The news: Programmatic pause ads drive substantially higher attention than traditional connected TV (CTV) ads, per Wunderkind Ads research released Thursday in partnership with OpenGlass. Powered by TVision’s attention data, the findings highlight pause ads’ ability to stand out in an increasingly crowded CTV ecosystem.

• Across every category analyzed, pause ads outperformed traditional 60-second CTV ads, delivering nearly twice the attention.
• The strongest results came from automotive, where pause ads generated 34.2 seconds of attention compared with 12.2 seconds for standard CTV video, a 180.3% lift. Technology and restaurant ads also performed well, with attention gains of 160.2% and 151.9%, respectively.

Why it matters: Pause ads are proving their ability to drive attention and prompt action in a landscape where brands are competing for small windows of attention.

• 51% of viewers surveyed by the Video Advertising Bureau took action after seeing a pause ad.
• Pause ads are a rare ad format that viewers not only accept, but also prefer across generations. Pause ads are preferred over frozen screens by 67% of Gen Zers, 67% of millennials, and 63% of Gen Xers, per Magna and DirecTV.
• Pause ads offer extended exposure periods that other CTV formats struggle to achieve. In the same Magna study, 54% of viewers paused content for one to five minutes, while 24% paused for up to one minute and 11% paused for six to 15 minutes.
• A previous Wunderkind Ads study found that jewelry brand Zales used Wunderkind’s pause ad inventory on Xumo to drive a 276% increase in QR code scans, leading to directly attributable purchases, compared with earlier campaigns that had larger budgets.

Implications for marketers: Pause ads offer a rare CTV format that can capture attention, support engagement, and create a clearer path to action.

But as more brands invest in pause ads, the format could become crowded. To stand out, marketers will need to focus on the features viewers value most, including the ability to save offers or reminders, receive relevant product recommendations, and engage with clickable formats.