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TTD vs. AMZN: Which Ad-Tech Stock is the Smarter Buy Now?
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Key Takeaways
The Trade Desk is expanding in CTV, retail media, Kokai adoption, and international markets.
Amazon's ad revenues jumped 22% in Q2 2025, fueled by its DSP, CTV reach, and broad partnerships.
TTD shares slid 40.8% in a month, while AMZN fell 2.1%; both trade at high forward P/E valuations.
Both The Trade Desk, Inc. (TTD - Free Report) and Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN - Free Report) play pivotal roles in the digital advertising ecosystem. While TTD is a pure-play ad-tech firm built around a demand-side platform (DSP), AMZN is an e-commerce and cloud giant with advertising quickly becoming one of its key revenue drivers.
Since both firms have sizeable exposure to the booming connected TV (CTV) and retail media trends, this makes for an intriguing comparison for investors.
So, which stock makes a better investment pick at present? Let’s deep dive into the pros and cons of each company.
TTD: A Pure Play Ad Tech Player
TTD expects to gain a larger share of future opportunities owing to solid execution across key initiatives, CTV, retail media, international expansion, Kokai, UID2 and OpenPath. As more consumers shift away from linear TV, advertisers are following suit, and TTD is well-positioned to capture that trend.
CTV, along with retail media, accounted for much of the company’s growth in the second quarter of 2025, supported by The Trade Desk’s decision-based programmatic approach, which delivers better returns compared with insertion order or programmatic guaranteed buying. Expanding partnerships with major media players, such as Disney, NBCU, Netflix, Roku, and Walmart, bode well. In the second quarter, Video, which includes connected CTV, accounted for a high-40s percentage of its overall business.
TTD is strengthening its position in the digital advertising space, with its latest platform upgrade, Kokai. More than 70% of the clients are now using the company’s Kokai platform, with full client adoption expected to be completed by this year. The integration of Koa AI tools was highlighted by management as a “game changer” for the Kokai platform, as it can deliver significant gains in campaign precision, efficiency and outcomes.
On the last earnings call, The Trade Desk highlighted that Samsung saw a 43% improvement in audience targeting efficiency for an omnichannel, while Cashrewards experienced a 73% improvement in cost per acquisition for campaigns in Asia. Management highlighted that advertisers transitioning the majority of spend to Kokai are increasing their overall spend on the platform more than 20% faster than those who have not.
As a pure-play ad-tech company, TTD is highly sensitive to macroeconomic conditions. Macroeconomic uncertainty is likely to weigh on advertising budgets. TTD remains cautious regarding the impact of the volatile macro backdrop, particularly on the large global brands. If macro headwinds worsen or persist into the second half of 2025, revenue growth may face further pressure due to reduced programmatic demand. Also, AMZN’s expanding DSP business is giving tough competition to TTD, especially in the CTV space.
AMZN: Growing Ad Business to Amp Up Competition
With annual ad services revenues of $56.2 billion in 2024, AMZN is quickly gaining market share in the digital ad space and is now one of the leading DSP players.
Amazon reported a 22% surge in ad revenues to $15.7 billion in the second quarter of 2025, driven by broad-based growth across Amazon’s full-funnel advertising portfolio. In the United States itself, advertisers can now reach an average ad-supported audience of more than 300 million across its retail marketplace, Prime Video, Twitch, Fire TV, Live sports (NFL, NASCAR, NBA), as well as third-party websites and apps. AMZN also highlighted that advertising remains an important contributor to profitability in both the North America and International segments.
AMZN is ramping up investment in its DSP and CTV businesses, putting it in direct competition with TTD. Amazon DSP platform allows advertisers to plan, activate and measure full funnel campaigns. The DSP platform leverages trillions of proprietary browsing, shopping and streaming signals. These, when paired with AMZN’s wide-ranging supply side relationships and secure clean rooms, help advertisers achieve optimization and higher ROI.
Recent collaborations with Roku (access to 80 million authenticated U.S. CTV households) and Disney (access to Disney+, ESPN and Hulu) significantly expand Amazon DSP’s reach. For investors, it is important to note that AMZN’s business diversification, especially retail, cloud and AI, with stupendous financial resources, gives it an edge and reduces reliance on one segment.
Ads are still a relatively small share of Amazon’s total revenue base compared to retail and AWS, meaning ample room to scale. That said, competition in CTV and DSP remains intense, and as Amazon ramps up, The Trade Desk faces growing pressure to defend its share.
Share Performance for TTD & AMZN
Over the past month, AMZN and TTD shares have declined 2.1% and 40.8%, respectively.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Valuation for TTD & AMZN
Both TTD and AMZN are overvalued, as suggested by the Value Score of F and D, respectively.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
In terms of the forward 12-month price/earnings ratio, TTD shares are trading at 26.02X, lower than AMZN's 31.39X.
How Do Zacks Estimates Compare for TTD & AMZN?
Analysts have made marginal upward revisions for TTD’s bottom line for the current year in the past 60 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
For AMZN, there is an upward revision of 6.69% for the current fiscal year.
