# Roku Just Became the Only TV-OS Company Showing Its Ad Math > First-itemized $613M ad line at 60.5% gross margin, third-party DSP spend up more than 40%, and a Magnite-powered marketplace shipped 72 hours earlier — Roku's segment-split debut is the open-stack pitch with numbers attached. - Publication: The State of Streaming - Section: Platforms - Published: 2026-05-03T00:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-05-02T00:00:00.000Z - Byline: The State of Streaming Staff - Canonical URL: https://thestateofstreaming.com/platforms/2026/05/roku-q1-2026-print-100m-segment-split/ - Read time: 6 min ## Summary Roku's first quarter under split Advertising and Subscriptions reporting itemizes a $613M ad business at 60.5 percent gross margin and confirms third-party DSP spend grew more than 40 percent year-over-year — putting structural distance between Roku and every other US TV-OS peer ahead of Magnite, TTD, and PubMatic. ## Key facts - Roku reported Q1 2026 Advertising revenue of $613 million (up 27 percent year-over-year) at a 60.5 percent gross margin and Subscriptions revenue of $519 million (up 30 percent year-over-year) at a 41.1 percent gross margin — the first quarter either segment has been disclosed separately under the new reporting structure formalized in the April 13 8-K. - Roku Media President Charlie Collier told analysts that third-party DSP ad spend grew more than 40 percent year-over-year, with named programmatic partners including Amazon DSP, The Trade Desk, Yahoo, FreeWheel, and Google's DV360 via the Confidential Publisher Match integration. - Roku raised its full-year Platform-revenue guide to roughly $5.0 billion (about 21 percent growth) from the prior $4.89 billion (18 percent) guide and lifted full-year adjusted EBITDA guidance to $675 million from $635 million. - Roku Curate launched April 27, three days before the print, bundling Roku first-party data with retail-purchase signal from Best Buy Ads, Criteo, Fandango, Fetch, Instacart, and Kroger Precision Marketing on Magnite SpringServe-powered infrastructure. ## Why it matters Roku is the only public US TV-OS company itemizing its ad business at the GAAP-segment level. Walmart's [VIZIO](https://corporate.walmart.com/news/2024/12/03/walmart-completes-acquisition-of-vizio) is now invisible inside Walmart U.S., Samsung Ads has never carried a public segment, and Amazon's CTV mix is buried inside a $17 billion advertising line. With ad spend through third-party DSPs up more than 40 percent at a 60.5 percent gross margin, Roku is positioning as the open-stack front door for every demand platform that is not a walled garden — at the moment the walled gardens are wiring themselves shut. ## What to watch - [Magnite Q1 2026 print](https://investor.magnite.com/news-releases/news-release-details/magnite-announce-first-quarter-2026-financial-results-may-6-2026) after market close May 6 — the SpringServe + Magnite Streaming SSP combination underpins Roku Exchange and powers Roku Curate, making Magnite the most directly exposed publisher-side read of Roku's third-party DSP disclosure. - [The Trade Desk Q1 2026 print](https://investors.thetradedesk.com/news-and-events/events/event-details/2026/Q1-2026-The-Trade-Desk-Earnings-Conference-Call/default.aspx) and [PubMatic Q1 2026 print](https://www.stocktitan.net/news/PUBM/pub-matic-to-announce-first-quarter-2026-financial-results-on-may-7-ut9sty5fg9h6.html) after market close May 7 — TTD now has a Roku-disclosed denominator to size CTV exposure against; PubMatic's curated-CTV thesis gets a structural tailwind from Roku's open-stack positioning. - The May 11–14 upfront cycle — NBCUniversal's and Amazon's on May 11, Disney's on May 12, YouTube Brandcast on May 13, and Netflix on May 14 — the first major industry stages where Amazon, Samsung, and LG will respond to Roku having put public dollar signs on a category none of them disclose. - Whether the FY 2025 segment restated comparables furnished in [Exhibit 99.1 of the April 13 8-K](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1428439/000162828026024842/wk-20260413.htm) confirm the Cleveland Research figures (Advertising $2.327B / +13% / 58% GM; Subscriptions $1.817B / +25% / 45% GM) — and how the Q1 2026 acceleration off those bases reads after the 10-Q filing. ## Article The structural disclosure thesis [our preview previewed](/platforms/2026/04/roku-q1-2026-earnings-preview-segment-split/) actually