TV is cool again but not the TV we grew up with

For years marketers treated television as a separate world. Big screens meant long form content, upfronts, 30 second spots and a few huge media owners controlling distribution. Social was where short form lived. Phones were for scrolling. TVs were for shows.

That line is gone.

What we are seeing now is social video moving into the living room and it is happening faster than most marketers realize.

YouTube is already there. According to data cited by Nielsen, more than 1B hours of YouTube are watched on TV screens every day. Shorts viewing on TV has doubled YoY. YouTube is now the #1 streaming platform in the US by total watch time, ahead of Netflix and Disney+.

That single statistic changes everything. YouTube is no longer just a digital video platform. It is a television network that happens to be programmable and creator driven.

YouTube is selling TV again but smarter

Because of that shift YouTube has quietly stopped selling itself like a digital video site. It is now selling like TV.

According to Digiday, YouTube is packaging inventory into upfront style deals that look a lot like how NBC or Fox sells media. Brands can buy bundles that include premium creator inventory, Shorts, long form and connected TV placements. YouTube is positioning this as a single TV buy that spans screens.

The important part is not just the format. It is the signal. YouTube knows advertisers want TV scale with digital targeting and creator credibility. So instead of forcing brands to think in terms of pre rolls and skippable ads, they are offering reach, frequency and premium programming the same way traditional TV does.

Only now it comes with data, targeting and creators built in.

Instagram is moving in the same direction

Meta saw what YouTube built and is following it into the living room.

Instagram is launching a Reels based TV app for Amazon Fire TV. It is technically called an IGTV comeback but what it really is is Reels on TV. Instead of scrolling a feed you get lean back channels for things like sports, fashion, travel and trends.

This is not about nostalgia for IGTV. It is about opening a new surface for attention.

Reels already make up ~21% of Instagram ad impressions in the US according to Meta. That is a huge share of their monetization engine. But mobile feeds are crowded and user tolerance for more ads is limited. A TV app gives Meta a new place to scale Reels without crushing the core experience.

More importantly it changes how people watch short form. Reels are no longer just something you sneak in line at Starbucks. They become something you put on while sitting on the couch.

That is a totally different kind of attention.

What this means for advertising in 2026

This is where things get interesting for brands.

TV will not be long form only anymore. Short clips, creator content and social video will live right next to traditional shows on the same screens.

Short form will not be mobile only anymore. The same Reels and Shorts built for phones will now be watched on 55 inch TVs, often with other people in the room.

And the best campaigns will not be built for one screen. They will be built for how people move between screens.

A user might see a creator on YouTube Shorts on their phone, watch that same creator on YouTube TV at night and then see a retargeted ad in Instagram the next morning. From the platform side that is already happening. Most brands just are not planning for it yet.

This is why YouTube is pushing upfronts and why Instagram is pushing TV apps. They want to own the full day of attention, not just the feed.

This is not old TV coming back

What is happening is bigger than a format shift.

Old TV was about programming schedules and ad breaks. New TV is about algorithms, creators and social discovery but delivered on the biggest screen in the house.

Social did not kill television. It became television.

And for advertisers in 2026 that means the living room is no longer owned by a few networks. It is owned by platforms that already control how people discover culture.

That is the real shift.