For investors, Amazon stands out as the stronger pick. Its diversified business model spanning retail, cloud, AI, and advertising provides stability and multiple growth engines, unlike TTD’s reliance on ad-tech alone.
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TTD vs. AMZN: Which Ad-Tech Stock is the Smarter Buy Now?
Key Takeaways
Both The Trade Desk, Inc. (TTD - Free Report) and Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN - Free Report) play pivotal roles in the digital advertising ecosystem. While TTD is a pure-play ad-tech firm built around a demand-side platform (DSP), AMZN is an e-commerce and cloud giant with advertising quickly becoming one of its key revenue drivers.
Since both firms have sizeable exposure to the booming connected TV (CTV) and retail media trends, this makes for an intriguing comparison for investors.
So, which stock makes a better investment pick at present? Let’s deep dive into the pros and cons of each company.
TTD: A Pure Play Ad Tech Player
TTD expects to gain a larger share of future opportunities owing to solid execution across key initiatives, CTV, retail media, international expansion, Kokai, UID2 and OpenPath. As more consumers shift away from linear TV, advertisers are following suit, and TTD is well-positioned to capture that trend.
CTV, along with retail media, accounted for much of the company’s growth in the second quarter of 2025, supported by The Trade Desk’s decision-based programmatic approach, which delivers better returns compared with insertion order or programmatic guaranteed buying. Expanding partnerships with major media players, such as Disney, NBCU, Netflix, Roku, and Walmart, bode well. In the second quarter, Video, which includes connected CTV, accounted for a high-40s percentage of its overall business.
TTD is strengthening its position in the digital advertising space, with its latest platform upgrade, Kokai. More than 70% of the clients are now using the company’s Kokai platform, with full client adoption expected to be completed by this year. The integration of Koa AI tools was highlighted by management as a “game changer” for the Kokai platform, as it can deliver significant gains in campaign precision, efficiency and outcomes.
On the last earnings call, The Trade Desk highlighted that Samsung saw a 43% improvement in audience targeting efficiency for an omnichannel, while Cashrewards experienced a 73% improvement in cost per acquisition for campaigns in Asia. Management highlighted that advertisers transitioning the majority of spend to Kokai are increasing their overall spend on the platform more than 20% faster than those who have not.
As a pure-play ad-tech company, TTD is highly sensitive to macroeconomic conditions. Macroeconomic uncertainty is likely to weigh on advertising budgets. TTD remains cautious regarding the impact of the volatile macro backdrop, particularly on the large global brands. If macro headwinds worsen or persist into the second half of 2025, revenue growth may face further pressure due to reduced programmatic demand. Also, AMZN’s expanding DSP business is giving tough competition to TTD, especially in the CTV space.
AMZN: Growing Ad Business to Amp Up Competition
With annual ad services revenues of $56.2 billion in 2024, AMZN is quickly gaining market share in the digital ad space and is now one of the leading DSP players.
Amazon reported a 22% surge in ad revenues to $15.7 billion in the second quarter of 2025, driven by broad-based growth across Amazon’s full-funnel advertising portfolio. In the United States itself, advertisers can now reach an average ad-supported audience of more than 300 million across its retail marketplace, Prime Video, Twitch, Fire TV, Live sports (NFL, NASCAR, NBA), as well as third-party websites and apps. AMZN also highlighted that advertising remains an important contributor to profitability in both the North America and International segments.
AMZN is ramping up investment in its DSP and CTV businesses, putting it in direct competition with TTD. Amazon DSP platform allows advertisers to plan, activate and measure full funnel campaigns. The DSP platform leverages trillions of proprietary browsing, shopping and streaming signals. These, when paired with AMZN’s wide-ranging supply side relationships and secure clean rooms, help advertisers achieve optimization and higher ROI.
Recent collaborations with Roku (access to 80 million authenticated U.S. CTV households) and Disney (access to Disney+, ESPN and Hulu) significantly expand Amazon DSP’s reach. For investors, it is important to note that AMZN’s business diversification, especially retail, cloud and AI, with stupendous financial resources, gives it an edge and reduces reliance on one segment.
Ads are still a relatively small share of Amazon’s total revenue base compared to retail and AWS, meaning ample room to scale. That said, competition in CTV and DSP remains intense, and as Amazon ramps up, The Trade Desk faces growing pressure to defend its share.
Share Performance for TTD & AMZN
Over the past month, AMZN and TTD shares have declined 2.1% and 40.8%, respectively.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Valuation for TTD & AMZN
Both TTD and AMZN are overvalued, as suggested by the Value Score of F and D, respectively.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
In terms of the forward 12-month price/earnings ratio, TTD shares are trading at 26.02X, lower than AMZN's 31.39X.
How Do Zacks Estimates Compare for TTD & AMZN?
Analysts have made marginal upward revisions for TTD’s bottom line for the current year in the past 60 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
For AMZN, there is an upward revision of 6.69% for the current fiscal year.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
TTD or AMZN: Which is a Smarter Bet?
TTD and AMZN currently carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) each. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
For investors, Amazon stands out as the stronger pick. Its diversified business model spanning retail, cloud, AI, and advertising provides stability and multiple growth engines, unlike TTD’s reliance on ad-tech alone.