landed. Roku, Inc. (NASDAQ: ROKU) reported its first quarter under split Advertising and Subscriptions reporting after the bell Thursday, and the line that matters for advertisers is no longer buried inside a blended Platform number: $613 million in ad revenue, up 27 percent year-over-year, at a [60.5 percent gross margin](https://ppc.land/roku-reports-1-25b-q1-2026-revenue-as-ad-spend-through-dsps-jumps-40/). On the call, Roku Media President Charlie Collier put a flag on the strategy that disclosure now makes legible, telling analysts that ad spend through third-party programmatic platforms grew [more than 40 percent year-over-year](https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/), with Amazon DSP, The Trade Desk, Yahoo, FreeWheel, and Google's DV360 all named in the same breath. Roku raised its full-year Platform-revenue guide to roughly $5.0 billion. The stock added about 3.5 percent. The print itself was a beat; the structural read is the story. Roku is the only US public TV-OS company showing its ad math, and the math it is showing argues for the open stack. First quarter results show our third-party DSP strategy is working. The majority of our video delivery is now through third-party programmatic partners, and we are growing quickly. ## What the Advertising line tells you Take the disclosure at face value for a beat. A $613 million ad business growing 27 percent at a [60.5 percent gross margin](https://ppc.land/roku-reports-1-25b-q1-2026-revenue-as-ad-spend-through-dsps-jumps-40/) is more profitable per revenue dollar than Magnite, Inc. (NASDAQ: MGNI), more granular than The Trade Desk (NASDAQ: TTD), and more legible than the comparable line at any other US TV-OS company. CFO Dan Jedda told analysts that 60.5 percent margin level is sustainable [for the rest of the year and thereafter](https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/). Subscriptions, the line nobody could see clearly under the blended Platform regime, came in at $519 million, up 30 percent (or [roughly 23 percent excluding Frndly](https://www.subscriptioninsider.com/article-type/news/roku-subscriptions-revenue-grows-30-as-premium-sign-ups-hit-record)), at a 41.1 percent gross margin. Both lines are accelerating off restated FY 2025 bases the [Cleveland Research analyst Ross Walthall pegged](https://ppc.land/roku-hits-100m-households-and-splits-open-its-platform-finances/) at +13 percent and +25 percent respectively, in a note reproduced by PPC Land before the print. That comparison sharpens when you look around the room. Walmart Inc. (NYSE: WMT) consolidated [VIZIO Holding Corp. into its Walmart U.S. segment in December 2024](https://corporate.walmart.com/news/2024/12/03/walmart-completes-acquisition-of-vizio); the smart-TV ad business now reports as part of a global advertising line, with no segment dollar figure. Samsung Electronics has never disclosed Samsung Ads as a reportable segment. LG Ad Solutions sits inside LG Electronics' Home Entertainment line. Amazon's CTV mix is folded inside a $17 billion advertising services aggregate. Of the five biggest US TV-OS publishers, Roku is the one investors and buyers can underwrite at the segment level, and it just put up a higher gross margin than anyone they could compare it to. ## Third-party DSP plumbing crosses a threshold The more-than-40-percent line item is what turns a disclosure event into a strategy event. If the Advertising segment grew 27 percent and DSP-routed buys grew more than 40, third-party programmatic outpaced direct-sold inside the same quarter. Collier framed Roku's positioning as "open, interoperable, and deeply integrated with every major DSP," and named Amazon DSP, Trade Desk, Yahoo, FreeWheel, and DV360 as the five rails. The DV360 line carries some weight: Roku is the [first streamer to participate in Google's Confidential Publisher Match](https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/), which routes Google's first-party signal through trusted-execution-environment matching directly into DV360-bought Roku inventory. The Amazon DSP rail is its own complication, and worth flagging. Amazon spent the [nine days before Roku's print wiring its identity stack together](/advertising-adtech/2026/04/amazon-identity-stack-consolidation/): Acxiom Real ID audiences live in Audience Hub, Dynamic Traffic Engine donated to the IAB Tech Lab, Samsung Ads in Amazon Publisher