Best Buy Wants to Sell You the TV, Then Sell Ads on It

Best Buy already gets paid when an Insignia TV leaves the store. Now it wants a piece of the advertising that runs on that TV for years.

Best Buy and Amazon expanded their Fire TV partnership on September 23. Fire TV will remain the exclusive operating system across Best Buy’s full Insignia TV lineup. Starting in February 2027, Best Buy Ads will use Amazon Ads technology to sell Fire TV inventory across new and existing Insignia sets.

The deal gives Best Buy another way to make money from hardware it already sells. Best Buy controls Insignia, the shelf space and the customer relationship. Amazon controls Fire TV and the ad technology running inside it.

Walmart took the expensive route. It paid $2.3 billion for Vizio, buying the TV brand, operating system, ad business and a direct connection between the living-room screen and Walmart purchase data.

Best Buy is renting access to that business instead of buying the machinery.

Best Buy Can Start Selling the Screen Before the Next Upgrade Cycle

Best Buy and Amazon have sold Fire TV sets together since 2018. The companies say the partnership has put TVs in tens of millions of homes and produced more than 100 Insignia and Toshiba models.

Best Buy already made money on the TV, accessories, installation, warranties and other services around the purchase. Amazon got another Fire TV household and controlled the software relationship once the customer turned the set on.

The new agreement lets Best Buy Ads sell Fire TV inventory across new and existing Insignia Fire TVs. Best Buy doesn’t have to wait for customers to replace their TVs. It can sell campaigns against part of the installed base it already helped build.

The announcement says advertisers will be able to buy video and display ads and receive campaign-performance information. It doesn’t spell out which placements Best Buy controls, how much inventory it gets or how Best Buy and Amazon split the money.

Best Buy already sells CTV campaigns using its shopper data and third-party inventory. Now it can sell media inside the operating system running on its own TV brand.

Best Buy sold the screen, knows a lot about the customer shopping for electronics, and can now sell advertising that appears on that screen.

Walmart Spent $2.3 Billion to Own the TV, the OS and the Ads

Walmart completed its acquisition of Vizio in December 2024. The deal included Vizio’s TV business and SmartCast operating system. At the time of the sale, Vizio’s Platform+ segment, which consisted largely of advertising, generated all of the company’s gross profit.

Vizio brought more than 19 million active accounts into Walmart. Walmart has since started connecting Vizio and onn TVs with Walmart accounts, bringing TV activity, shopper identity and retail purchases into the same system.

Walmart wants to use that connection to sell CTV campaigns through Walmart Connect and measure whether exposed households later buy the advertised products at Walmart.

The operating system creates ad inventory. Walmart’s retail business supplies purchase data. Walmart Connect sells the campaign and can tie the ad exposure back to a Walmart transaction.

Owning Vizio gives Walmart control over more of that process. It can change the TV software, decide how Vizio inventory enters Walmart Connect, connect campaigns with Walmart data and keep more of the economics inside businesses it owns.

It also had to write a $2.3 billion check and now has to run and integrate the thing.

Best Buy Gets the Ad Inventory Without Buying the OS

Best Buy doesn’t need its own TV operating system because Amazon already has one.

Fire TV brings the interface, ad inventory, advertiser demand, programmatic plumbing and campaign tools. Best Buy brings Insignia, its stores and website, customer relationships and an ad sales team that already works with major electronics brands.

Using Fire TV lets Best Buy enter the business without buying a Vizio-sized asset.

Amazon decides how Fire TV develops, which ad formats exist and what data can move through its systems. Best Buy can sell the inventory covered by the agreement, but Amazon owns the operating system creating it.

The companies haven’t disclosed the revenue split, who owns the advertiser relationship, whether Amazon can sell the same inventory through its own channels or what happens to Best Buy’s access if the partnership changes.

Walmart spent $2.3 billion to own the TV brand, operating system and ad business. Best Buy avoided that capital outlay, but its TV ad business depends on software and ad technology Amazon controls.

The TV Aisle Now Picks Which Ad Business Gets Into the Living Room

TV shoppers still buy on screen size, picture quality, price and brand. Best Buy and Walmart have another variable to manage: which operating system and ad business gets installed with the set.

