Programmatic advertising is witnessing an impressive growth rate in recent times with global ad spending approaching 557.56 billion U.S. dollars.
If you're looking to invest in programmatic advertising or optimize your efforts, the first thing on your mind would be to determine the best platform to partner with.
This guide explores 12 of the best programmatic advertising platforms that can help your business achieve marketing success in 2024 and beyond. We'll compare platforms based on several criteria, including pricing, ad inventory quality, audience targeting, and anti-fraud/safety measures.
Top Programmatic Platforms by Category
Programmatic advertising relies on four categories of platforms to function: Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs), Supply-Side Platforms (SSPs), Ad Exchanges, and Data Management Platforms (DMPs).
Advertisers make use of DSPs to bid for digital ad space, while publishers make use of SSPs for selling their ad spaces.
An ad exchange serves as a marketplace for connecting advertisers and publishers through their respective platforms. A DMP collects all kinds of data related to an advertiser's ideal customer.
Now, let’s explore some of the best programmatic ad platforms in each category.
1. Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs)
A demand-side platform (DSP) allows advertisers to bid for ad impressions on publisher websites. It also enables advertisers to filter their target audience based on specific criteria like location, age, past online behavior, gender, and more.
Here are some of the most popular programmatic DSPs:
Adobe Advertising Cloud DSP
Adobe Advertising Cloud DSP prides itself as “the only omnichannel programmatic DSP that supports connected TV, video, display, native, audio, and search campaigns.”
Mentioned as a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Ad Tech, Adobe provides features that help advertisers launch, manage, and optimize campaigns. This includes inventory management, personalized marketing, search management, and more.
- Pricing: Custom. Pricing depends on different factors like company size, requirements, and the number of tools purchased
- Supported Ad Inventory: Display, video, audio, mobile apps, Digital out of Home (DOOH), TV, native, and social
- Audience Targeting: Audience segment, device type, location, browser, and more
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Offers page screening for detecting faulty inventory and pre-bid filtering for detecting fraud, suboptimal viewability, and brand violation.
MediaMath
Launched in 2007, MediaMath is one of the best programmatic advertising platforms (DSPs) in the industry. Today, it partners with over 3,500 advertisers to help them run omnichannel campaigns across mobile, display, OTT, native, video, audio, and more.
Its SOURCE ecosystem is designed to help advertisers achieve better supply-path optimization and algorithm decision. MediaMath is also recognized as a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Ad Tech.
- Price: Custom
- Supported Ad Inventory: Connected TV, display, mobile, video, audio, native, and DOOH
- Audience Targeting: Audience segment, contextual, first-party data, site list, location, daypart, technology, video, and audio.
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Uses its SOURCE ecosystem to ensure supply-chain trust through pre-bid IVT protection and onboarding tools.
AdRoll
AdRoll is known for its simplicity and the quality of its ad templates. The platform focuses on helping brands expand their reach through video, social ads, display, native, email, and more.
Recognized as a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Ad Tech, AdRoll uses a broad spectrum of data to determine where and when to deliver ads to prospects.
- Price: Offers a free package for starters as well as a custom pricing package for enterprises
- Supported Ad Inventory: Video, social ads, display, native, and email
- Audience Targeting: Contextual, lookalike, demographic, interest, lookalike, and CRM targeting
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Has a Trust and Safety Team for automatically and manually filtering invalid traffic
Google Display & Video 360 (DV360)

Google Display & Video 360 (DV360) is an enterprise-grade demand-side platform that allows marketers to plan, buy, and optimize media across display, video, YouTube, native, audio, and connected TV.
What sets DV360 apart is its deep integration with the broader Google Marketing Platform, including GA4, Campaign Manager 360, and Search Ads 360. This enables unified audience targeting, cross-channel frequency management, and more accurate attribution.
DV360 offers access to premium inventory through both open exchanges and programmatic guaranteed deals. Its advanced tools allow for precise audience segmentation using first-party data, Google audiences, or custom intent signals, making it suitable for both brand and performance goals.