Cloud. Amazon DSP being one of Roku's named third-party buyers is the same Amazon hardening curation on its own protocol, with Roku's open inventory as a buy-target. The two companies are competing for the same demand and routing the same demand through each other. That is what plumbing looks like when nobody owns the whole pipe. ## Why Roku Curate is the operational footprint Three days before the print, Roku [launched Roku Curate](https://newsroom.roku.com/news/2026/04/roku-introduces-roku-curate-a-streamlined-advertising-solution-for/dcu2cyqp-1777050003), a curated marketplace bundling Roku first-party data with retail-purchase signal from six launch partners (Best Buy Ads, Criteo, Fandango, Fetch, Instacart, and Kroger Precision Marketing), powered in part by [Magnite's SpringServe ad server](https://thedesk.net/2026/04/roku-curate-advertising-product-launch/) and Roku's own exchange infrastructure. The timing was not casual. Curate is the product that proves the segment-split is a posture, not a GAAP rearrangement. It uses the SSP layer (Magnite SpringServe) without ceding the buyer relationship; it assembles the not-Walmart retail-data graph in one direct-sold package; and it ships during the same week Roku's first segment-itemized P&L hits the wires. Read it against the [walled-garden map](/opinion/2026/04/independent-adtech-stack-walled-garden-thesis/) and the bet sharpens. Walmart Connect plus VIZIO offers retail-data inside a closed Walmart pipe. Amazon DSP plus Acxiom plus Samsung Ads-in-APC offers identity inside a closed Amazon graph. Roku Curate plus six retail-data partners plus five named DSP rails offers the same composite signal without the closed pipe. Roku is selling the open option to ad buyers who do not want to underwrite a single hyperscaler, and it is doing it on margin economics that, on the Advertising line, beat the SSPs that supply it. ## Three Q1 prints sit in Roku's gravity now The next seven days frame the gravity. Magnite reports [Q1 results after the bell next Wednesday, May 6](https://investor.magnite.com/news-releases/news-release-details/magnite-announce-first-quarter-2026-financial-results-may-6-2026), and is the most directly exposed publisher-side read: Magnite SpringServe + Magnite Streaming SSP underpin Roku Exchange, power Roku Curate, and benchmark against Magnite's Q1 guide of CTV contribution-ex-TAC at $81 to $83 million. Trade Desk and PubMatic, Inc. (NASDAQ: PUBM) [both report after the bell Thursday, May 7](https://investors.thetradedesk.com/news-and-events/events/event-details/2026/Q1-2026-The-Trade-Desk-Earnings-Conference-Call/default.aspx). TTD now has a Roku-disclosed denominator to size its CTV exposure against, and the [Ventura Ecosystem framing](/advertising-adtech/2026/04/trade-desk-ventura-ecosystem-pivot/) gets to be tested against a publisher openly routing more than 40 percent more of its inventory through DSPs including TTD. PubMatic, with omnichannel video at 39 percent of FY 2025 revenue, has the open-stack tailwind that Roku just monetized in public. Then the May 11–14 upfront cycle — [NBCUniversal](https://deadline.com/2025/10/nbcuniversal-confirms-radio-city-may-2026-upfront-advertisers-1236573586/) and Amazon on May 11, [Disney](https://www.thewrap.com/disney-2026-upfront-date-time-location/) on May 12, [YouTube Brandcast](https://blog.google/products-and-platforms/products/youtube/youtube-brandcast-2026-lineup/) on May 13, Netflix on May 14 — gives Amazon, Samsung, and LG their first major stages to respond to Roku having put public dollar signs on a category none of them disclose. The financial profile underneath is real and helps. EPS came in at $0.57 against a $0.35 Street estimate; trailing-twelve-month free cash flow hit an [all-time high of $538.8 million](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/roku-q1-2026-earnings-1236581264/); adjusted EBITDA was $148.4 million, up 165 percent. Wall Street rolled into the print and lifted price targets (Wedbush to $155, Morgan Stanley to $135, Benchmark to $160) the morning after. None of that is the lede. The lede is that for the first quarter Roku has been a public company, an ad buyer can read its ad business as an ad business, and the read is structurally at odds with how every other US TV-OS company has chosen to report. ## Entities - Companies: Roku, Inc., Magnite, Inc., The Trade Desk, PubMatic, Inc., Amazon.com, Walmart Inc., Vizio