But TV brands, especially more budget ones like Vizio, are increasingly looking for new places to show ads. And one of the biggest opportunities for more ad space is idle TVs.
TV OS operators besides Vizio are trying to seize that opportunity. For example, in 2022, Roku launched Roku City, a screensaver for devices using Roku OS that shows an animated city with advertisements in the form of logos splattered across the city. Roku claims that Roku City reaches 38.5 million streaming households a week on average.
A shot of a Roku City screensaver.
Credit:
Roku
Smart TVs and streaming devices running Amazon’s Fire OS have screensaver ads, too. Even LG, which is considered a more premium brand, launched screensaver ads in September, but users can disable them.
Startup Telly is a standout example of a company trying to monetize idle TV time. Announced in 2023, Telly TVs have a secondary screen that can show ads when the TV is not in use. Telly TVs are free to purchase in exchange for providing the company with user data, including disclosing your favorite news outlets, film and TV genres, foods, and services, your gender and race, and other information before you’re able to order the TV.
After they’re set up, Telly TVs track user behavior, including what they watch and for how long, what they search for, and where they put their Telly. If users opt out of tracking, Telly charges them for the TV.
Glance is another company demonstrating the strong interest advertisers have in TV screensavers. Glance is known for custom lock screens for phones that show things like news and weather. In December, it announced Glance TV, which essentially brings the same capability to TVs with Glance TV embedded into their OS. In addition to offering a different idle screen, Glance TV delivers targeted advertising and shoppable content to TVs when they go idle. Glance TV only delivers content from Glance’s partners and doesn’t gather information from the web, Digital Trends previously reported.