For the past several years, commerce media has been defined by proliferation: New networks, new formats, new acronyms. As the category heads into 2026, industry leaders agree that growth alone is no longer the story. What matters now is connection: Across channels, across data, and across the full customer journey.

“In 2026, retail media networks will evolve into full omnichannel commerce engines, powering off-site targeting, in-store activations, and integrated shopper experiences,” said Mac Hagel, president of media at Razorfish.

From dashboards to decisions

If commerce media’s first act was about proving it could drive performance, its next act is about making that performance accessible and actionable at scale.

“Commerce media networks [will become] more connected, more shoppable, and closer to search and planning,” said Julie Towns, vice president, product marketing and product operations at Pinterest. “The networks that succeed will be the ones that can connect high‑intent planning signals with retailer outcomes across platforms, formats and partners.”

But with scale comes complexity, something that marketers are constantly trying to overcome.

“Marketers and buyers want fewer dashboards and better insight that helps them reach shoppers in meaningful moments,” said Joshua John, senior director and head of strategy at Yahoo DSP.

In-store media grows up

While digital commerce media races toward interoperability, physical retail is undergoing its own maturation. And the real growth isn’t always coming from the biggest names.

• “The national retailers that made headlines for in-store media this year were focused on pilots,” said Marlow Nickell, co-founder and CEO of GroceryTV. “Meanwhile, regional grocers across the country have quietly rolled out chain-wide programs.”
• By the time national players scale broadly, Nickell expects regional retailers to have already refined what works and expanded it further.

With in-store media scaling, expectations are rising.

“The future of in-store experience is not about more screens,” said Harvey Ma, vice president and general manager of Sam’s Club Member Access Platform. Instead, retailers must create “immersive and personalized environments that feel helpful rather than disruptive,” paired with “clearer, closed-loop measurement that reflects the full customer journey across both physical and digital touchpoints.”

Commerce media breaks out of the walled garden

One of the clearest signals of commerce media’s next phase is its push beyond owned-and-operated environments.

“Retail media networks are maturing fast, and I think the real growth in 2026 will come from what happens off-site,” said Jon Schulz, CMO of Viant. “Commerce media isn’t just a walled-garden play anymore, it’s becoming a full-funnel strategy.”

But as commerce media spreads across screens, formats, and environments, marketers must confront how disconnected their measurement is.

• “In 2026, the evolution of commerce media will focus on sales modernization and the need for more unified, cross-channel measurement,” said Sharon Taylor, chief revenue officer at Triton Digital.
• Platform fragmentation has exposed the limits of traditional attribution models, making AI a powerful alternative.
• “Measurement will become real-time and proactive, with AI-driven analytics enabling marketers to optimize investments and creative on the fly instead of relying on post-campaign reports,” said Razorfish’s Hagel.

Even so, on-site media will remain a critical component of retail media strategies, requiring marketers to find ways to work around retailer walls.

“Retailers’ approach to walled data gardens will force new data collaboration solutions to enable data and performance signals to be leveraged to full potential,” said Megan Hoppenjans, executive director of strategy at VML.

Structure, standards, and power shifts

Commerce media spending is moving beyond retail into categories like travel, finance, and B2B, bringing the industry’s growing pains into sharper focus.

“2026 is not only about expansion, it’s about structure,” said Collin Colburn, vice president of commerce at IAB. Without common frameworks and consistent definitions, commerce media risks stalling at the testing phase instead of becoming a reliable growth engine.

Others see deeper strategic implications. There’s an “ongoing power transfer between retailers and brands,” said Hoppenjans.

• “Many brands, CPG especially, are being forced to finance the retailer surveillance infrastructure that ultimately may be used to replace them, paying a premium for attribution clarity that bolsters short-term ROI but simply documents their own value extraction.” she said.
• This raises a critical question: At what level of retail media investment does a brand shift from being a brand builder and sales driver to a contract manufacturer that simply owns a trademark?

The expectation reset

Still, the direction of travel is clear.

“Physical stores are slowly evolving into media environments, blending shopping, entertainment and advertising,” said Ashwini Karandikar, executive vice president of media, technology, and data at the 4As.

And by 2026, performance alone won’t be enough to stand out.

“Commerce media networks will evolve into performance-first ecosystems,” said Keith Turco, CEO of Madison Logic, where “richer audience intelligence and closed-loop measurement become the expectation, not a differentiator.”

For high-level marketers, the takeaway is less about whether commerce media will keep growing and more about what kind of system they’re building into. In 2026, success won’t come from adding another network. It will come from making the entire ecosystem work together.

This was originally featured in the Commerce Media Weekly newsletter. For more marketing insights, statistics, and trends, subscribe here.