Holding Corp., Samsung Electronics, Comcast Corporation, Apple Inc. - People: Anthony Wood, Dan Jedda, Charlie Collier, Miles Fisher - Products: The Roku Channel, Roku Curate, Roku Ads Manager, Roku Exchange, Howdy, SpringServe, Amazon DSP, DV360 ## Tags - roku - q1-2026-earnings - segment-reporting - ctv-advertising - third-party-dsp - roku-curate - roku-exchange - magnite - the-trade-desk - pubmatic - amazon-dsp - yahoo-dsp - newfronts-2026 - gaap-segment ## Corrections and updates - 2026-05-02 — correction: Original published version stated the IAB NewFronts would 'begin May 11.' That was wrong: IAB NewFronts 2026 took place March 23–26 in New York City and had already concluded before this article was published. The forward-looking framing has been corrected to anchor on the May 11–14 upfront cycle (NBCU/Amazon/Disney/YouTube/Netflix). ## Sourced claims - Roku reported Q1 2026 total net revenue of $1.248 billion, up 22% year-over-year, beating the company's own $1.200B guide and $1.204B analyst consensus. — Roku Q1 2026 release (BusinessWire syndication), April 30, 2026: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260430953135/en/Roku-Releases-First-Quarter-2026-Financial-Results - Q1 2026 Platform revenue was $1.13 billion, up 28% year-over-year, with a 51.6% gross margin. — Roku Q1 2026 release: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260430953135/en/Roku-Releases-First-Quarter-2026-Financial-Results - Q1 2026 Advertising revenue, disclosed for the first time as a segment, was $612.7 million, up 27% year-over-year, at a 60.5% gross margin. — PPC Land reproduction of Q1 release figures: https://ppc.land/roku-reports-1-25b-q1-2026-revenue-as-ad-spend-through-dsps-jumps-40/ - Q1 2026 Subscriptions revenue was $518.5 million, up 30% year-over-year, at a 41.1% gross margin; the growth rate is roughly 23% excluding Frndly TV. — Subscription Insider, April 30, 2026: https://www.subscriptioninsider.com/article-type/news/roku-subscriptions-revenue-grows-30-as-premium-sign-ups-hit-record - Roku President of Roku Media Charlie Collier said on the Q1 2026 earnings call: 'First quarter results show our third-party DSP strategy is working. The majority of our video delivery is now through third-party programmatic partners, and we are growing quickly.' — Roku Q1 2026 earnings call transcript (The Motley Fool reproduction): https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/ - Collier said advertisers can access Roku's premium inventory through 'virtually every major buying platform,' naming Amazon DSP, The Trade Desk, Yahoo, and FreeWheel as DSP partners. — Roku Q1 2026 earnings call transcript: https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/ - Collier said Roku is the first streamer to participate in Google's Confidential Publisher Match, allowing advertisers to activate Google's first-party data inside DV360. — Roku Q1 2026 earnings call transcript: https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/ - Third-party DSP ad spend grew more than 40% year-over-year in Q1 2026, per management commentary on the earnings call. — PPC Land, May 2, 2026: https://ppc.land/roku-reports-1-25b-q1-2026-revenue-as-ad-spend-through-dsps-jumps-40/ - CFO Dan Jedda told analysts the 60.5% Advertising gross margin is sustainable for the rest of the year and thereafter. — Roku Q1 2026 earnings call transcript: https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/ - Jedda said Roku raised its full-year Platform-revenue guide 'by over $100 million, or approximately three points of growth,' to roughly $5.0 billion (about 21% growth) from the prior $4.890 billion (18% growth) guide. — Roku Q1 2026 earnings call transcript: https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/05/01/roku-roku-q1-2026-earnings-transcript/ - Roku raised its full-year adjusted EBITDA guide to $675 million from $635 million. — Variety, April 30, 2026: https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/roku-q1-2026-earnings-1236734538/ - Q1 2026 net income was $85.7 million ($0.57 diluted EPS), versus a $27.4 million net loss in Q1 2025; trailing-twelve-month free cash flow reached an all-time high of $538.8 million. — The Hollywood Reporter, April 30, 2026: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/roku-q1-2026-earnings-1236581264/ - Q1 2026 adjusted EBITDA was $148.4 million, up 165% year-over-year, at an 11.9% margin. — Variety, April 