For organizations managing multi-channel media at scale, DV360 provides strong governance, collaborative workflows, and granular control over campaign performance.
- Pricing: Percentage of media spend (typically 7–15%), plus potential data and tech fees
- Supported Ad Inventory: Broad access to open exchanges, private marketplaces, YouTube, CTV, audio, native, display, mobile
- Audience Targeting: 1st-party, 3rd-party, Google audiences, custom affinity, in-market, lookalike, and intent-based; supports GA4 and CDP integrations.
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Built-in protections via Google’s proprietary systems; integrates with third-party tools (e.g., IAS, DV, MOAT); supports brand safety, viewability, and fraud prevention standards
Simpli.fi
Simpli.fi is another popular programmatic ad platform. It’s designed to deliver localized, data-driven advertising across channels like CTV, display, mobile, video, native, and audio.
It stands out for its ability to ingest and act on unstructured, real-time data such as GPS signals, browsing behavior, and keyword-level intent, enabling highly granular audience targeting.
Unlike traditional DSPs that rely on pre-packaged audience segments, Simpli.fi allows advertisers to build custom audiences using individual data elements. This approach enhances precision and reduces overlap, making it particularly effective for location-based campaigns, addressable targeting, and performance-driven initiatives.
Simpli.fi is most suited for organizations seeking to execute hyper-targeted, omnichannel campaigns.
- Pricing: Transparent CPM-based pricing; no minimum spend; flexible self-serve or managed service options
- Supported Ad Inventory: Display, mobile, video, native, audio, CTV, addressable geofencing, and DOOH
- Audience Targeting: Granular targeting using unstructured data (e.g., location, search keywords, CRM lists); strong local and address-level precision
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Uses pre-bid fraud filters and third-party verification
StackAdapt
StackAdapt is a self-serve, AI-powered DSP.
A key differentiator of StackAdapt is its integration of advertising technology (adtech) and martech functionalities. The platform's Data Hub enables seamless activation of first-party data, facilitating personalized and privacy-compliant campaigns. Additionally, the inclusion of native email marketing tools allows for coordinated messaging strategies within a single platform.
StackAdapt offers advanced targeting options, such as contextual targeting powered by proprietary AI, account-based marketing (ABM), and precise geolocation targeting.
- Pricing: CPM-based; no minimum spend for self-serve; managed service available with variable thresholds
- Supported Ad Inventory: Native, display, video, audio, CTV, in-game, DOOH, and email
- Audience Targeting: 1st-party data, contextual AI, lookalike, ABM, geolocation, keyword, site lists, and retargeting
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Integrates with third-party verification (IAS, HUMAN, etc.); pre-bid filters, domain blocklists
Amazon DSP
Amazon DSP is a demand-side platform that enables advertisers to programmatically buy display, video, and audio ads both on and off Amazon’s owned properties. It offers access to Amazon’s unique, high-intent audience segments derived from real-time shopping and browsing behavior.
Advertisers can target audiences based on purchase history, product views, or shopping patterns. With built-in measurement tools, advertisers can track conversions, brand lift, and retail outcomes like sales and detail page views.
Amazon DSP is especially valuable for brands selling on Amazon, but it also serves non-endemic advertisers seeking access to high-quality inventory, advanced targeting, and retail-linked attribution.
- Pricing: CPM-based; typically requires a $35K–50K/month minimum for managed service
- Supported Ad Inventory: Display, video (including Fire TV, Twitch, IMDb), audio, mobile, and third-party web/app inventory
- Audience Targeting: Amazon 1st-party behavioral, in-market, lifestyle, purchase data; CRM/retargeting; lookalike modeling
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures: Proprietary fraud detection backed by Amazon data; verified inventory; integrates with third-party tools
2. Supply Side Platform (SSP)
A supply-side platform (SSP) focuses on helping publishers (website owners) sell ad space on their apps, websites, and other digital properties.
These platforms use automation to determine the optimal price for each ad space and sell to the best bidder. SSPs work with ad networks to connect publishers to a broader pool of advertisers.
Let’s take a look at a few of the leading SSPs in the industry.
