Amagi has reported a 21% year-on-year increase in global FAST hours of viewing in Q4 2025, alongside a 27% rise in ad impressions, as the company said applied AI is starting to move deeper into day-to-day media operations.
The findings come in the March 2026 edition of the Amagi Airtime Report, which is based on around 4,200 FAST channel deliveries distributed through the company’s Thunderstorm server-side ad insertion platform.
While the report points to continued momentum for FAST worldwide, its main focus is on the growing use of AI across content operations. Amagi said a survey of 50 broadcast and streaming executives covering 20 end-to-end workflow tasks highlighted the strongest potential for AI in metadata enrichment, context tagging, subtitling and translation, and social content publishing.
Srinivasan KA, co-founder and president of global business at Amagi, said the industry is moving beyond experimentation and towards embedding AI directly into operational workflows.
According to the report, FAST growth continued across all major regions in Q4 2025 compared with the same period a year earlier. Latin America recorded the strongest rise in viewing, with hours of viewing up 66% and ad impressions increasing 77%. APAC posted growth of 23% in viewing and 43% in ad impressions, while EMEA was up 22% and 43% respectively.
Amagi said the United States and Canada still account for the largest share of global FAST consumption and monetisation, though international markets are steadily gaining ground. Entertainment and news remained the leading genres worldwide.
New channels launched after December 2024 accounted for 18% of global hours of viewing and 16% of ad impressions in the quarter, which Amagi said underlined continued FAST expansion and content diversification.
The company said the report suggests applied AI could become the next major structural shift in media operations, with the potential to be as transformative for workflows as streaming has been for distribution.
