Pixalate Releases September 2026 Streaming TV Rankings: Scripted Crime Drives CTV Programmatic Ad Spend While National News Dominates Mobile

(MENAFN- GlobeNewsWire - Nasdaq) Lifetime captures 16% of CTV ad spend with four series in the top 10, while News takes 45% of mobile programmatic spend across 620,000+ mapped shows on Pixalate's OpenEPGTM Index.

LONDON, Oct. 23, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pixalate, a global ad fraud and privacy compliance platform, today published the September 2026 update to its free monthly OpenEPGTM Index, the programmatic advertising industry's first public benchmark of streaming TV content built on real-world U.S. open programmatic ad spend and U.S. consumer reach - across both small screens (mobile) and large screens (CTV).

The September Index ranks 620,000+ shows mapped in OpenEPG DBTM 1.0 - with the top 100 by measured U.S. consumer reach published free each month.

Key observations:

• Lifetime's NCIS ranked No. 1 on large-screen (CTV) for the second consecutive month, with Lifetime placing four series in the CTV top 10 (NCIS, Castle, The Rookie, Rizzoli & Isles) and capturing 16% of CTV ad spend, the most of any channel
• The Weather Channel's America's Morning Headquarters led the small-screen (mobile) rankings for the third consecutive month, with The Weather Channel sweeping the top three mobile slots and capturing 25% of mobile streaming TV ad spend
• Weather and seasonal programming climbed on CTV: Weathernation's live weather coverage rose from No. 33 to No. 2, and Travel Channel's Paranormal Caught On Camera jumped from outside the top 1,000 to No. 7 ahead of Halloween
• Large screens captured 76% of all streaming TV ad spend in September 2026, up from 64% in August; News led CTV with 24% of ad spend, ahead of Reality (21%)
• News accounted for 45% of U.S. mobile streaming TV open programmatic ad spend, up from 35% in August; live sports reached the mobile top 10, led by Stadium's Bare Knuckle Boxing
  

News Leads Streaming TV Ad Spend in September 2026

Genre	Mobile (Ad Spend SOV)	CTV (Ad Spend SOV)
News	45%		24%
Reality	9%		21%
Documentary	13%		14%
Crime	8%		13%
Sport	7%		5%
Comedy	8%		4%

The Index ranks shows by estimated U.S. consumer reach and measures each show's share of open programmatic ad spend - by screen, genre, market, and daypart. September's patterns:

• CTV ad spend shifted toward scripted crime drama: Lifetime (NCIS, Castle, The Rookie, Rizzoli & Isles) became the top CTV channel by ad spend (16%), ahead of HGTV (9%), while Food Network fell to 3%
• Mobile split between weather news and A&E: The Weather Channel took the top three shows by reach (America's Morning Headquarters, The Weather Channel LIVE, Weather Unfiltered) and 25% of mobile ad spend; A&E slipped to No. 2 on mobile (18%, down from 27% in August) even as its CTV share tripled to 6%, led by Storage Wars and Live PD: Greatest Shifts
• National news out-earned local news: about five of every six dollars of streaming TV ad spend on news shows went to national outlets rather than local stations
• Live sports skewed to the big screen: large screens captured 70% of live-sports ad spend, with Soccer (43%) No. 1 ahead of Boxing/MMA (24%) and Basketball (5%)

OpenEPGTM Index September 2026 Rankings

Large Screen - Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung & Apple TV (Combined)

Ranked by consumer reach; ad-spend and reach figures are share of voice.

#	Show	Channel	Genre	Top U.S. Market	Ad Spend SOV	Reach SOV	Top Daypart
1	NCIS	Lifetime	Crime	New York	5.0%		5.5%		Prime Time
2	Top Weather News, Regional Forecasts, Live Severe Coverage, and Local Weather	Weathernation	News	New York	2.7%		3.0%		Prime Time
3	Castle	Lifetime	Drama	New York	2.1%		2.3%		Afternoon
4	Shark Tank	CNBC	Reality	New York	1.6%		1.8%		Prime Time
5	Storage Wars	A&E	Reality	New York	1.2%		1.3%		Morning
6	The Rookie	Lifetime	Crime	New York	1.2%		1.3%		Afternoon
7	Paranormal Caught On Camera	Travel Channel	Documentary	New York	1.0%		1.2%		Morning
8	Rizzoli & Isles	Lifetime	Crime	New York	0.9%		1.0%		Prime Time
9	My Lottery Dream Home	HGTV	Reality	New York	0.9%		0.9%		Prime Time
10	Live PD: Greatest Shifts	A&E	Crime	Los Angeles	0.7%		0.8%		Prime Time

Small Screen - Android & iOS (Combined)

Ranked by estimated consumer reach

#	Show	Channel	Genre	Top U.S. Market	Ad Spend SOV	Reach SOV	Top Daypart
1	America's Morning Headquarters	The Weather Channel	News	New York	8.8%		8.3%		Morning
2	The Weather Channel LIVE	The Weather Channel	News	New York	3.5%		2.9%		Afternoon
3	Weather Unfiltered	The Weather Channel	News	New York	2.6%		2.6%		Prime Time
4	Boys Over Flowers	AsianCrush	Comedy	Los Angeles	1.6%		2.4%		Overnight
5	On The Scene	Scripps News	News	New York	1.9%		2.2%		Afternoon
6	Bare Knuckle Boxing	Stadium	Sport	Cleveland-Akron (Canton)	1.5%		2.0%		Afternoon
7	Morning Rush	Scripps News	News	New York	1.6%		1.9%		Morning
8	Today as It Happened	Scripps News	News	New York	1.3%		1.4%		Prime Time
9	The National Report	Scripps News	News	New York	1.3%		1.3%		Overnight
10	America's Weekend Headquarters	The Weather Channel	News	New York	1.1%		1.3%		Morning

All trademarks, service marks, and trade names referenced herein (including but not limited to Lifetime, Weathernation, CNBC, A&E, Travel Channel, HGTV, The Weather Channel, AsianCrush, Scripps News, Stadium, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung, and Apple TV) are the property of their respective owners and are used for identification purposes only. No endorsement, affiliation, or sponsorship is implied.

Availability

The top 100 OpenEPGTM Index public rankings are updated monthly and available at pixalate.com.

The OpenEPGTM Index is powered by OpenEPG DBTM 1.0 - Pixalate's database mapping 620,000+ streaming TV shows across 14,100+ channels and 7,300+ apps - and Pixalate OpenEPGTM Analytics, which resolves TV shows using only standard bidstream Bundle IDs, with no publisher opt-in required.

About Pixalate

Pixalate is a global platform specializing in privacy compliance, ad fraud prevention, and digital ad supply chain data intelligence. Founded in 2012 and recognized by UNICEF as a "key innovator" for children's online privacy, Pixalate is trusted by regulators, data researchers, advertisers, publishers, ad tech platforms, and financial analysts across the Connected TV (CTV), mobile app, and website ecosystems. Pixalate is accredited by the MRC for the detection and filtration of Sophisticated Invalid Traffic (SIVT). pixalate.com

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Disclaimer

OpenEPGTM data reflects Pixalate's opinions based on open-exchange signals and public EPG data; no assurances or guarantees are made as to the accuracy or completeness of any classification, resolution, or rating. Attributions are for identification and measurement purposes only and imply no affiliation, partnership, or endorsement. IVT metrics follow Pixalate's MRC-accredited methodology and do not constitute a finding of fraud or any violation of law or platform policy. Pixalate's full disclaimer can be found here.

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