ITV is cutting back on new shows amid an anticipated advertising downturn this festive season, as the broadcaster cut its Q4 outlook for ITV Studios, citing a slump in demand from free-to-air broadcasters who have been cutting costs.

The broadcaster said total advertising revenues for the full year (across traditional TV advertising as well as streaming service ITVX), will decline by 8% this year as the ad market remains “challenging”.

Speaking to The Times newspaper ITV chief executive Carolyn McCall blamed the dip on a “challenging macro environment”.

McCall added that the growth of the studio and business was “helping to offset the current headwinds” and said the brand remains confident in delivering its 2026 targets.

Last month, McCall spoke at the Royal Television Society Conference in Cambridge and highlighted that the state of the economy is impacting the sector with businesses cutting back on their marketing expenses.

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“It’s not about programmes. Advertising revenue is tied to the economy, and the UK is not doing very well. The government talks about growth all the time but it has been very, very quiet,” McCall said speaking to the audience.

She also highlighted that she was not optimistic for the next election citing that she “couldn’t see the difference” between Labour and Conservative approaches to the advertising sector.

Another factor behind the downtown cited by analysts has been the impact of the writer’s strike, which took place between May and September of this year which led to uncertainty in the television advertising industry.

The news comes as the television network has sought to expand with linear addressable advertising across ITV2, ITV3, ITV4 and ITVBe in homes with YouView access.

In addition, the brand’s in-house creative agency ITV Creative recently poached Mother exec Tatiana Jezierski in the hope of bolstering its strategy.