PubMatic
PubMatic offers services for both media buyers and publishers. As an SSP, it provides an impressive collection of tools to help publishers optimize the monetization potential of all their digital assets.
This includes tools for header bidding, RTB advertising, Private Marketplaces (PMP), and ad quality.
- Supported Ad Inventory: CTV, OTT, display, video, addressable, mobile, native, and more
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures for Publishers: Uses real-time scanning and strategic partnerships to safeguard publisher’s audiences across ad formats, channels, and screens
Google Ad Manager
Programmatic publishers utilize an average of 6 SSPs to sell ad space to advertisers. Despite this, Google remains the most popular SSP among publishers, claiming 51% of the industry’s market share.
In fact, 75% of ad impressions in the US come from Google Ad Manager. More insights in the Twitter thread below.
Google Ad Manager exists for large publishers with significant direct sales. Some of the tools it offers include server-side header bidding, managed PMPs, advanced dashboard and reporting system, and more.
- Supported Ad Inventory: Video, mobile, display, and native.
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures for Publishers: Google supports popular safety standards, initiatives, and protocols such as the IAB ads.txt standard, SafeFrame, and HTTPS to protect against unsuitable ads and invalid activity
Criteo
Criteo is a programmatic advertising solution with a commerce-first approach—tailored more for retail, ecommerce, and performance marketing than broad awareness campaigns.
It uses its proprietary commerce media network to deliver personalized ads based on real-time shopper behavior across thousands of publishers and retailers.
Unlike traditional DSPs that rely heavily on third-party data and open exchange inventory, Criteo leverages its direct integrations with retailers and first-party commerce data. This gives advertisers access to high-intent audiences and product-level targeting that aligns with shopping behavior, not just general demographics.
Criteo’s closed-loop measurement allows marketers to track the full path to purchase, connecting ad exposure to actual sales outcomes. This makes it especially valuable for brands focused on lower-funnel performance and measurable ROI.
Read the thread for more details on how Criteo monitors users and matches data on user behaviors.
- Supported Ad Inventory: Display, native, video (desktop and mobile), and in-app; primarily focused on commerce media inventory across Criteo’s network of retailers and publishers
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures for Publishers: Proprietary fraud prevention system focused on commerce intent signals; strict supply-side controls via its closed network; brand safety enforced through curated publisher partnerships and internal review processes
Magnite (ex Rubicon Project)
Magnite, formerly known as Rubicon Project, is one of the leading SSP for inventory monetization across CTV, video, display, and mobile environments. It connects premium media owners with top-tier demand sources through real-time auctions and programmatic deals.
Magnite is strongly focused on connected TV and video monetization. The platform is purpose-built to handle the complex needs of CTV publishers, offering advanced tools for ad podding, ad frequency capping, and audience segmentation.
For advertisers looking to scale high-quality video and CTV campaigns while maintaining control and transparency, Magnite serves as a critical part of the programmatic supply chain.
- Supported Ad Inventory: CTV, OTT, desktop and mobile display, mobile in-app, video, native; strong in premium video and publisher-direct inventory
- Anti-fraud/Safety Measures for Publishers: Offers pre-bid and post-bid protections, ads.txt and sellers.json compliance, integration with third-party verification; also supports traffic filtering and auction-level transparency
3. Ad Exchanges
Ad Exchanges position themselves as the intermediary between advertisers and publishers.
Publishers come to ad exchanges to submit ad impressions which are then presented to advertisers for bidding in real-time.
Here are some of the best ad exchanges in the industry.
Xandr
Originally called AppNexus, Xandr is a leading programmatic advertising company offering a full stack of programmatic advertising services. This means it provides services, such as a DSP, SSP, and an Ad Exchange.
As an Ad Exchange, Xandr serves over 11.4 billion ad impressions daily.
One of its most notable features is its header bidding wrapper, which makes header bidding more convenient and efficient for publishers. The platform supports different ad inventory, including video, banner, audio, native, and more.
Xander partners with White Ops, an MRC-accredited company, for ensuring brand safety across its marketplace.
