Start with the headline. UK marketers who already buy programmatic DOOH expect it to feature in 47% of their campaigns over the next 18 months, up from 34% over the last 18 — and just behind the global figure of 48%. That growth is expected to be paid for, not just planned: 99% of recent pDOOH buyers say they will increase or maintain their investment in the channel, with an average anticipated uplift of 44% across the six markets surveyed. Beyond that headline, there are some key observations in the report.
Brand safety is now a top-three attribute for pDOOH
66% of UK marketers link programmatic DOOH to brand-safe delivery, including protection against bot and click fraud — one of the three attributes most closely associated with the channel in the UK, and ten percentage points ahead of DOOH generally. At Abode Media, our resident-approved, no-cameras, premium-building environment exceeds these standards — while providing a close-proximity environment to in-home decision-making and planning.
VIOOH State of the Nation 2026, UK edition, question B1 (respondents choose which media they feel deliver against each attribute; base: 200 UK marketers). The UK’s three most-associated attributes are increasing sales and performance (68%), delivering brand objectives (66%) and brand-safe delivery (66%).
A move toward curated, premium inventory
Amid the pDOOH growth reported, there is an active move toward curated, premium inventory. VIOOH’s global report puts it plainly: as more inventory has become available programmatically, buyers have been able to unlock a wider range of contextual placements, supported by richer data and greater flexibility than DOOH typically allows.
Agencies say the same about indoor environments specifically:
“In 2025, we significantly increased our use of indoor screens, moving beyond a solely outdoor focus. This shift has been particularly valuable, as access to first-party data enables more precise and effective targeting.” Susana Garcia-Calderon, Senior Performance Planning & Optimisation Director, Kinesso UK&I — quoted in VIOOH State of the Nation 2026, Global edition
Read together, those two findings describe a market moving toward indoor, data-rich, contextually selected inventory — and residential is the clearest example of it. A resident lobby is indoor, it is addressable at building level, and it is a known audience rather than an estimated passing one.
As buyers move toward curated, premium inventory, residential is exactly where that demand is heading.
Built for the moment
Abode’s build and growth have accelerated through 2026 as we expand our unique media proposition as the UK’s leading premium and upscale residential DOOH network. Our screens connect brands with affluent, hard-to-reach audiences in their most trusted spaces — a community environment embedded in vertical living, with retail proximity, green spaces and urban living for a key demographic.
Abode is live and buyable across VIOOH, Place Exchange and Vistar. If the next 18 months look the way this report expects, the inventory question for programmatic buyers stops being “can we buy it” and becomes “is it worth buying” — which is a question premium residential is well placed to answer. Good times ahead.
Source: VIOOH State of the Nation 2026, Global and UK editions. Figures quoted here are taken from those reports; the UK and Global editions differ on several measures, and each figure above is labelled with the edition it comes from.