Kia No.1 in Latest Ranking of Most-Seen Auto TV Ads

Kia’s commercial for the ’23 Sportage Hybrid ascends from fourth to first place week-over-week with nearly 218 million national TV ad impressions as tabulated by iSpot.tv. 

Sports delivered top impressions counts, led by NFL games (17.3 million impressions), college football (10.5 million) and NBA (8.8 million), while the top networks were CBS (34 million), ABC (27.6 million) and HGTV (15.2 million).  

Second place goes to Hyundai’s Getaway Sales Event promotion, which ran up 187.5 million national TV ad impressions, 75% of which came from primetime ad airings. NBC was a huge driver of impressions, accounting for nearly 60% of the spot’s total, most of which (101 million) were generated by NFL games on the network. 

Honda’s “Keep Dreaming” slips from second to third place week-over-week with 150.4 million national TV ad impressions. A third of those impressions came from CBS (50.3 million), with Fox close behind (46.3 million) and NBC (20.2 million) a distant third. Football continues to be a generator of impressions, with NFL games delivering over 84 million and college football another 31.6 million. 

Football was also the name of the impressions game with GMC’s fourth-place spot declaring that the Sierra is “THE truck.” NFL games racked up 40% of the spot’s 127.6 million national TV ad impressions, while college football accounted for another 30%. Fox (78.8 million impressions) and CBS (28.5 million) blew other networks out of the water. Per iSpot’s Creative Assessment, this ad had an 85% brand match (the percentage of survey respondents who remembered it was a GMC ad after watching it), above the recent automaker industry norm of 78%.

Rounding out the ranking with 101.7 million national TV ad impressions is Subaru’s “Push Your Limits,” which features an intrepid couple enjoying extreme outdoor sports. According to iSpot’s Creative Assessment, 34% of surveyed viewers considered the visual scenes to be the single best thing about the ad. While the other spots on the chart rely heavily on broadcast networks and sports for impressions, this ad takes a different approach: Hallmark was the top impressions-driving network (13.1 million), followed by Animal Planet (8.3 million) and TLC (7.2 million). Top programming by impressions included Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (6.2 million impressions), Yellowstone (3.2 million) and 90 Day: The Last Resort (2.7 million). 

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1. Kia: Bird's Eye View 

Impressions: 217,996,910

Interruption Rate: 2.81%

Attention Index: 114

Est. TV Spend: $2,946,741 

2. Hyundai: Get In and Get Away: Vail 

Impressions: 187,482,046 

Interruption Rate: 2.69%

Attention Index: 101

Est. TV Spend: $5,741,093 

3. Honda: Keep Dreaming 

Impressions: 150,416,024 

Interruption Rate: 2.02%

Attention Index: 128

Est. TV Spend: $5,561,231 

4. GMC: THE Truck 

Impressions: 127,563,125 

Interruption Rate: 2.70%

Attention Index: 107

Est. TV Spend: $4,184,910 

5. Subaru: Push Your Limits 

Impressions: 101,676,587 

Interruption Rate: 2.89%

Attention Index: 104

Est. TV Spend: $904,355 

Data provided by iSpot.tv, The New Standard for TV Ad Measurement

TV Impressions - Total TV ad impressions delivered for the brand or spot.

Interruption Rate - The percentage of devices that were present at the beginning of the ad but did not complete watching the ad. Actions that interrupt ad play include changing the channel, pulling up the guide, fast-forwarding or turning off the TV. The Interruption rate is measured on a scale of 0 to 100%.

Attention Index - A comparison of the ad’s Interruption Rate against its specific media placement. The Attention Index is measured on a scale of 0 to 200, where 100 is the average and means the ad is performing as expected.

Est. National TV Spend - Amount spent on TV airings for the brand’s spots.