SmartyAds
SmartyAds provides a white-label ad exchange platform, Smart Hub, which has recorded over 25,000 publishers and 2 billion impressions daily.
It also serves as a full-stack programmatic ad tech platform, offering services as a DSP and SSP to both advertisers and publishers. The platform is compatible with a wide range of traffic types and ad formats, including video, banner, audio, native, push, pop, and more.
Compared to Xandr, SmartyAds offers a more comprehensive collection of security and anti-fraud features and partnerships to make the marketplace safer for publishers and advertisers.
PubMatic
PubMatic makes a second appearance in this guide, thanks to its incredible capabilities as a full-stack ad tech platform.
As an ad exchange, PubMatic has established itself as an industry leader with over 171 billion ad impressions per day. Publishers benefit from its ease-of-use, DMP integrations, and open-source header bidding.
On the advertisers' side, PubMatic offers integration with various security tools to prevent fraudulent practices and ensure brand safety.
4. Data Management Platforms (DMPs)
DMPs are less talked about in programmatic advertising platforms realm. But they're equally as important. Advertisers use all kinds of data when developing a campaign strategy to ensure their ads are relevant to their prospects.
DSPs automatically place bids for ad spaces in the marketplace, but to ensure that the purchased ads are aimed at the right demographic, these platforms take advantage of data supplied by DMPs. Publishers, on the other hand, use DMPs to store and analyze user data to get a better understanding of their website visitors.
Here are some of the most popular DMPs in the industry.
The Trade Desk
Alongside a DSP, The Trade Desk offers a DMP to help advertisers and publishers collect, manage, and activate their data in one place.
One of its most popular features is its lookalike modeling which allows you to discover new audiences based on insights from your existing audiences. It also offers a data marketplace where users can access high-quality audiences from data providers.
TheTradeDesk is actively expanding in the DMP sector. For example, TikTok and theTradeDesk launched a partnership not long ago. This collaboration will drive more brands to the platform and stimulate the growth of advertising on TikTok.

Audience Studio by Salesforce
Salesforce is widely known for its CRM system. However, the company also offers a Data Management Platform for advertisers.
Formerly known as Salesforce DMP, Audience Studio allows advertisers to capture data from any source and segment this data using machine learning algorithms. It also offers a native consent management framework to help advertisers maintain transparency and trust with their customers.
Lotame
Lotame is an industry-leading DMP that offers a wide range of services, including audience management, data marketplace, and identity resolution.
It allows its users to access first-party data from sources like emails, CRMs, social media, apps, and more. It also provides the opportunity to expand on available data through its data marketplace.
Lotame’s DMP, however, lacks live reporting features and loads relatively slowly.
Protect Ad Revenue with Smarter Marketing Data Governance
Programmatic advertising involves managing countless moving parts—targeting parameters, budget allocations, creative variations, and platform-specific nuances.
Even small inconsistencies can lead to wasted spend or missed opportunities.

Improvado’s Marketing Data Governance tackles these challenges by automating the monitoring and validation of campaign guidelines in real time. It identifies and flags misaligned targeting, incorrect budget allocations, and underperforming segments before they escalate into bigger problems.
By ensuring campaigns stay aligned with goals and benchmarks throughout their lifecycle, it empowers advertisers to adjust and optimize campaigns on the go, not after execution. This proactive approach reduces inefficiencies and maximizes both ROAS and ad spend efficiency.
Here’s an example of DV360 parameters Marketing Data Governance monitors:
- Keywords added for the insertion order,
- Geographical targets set for the insertion order,
- Keyword exclusions are used (Display & Video),
- Third-party brand safety partner solution is integrated,
- Sensitive content placements were removed,
- Advertiser Account is at or less $X Avg. CPC,
- Advertiser Account is at or above X% Clicks,
- Insertion Order is at or above X% Interaction Rate,
- Line Item is at or less $X CPM,
- Line Item Target CPA is at or below $X.
FAQs
General questions
What is an ad exchange?
