latinos, where the world of advertising is completely incongruous with the world as it exists — the lived experiences of many Latinos are just not reflected in advertising.”