According to Pixalate's research into invalid traffic (IVT, including ad fraud) in programmatic advertising, the United Kingdom’s desktop and mobile web IVT rate was 18% in Q2 2026.
LONDON, August 12, 2026 -- Pixalate, an ad fraud and privacy compliance platform, today released the Q2 2026 Invalid Traffic (IVT) & Ad Fraud Benchmark Reports. The Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) reports analyze the invalid traffic (IVT, including ad fraud) rates for programmatic advertising on desktop and mobile websites, mobile apps, and Connected TV (CTV) in the United Kingdom and Germany.
In addition to the Q2 2026 Invalid Traffic (IVT) & Ad Fraud Benchmark Reports for the United Kingdom and Germany, Pixalate released IVT benchmarks for the United States and a Global report.
| Device | UK | Germany |
| Desktop and Mobile Web | 18% | 16% |
| Mobile App | 36% | 37% |
| CTV | 34% | NA |
The global IVT rates were 20% for web traffic, 41% for mobile app traffic, and 26% for CTV traffic. To compile this research, Pixalate's data science team analyzed over 80 billion global programmatic advertising impressions in Q2 2026.
The report benchmarks IVT and ad fraud across these devices and platforms by various criteria, including country, device type, app category, and app-ads.txt files. Pixalate's datasets — used exclusively to derive these insights — consist predominantly of buy-side open auction programmatic traffic sources.
Download all of Pixalate’s Q2 2026 Ad Fraud Benchmarks Reports
About Pixalate
Pixalate is a global platform for privacy compliance, ad fraud prevention, and data intelligence in the digital ad supply chain. Founded in 2012, Pixalate’s platform 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 MRC-accredited for the detection and filtration of Sophisticated Invalid Traffic (SIVT). www.pixalate.com
Disclaimer
The content of this press release, and the Q2 2026 Invalid Traffic (IVT) & Ad Fraud Benchmark Reports (the "Reports"), reflect Pixalate's opinions with respect to factors that Pixalate believes may be useful to the digital media industry. Any data shared is grounded in Pixalate's proprietary technology and analytics, which Pixalate is continuously evaluating and updating. Any references to outside sources should not be construed as endorsements. Pixalate's opinions are just that, opinions, which means that they are neither facts nor guarantees. Pixalate is sharing this data not to impugn the standing or reputation of any entity, person or app, but, instead, to report findings and trends pertaining to programmatic advertising activity across in the time period studied. Per the Media Rating Council (MRC), "'Invalid Traffic' is defined generally as traffic that does not meet certain ad serving quality or completeness criteria, or otherwise does not represent legitimate ad traffic that should be included in measurement counts. Among the reasons why ad traffic may be deemed invalid is it is a result of non-human traffic (spiders, bots, etc.), or activity designed to produce fraudulent traffic." Where the traffic characteristics are suggestive of deliberate intent to mislead, such IVT is often referred to as "ad fraud." Also per the MRC, "'Fraud' is not intended to represent fraud as defined in various laws, statutes and ordinances or as conventionally used in U.S. Court or other legal proceedings, but rather a custom definition strictly for advertising measurement purposes."