An ad exchange is a digital marketplace where advertisers and publishers buy and sell advertising inventory in real-time auctions. It enables automated ad buying by connecting supply-side platforms (SSPs), which represent publishers, with demand-side platforms (DSPs), used by advertisers.
Ad exchanges allow for efficient, data-driven transactions based on criteria such as audience segmentation, bid price, and ad format, supporting display, video, mobile, and other types of inventory across the open web.
What are the benefits and drawbacks of using programmatic ad platforms?
Benefits of using programmatic ad platforms:
- Automates ad buying across thousands of publishers, enabling efficient campaign management at scale.
- Supports audience segmentation by demographics, behavior, location, and intent using real-time data.
- Adjusts bids and creative dynamically based on performance metrics and market signals.
- Unifies ad delivery across multiple channels and formats, including display, video, mobile, audio, and connected TV.
- Reduces waste through real-time bidding and better control of ad frequency capping, pacing, and audience overlap.
Drawbacks of using programmatic platforms:
- Limited visibility into media placements, intermediaries, and actual costs within the supply chain.
- Requires expertise in data integration, bid strategies, and platform configurations to avoid inefficiencies.
- Fragmented platforms and disconnected data sources can limit visibility across the full marketing funnel.
- Heavy reliance on a single DSP or ecosystem may reduce flexibility and cross-platform insights.
Technical questions
What is the difference between DSPs, SSPs, and DMPs?
DSPs, SSPs, and DMPs each serve different roles in how ads are bought, sold, and targeted. Here's a side-by-side comparison to clarify their functions.
What role does artificial intelligence play in programmatic advertising?
Artificial intelligence enables real-time optimization at scale by analyzing large volumes of signals, such as user behavior, contextual relevance, device type, and historical performance, to dynamically adjust bids, targeting parameters, and creative delivery.
It powers lookalike modeling, probabilistic attribution, and frequency capping decisions based on predicted conversion likelihood rather than static rules. AI also supports anomaly detection in campaign performance, pacing control, and ad fraud prevention.
What are the best practices for ensuring brand safety in programmatic campaigns?
Here are top 3 best practices for ensuring brand safety in programmatic campaigns:
- Implement pre-bid brand safety filters and verification tools like DoubleVerify, IAS, or MOAT to block unsafe content categories (e.g., adult, violence, misinformation) before bidding occurs. It reduces exposure to high-risk inventory without relying solely on post-campaign cleanup.
- Leverage private marketplaces (PMPs) and prioritize curated marketplace segments to control media quality and context. PMPs offer more transparency and reduce the chance of appearing next to objectionable or low-quality content.
- Maintain dynamic blocklists of domains and apps flagged for inappropriate or fraudulent content, and use allowlists for verified partners. Complement this with contextual advertising (rather than behavioral targeting only) to ensure ads appear in relevant, brand-aligned environments.
How do I measure the success and ROI of my programmatic advertising?
To accurately measure ROI of programmatic advertising, apply a multi-layered framework:
- Cost-efficiency metrics: Go beyond CPM and CPC by tracking eCPM (effective cost per 1000 impressions) and eCPA (effective cost per acquisition) across audience segments and channels. Break down these metrics by inventory type, exchange, and device to identify inefficiencies or wasted spend.
- Revenue attribution: Use incrementality testing to measure true lift in conversions or revenue driven by digital ad campaigns. Complement this with multi-touch attribution or data-driven models to assign weighted credit across the buyer journey rather than relying on last-click logic.
- Quality and engagement signals: Track viewability metrics, attention metrics, brand safety violations, and IVT (invalid traffic) levels using third-party verification. High-quality media environments correlate strongly with downstream ROI and brand lift.
Finally, unify programmatic platform data with first-party business data (CRM, LTV, offline conversions) inside a centralized analytics platform or BI layer to produce holistic ROI insights that map media efficiency to actual business outcomes.
Platform-specific questions
Is Criteo a DSP or SSP?
Criteo primarily operates as a demand-side platform, though it also has supply-side capabilities through its direct publisher integrations, making it more of a hybrid but its core function is demand-side, focused on ad buying and retargeting.
