Kinetiq Finds QSR Emerged as the Fastest-Growing Category in Women’s NCAA Tournament as Ad Volume Surged 37%

New data shows expanding advertiser participation and rising investment signal growing confidence in women’s sports

PHILADELPHIA and LONDON – April 13 – Kinetiq, the leading AI-powered platform for global media and marketing intelligence, and creative data provider DAIVID, today released new analysis of advertising across the 2025 and 2026 NCAA Women’s NCAA Tournament, showing a sharp increase in both ad volume and brand participation.

Total advertising airings during the Women’s tournament rose 37.4% year over year. Recent industry reports show Women’s NCAA Tournament ad inventory is selling at record levels, with pricing up double digits year over year and top units exceeding $1 million, reinforcing the surge in advertiser demand reflected in Kinetiq’s data.

While financial services and CPG remained the largest categories, QSR nearly doubled its share of advertising in the women’s tournament, increasing from approximately 6% in 2025 to 11% in 2026. In contrast, QSR share in the men’s tournament remained stable at approximately 15%, reinforcing its position as a mature, high-volume category.

This divergence highlights a shift in strategy. The men’s tournament continues to serve as a consistent, high-frequency channel, while the women’s tournament is emerging as a growth environment where brands are increasing investment and expanding participation.

Leading brands including McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Dairy Queen, and Wendy’s expanded their presence year over year, while others such as Chick-fil-A, Subway, and Domino’s increased activity or entered more meaningfully into the women’s tournament.

The result is a clear shift from limited participation to sustained, competitive activity, with a broader mix of QSR brands now investing in the space.

Unlike categories such as financial services and CPG, where growth is largely driven by official NCAA sponsors, QSR expansion in the women’s tournament was led primarily by non-sponsor brands. This indicates that increased investment is being driven by advertiser demand rather than rights-based presence, reinforcing the tournament’s growing value as a scaled, competitive media environment.

This contrast signals a maturing market. Some categories are scaling through deeper investment from established leaders, while others, like QSR, are expanding through increased advertiser adoption.

“QSR is one of the clearest indicators of where real ad dollars are moving,” said Kevin Kohn, CEO of Kinetiq. “We’re seeing more brands enter, not just spend more. That shift signals growing confidence in the Women’s NCAA Tournament as a high-impact advertising environment.”

Ads in women’s sports are outperforming broader TV benchmarks in engagement, making the tournament an increasingly attractive environment for performance-driven categories like QSR. To assess performance, Kinetiq partnered with DAIVID to analyze the effectiveness of top QSR creatives.

Key findings include:

• Burger King’s “Whopper Perfection” ranked as this year’s most effective QSR ad, delivering the highest combined levels of attention, positive emotion and correct brand recall, placing it in the top 28% of all ads ever tested by DAIVID.
• KFC was the brand that generated the strongest food cravings this year. Its 2026 ads were most likely to make viewers’ mouths water, producing a craving response nearly 3.6x the global average.
• QSR ads consistently outperformed creative effectiveness benchmarks over the past two years, averaging 5% above the global norm in both 2025 and 2026.

Ian Forrester, CEO and founder of DAIVID, said: “Our analysis shows that QSR creatives are outperforming global benchmarks, capturing attention, positive emotion and generally making people’s mouths water. The growth we’re seeing isn’t just from bigger spend, it’s from more brands entering the space and competing effectively, which is a strong signal of confidence in women’s sports as a high-impact, scalable ad platform.”

Together, the findings show the Women’s NCAA Tournament is shifting from an emerging opportunity to a competitive, must-buy moment for advertisers.

For complete analysis, category benchmarks or custom reports, contact videoadtrends@kinetiq.tv.

About Kinetiq

Kinetiq is the leading AI-powered platform for global media and marketing intelligence, capturing and monitoring video, audio, and digital content across 40,000 channels in over 120 countries. We transform unstructured data into actionable insights, giving our customers the real-time intelligence they need to optimize investments, outpace competitors, and maximize impact. For more information visit: kinetiq.tv.

About DAIVID

DAIVID is a global AI company powering the ad ecosystem with #CreativeData – the untapped signal of ad effectiveness – at unprecedented scale and depth. Its human-trained, AI-powered technology analyzes video and image content to predict creative attention, 39 emotions and impact on brand metrics, giving ad platforms and marketers access to fast, actionable insights to dramatically improve performance and strategy. With simple API integrations, DAIVID’s Creative Data Feed supercharges ad performance and media strategy across the ad tech ecosystem. Partners include ad platforms such as Kinetiq, CreativeX and Mass Analytics, as well as global brands and agencies including Nike, Snapchat, and WPP. Visit daivid.co.