Best Buy controls where Insignia shows up in its stores, app and website. It’s also the exclusive retailer for Insignia sets sold through Amazon.com. Each additional connected Insignia Fire TV expands the number of screens covered by the Best Buy-Amazon advertising relationship.

Walmart can do the same with Vizio and onn sets running Vizio software. More units in homes give Walmart Connect more screens against which it can sell campaigns.

Neither retailer controls every TV on its shelves. Best Buy carries Samsung, LG, Sony, Roku, Hisense and other brands. Walmart also sells plenty of TVs running software it doesn’t own. The TVs tied to their own brands and operating-system relationships give both retailers more ways to make money after the hardware sale.

A house-brand TV sale now does two jobs. It books hardware revenue today and installs an operating system that can keep selling ads after the box leaves the store.

TV operating systems control what viewers see before they open an app. Home-screen banners, sponsored recommendations, search placements and video ads can keep generating revenue years after the original hardware sale.

Walmart Can Close the Loop. Best Buy Hasn’t Shown That Yet

Walmart can connect TV advertising with something advertisers care about even more: whether somebody bought the product.

The company says permissioned first-party data can support Vizio campaign targeting and connect ad engagement with later Walmart purchases through closed-loop sales attribution. A CPG brand can run a TV campaign and get evidence that exposed Walmart customers later bought its product online or in a store.

Best Buy has some of the same ingredients. Best Buy Ads uses shopper data to build audiences and already measures some CTV campaigns against sales through Best Buy channels.

The Fire TV announcement doesn’t say whether Best Buy purchase history will be used for targeting, whether an ad shown on an Insignia Fire TV can be matched with a later Best Buy purchase or how customer permissions would work across the two companies.

Without that connection, Best Buy gets more CTV inventory to sell. If it can tie an Insignia ad exposure to an actual Best Buy transaction, it gets a much stronger retail-media product.

Selling somebody a TV also doesn’t prove who watches it, which household member uses which account or whether an ad caused a later purchase. Any closed-loop product still has to handle those gaps without turning correlation into a sales claim.

Walmart has already laid out how it wants to connect those pieces. Best Buy has announced the inventory and the ad technology. The link between Fire TV exposure and Best Buy purchase data is still the part advertisers need to see.

Best Buy’s Deal Also Makes Fire TV Stronger

Best Buy gets another CTV product to sell. Amazon keeps Fire TV across the entire Insignia lineup and gains another sales organization feeding advertiser demand into its ecosystem.

Amazon and Best Buy compete for electronics sales. Amazon also operates a massive advertising business and owns the software inside Best Buy’s house-brand TVs. Best Buy remains the exclusive seller of Insignia Fire TVs, including the sets listed on Amazon.com.

Best Buy brings the stores, customer relationships, home-theater business and Insignia. Amazon brings Fire TV, the ad stack and a large streaming footprint. Building those capabilities from scratch would cost either company far more than using what the other already has.

Walmart bought Vizio partly to connect media and commerce inside infrastructure it owns. Best Buy is chasing some of the same ad dollars while running the product through Amazon’s technology.

Every Insignia set Best Buy puts into a home gives Best Buy more inventory to sell and gives Amazon another Fire TV household.

The Streaming Wars Take

The value of Best Buy’s Fire TV deal will come down to how closely it can connect an ad shown on an Insignia TV with a purchase made at Best Buy.

If Best Buy can use its shopper data to show that exposure on Fire TV drove a sale, it can sell advertisers more than CTV reach. It can sell measurement tied to its own retail transactions, which puts the product much closer to what Walmart is building with Vizio and Walmart Connect.

Amazon still controls the operating system, ad technology and rules around the inventory. Every additional Insignia Fire TV gives Best Buy another screen it can monetize, but it also adds another Fire TV household to Amazon’s ecosystem.

Walmart paid $2.3 billion to own the TV brand, software, ad inventory and more of the data connection. Best Buy committed far less capital, but it still has to show advertisers that Fire TV exposure can be tied to Best Buy sales. Amazon controls the infrastructure underneath that product, which limits how much of the economics and customer relationship Best Buy can ultimately own.