Is Google Ads considered a programmatic advertising platform?
Yes, Google Ads is considered a programmatic advertising platform, but with limitations. It automates ad buying using real-time bidding for placements across Google’s inventory (Search, Display Network, YouTube), yet lacks the openness and scale of enterprise DSPs like DV360 that access broader third-party exchanges and inventory.
Does Facebook offer programmatic ad buying?
Yes, Facebook (Meta) offers programmatic ad buying, but it operates within a closed ecosystem. Ads are bought programmatically through Meta Ads Manager using automated bidding and audience targeting, but unlike open DSPs, it doesn't allow access to third-party inventory or external exchanges.
Is Spotify’s advertising solution programmatic?
Yes, Spotify now offers programmatic ad buying through its Spotify Ad Exchange (SAX), launched in early 2025. This platform enables advertisers to purchase Spotify's audio, video, and display inventory in real time via major demand-side platforms (DSPs) such as The Trade Desk, Google Display & Video 360 (DV360), and Magnite.
SAX supports various buying methods, including open auction, private marketplaces, and programmatic guaranteed deals.
How does header bidding improve ad inventory performance?
Header bidding improves ad inventory performance by allowing publishers to offer impressions to multiple demand sources simultaneously before calling their ad server. This increases competition, drives up CPMs, and improves yield by enabling real-time price comparison across DSPs. It also reduces reliance on a single demand partner, giving publishers more control and transparency over who wins the auction and at what price.
Comparative questions
What is the difference between PPC advertising and programmatic advertising?
PPC advertising and programmatic advertising are both digital media buying models, but they differ in scope, automation, and media inventory management.
Should I choose programmatic guaranteed deals or open RTB?
The choice depends on your campaign objectives, budget control needs, and brand safety requirements.
When to choose programmatic guaranteed deals:
- You need fixed pricing and guaranteed inventory on high-quality or premium placements.
- You want brand-safe environments and full transparency into publisher context.
- You’re running awareness-driven campaigns that demand scale and predictable delivery.
- You have negotiated deals with specific publishers or prefer direct relationships.
When to choose open RTB:
- You prioritize cost efficiency and want to maximize reach through auction-based buying.
- You’re focused on performance-driven campaigns with flexible bidding strategies.
- You’re optimizing toward specific audiences, leveraging data and algorithms to target across a wide inventory pool.
- You’re comfortable with dynamic pricing and varying inventory quality, managed through brand safety filters and allowlists.
How do DSPs differ from traditional media buying agencies?
DSPs differ from traditional media buying agencies by enabling algorithmic, real-time bidding across multiple ad exchanges with precise audience targeting and dynamic budget allocation.
Unlike agencies that negotiate fixed inventory buys and rely on historical planning, DSPs integrate with data platforms, optimize toward performance signals in real time, and provide transparent, impression-level reporting—offering greater efficiency, scale, and accountability.
How do I choose a DSP?
To choose a DSP, evaluate alignment with your campaign objectives, data strategy, and media mix.
Prioritize platforms that offer:
- Robust inventory access across display, video, CTV, and native channels,
- Advanced targeting and data integration (1P/3P, CRM, CDP),
- Transparent advertising analytics and real-time optimization controls,
- Brand safety, fraud prevention, and compliance features,
- Seamless integrations with your analytics stack (e.g., DMPs, attribution tools, BI platforms).
Which DSP is best?
There is no single “best” DSP. Selection depends on your budget, ad placement strategies, and data strategy. However, here are a couple of top-tier platforms:
- Google Display & Video 360 (DV360): Best for advertisers deeply embedded in the Google ecosystem, with access to YouTube, strong integrations with GA4 and CM360, and premium inventory.
- The Trade Desk: Ideal for multichannel marketing campaigns and advanced targeting; offers strong data partnerships, open web reach, and leading CTV capabilities.
- Amazon DSP: Best for ecommerce and retail brands leveraging Amazon’s first-party shopping data across web and CTV inventory.
- Xandr: Strong for large-scale buyers focused on premium supply, programmatic guaranteed, and curated deals.
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