30, 2026: https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/roku-q1-2026-earnings-1236734538/ - Roku surpassed 100 million streaming households globally on April 16, 2026, defined as distinct user accounts streaming on the platform in any 30-day period. — Roku Newsroom, April 16, 2026: https://newsroom.roku.com/news/2026/04/roku-surpasses-100-million-streaming-households-a-historic-milestone/cbdb6hs7-1776191291 - Q1 2026 streaming hours reached 38.7 billion, up 8% year-over-year. — StockTitan filing summary: https://www.stocktitan.net/news/ROKU/roku-releases-first-quarter-2026-financial-qr9yii6nxja4.html - Roku launched Roku Curate on April 27, 2026, a curated-marketplace product bundling Roku first-party data and inventory with retail-purchase signal from Best Buy Ads, Criteo, Fandango, Fetch, Instacart, and Kroger Precision Marketing, powered in part by Magnite's SpringServe and Roku's own exchange infrastructure. — Roku Newsroom, April 27, 2026: https://newsroom.roku.com/news/2026/04/roku-introduces-roku-curate-a-streamlined-advertising-solution-for/dcu2cyqp-1777050003 - Miles Fisher, Roku Senior Director of Strategic Advertising Partnerships, said in the Curate launch: 'The goal of Roku Curate is simple: enable buyers to access the best of Roku and partner data, with the scale and performance of premium CTV.' — PPC Land reproduction of Roku Curate launch quotes: https://ppc.land/roku-curate-bundles-retail-purchase-data-with-ctv-inventory-in-one-package/ - Magnite named Roku as a launch client for the next-generation SpringServe combined ad server and SSP on April 23, 2025; the combined platform reaches roughly 99% of US streaming supply per Jounce Media's March 2025 Supply Path Benchmarking Report. — Magnite IR, April 23, 2025: https://investor.magnite.com/news-releases/news-release-details/magnite-unveils-next-generation-springserve-combining-its - Roku formalized the split of its Platform segment into Advertising and Subscriptions effective Q1 2026 in an 8-K filed April 13, 2026, with restated 2024 and 2025 comparables furnished in Exhibit 99.1. — Roku 8-K, April 13, 2026 (SEC EDGAR): https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1428439/000162828026024842/wk-20260413.htm - Cleveland Research analyst Ross Walthall, in a note dated April 15, 2026, reproduced by PPC Land, pegged FY 2025 Advertising at $2.327 billion (58% gross margin, +13% YoY) and Subscriptions at $1.817 billion (45% gross margin, +25% YoY) within the restated Platform segment. — PPC Land, reproducing Cleveland Research note by Ross Walthall, CFA: https://ppc.land/roku-hits-100m-households-and-splits-open-its-platform-finances/ - Walmart completed its acquisition of VIZIO on December 3, 2024; VIZIO is now consolidated within Walmart's Walmart U.S. segment with no separate VIZIO ad-revenue line item. — Walmart corporate news, December 3, 2024: https://corporate.walmart.com/news/2024/12/03/walmart-completes-acquisition-of-vizio - Antenna estimated in late April 2026 that Howdy, Roku's $2.99-per-month ad-free SVOD launched August 2025, has surpassed 1 million subscribers eight months from launch with a 51% six-month retention rate versus the 47% premium-SVOD average. — StreamTV Insider, citing Antenna: https://www.streamtvinsider.com/content/rokus-3-ad-free-howdy-svod-surpasses-1m-subscribers-antenna - Magnite, Inc. (NASDAQ: MGNI) reports Q1 2026 financial results after market close on May 6, 2026. — Magnite IR: https://investor.magnite.com/news-releases/news-release-details/magnite-announce-first-quarter-2026-financial-results-may-6-2026 - The Trade Desk reports Q1 2026 financial results after market close on May 7, 2026. — The Trade Desk IR: https://investors.thetradedesk.com/news-and-events/events/event-details/2026/Q1-2026-The-Trade-Desk-Earnings-Conference-Call/default.aspx - PubMatic reports Q1 2026 financial results after market close on May 7, 2026. — StockTitan, PubMatic IR mirror: https://www.stocktitan.net/news/PUBM/pub-matic-to-announce-first-quarter-2026-financial-results-on-may-7-ut9sty5fg9h6.html - The IAB NewFronts 2026 took place March 23–26 in New York City. — IAB: https://www.iab.com/events/newfronts-2026/ --- View this article in a browser: https://thestateofstreaming.com/platforms/2026/05/roku-q1-2026-print-100m-segment-split/ Browse the publication: https://thestateofstreaming.com/ Machine-readable index: https://thestateofstreaming.com/llms.txt