The $9.3 billion spent on Internet ads from July through September is an 18 percent increase from $7.8 billion at the same time last year, according to a breakdown released Wednesday by the accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Internet Advertising Bureau, a trade group.
The third-quarter total marks the highest ad volume for any three-month period since 1995, when online marketing first began to move to the Web. Another record is expected in the current quarter ending this month.
Internet advertising more than doubles the amount in U.S. newspapers' print advertising, which totaled $4.5 billion in the third quarter, according to the industry's own figures.
The upheaval has been driven by the growing number of people who rely on computers and mobile devices to get information on the Internet.
The increasing number of Internet ads helps subsidize many free online services, including search, email and social networking.
Google Inc., the Internet's search leader, has been the biggest beneficiary of the online ad boom so far. Other major sellers of online ads include Yahoo Inc., Facebook Inc., Microsoft Corp. and AOL Inc.
Despite its steady growth, the Internet still lags well behind television as the most popular marketing machine. Through the first half of this year, U.S television advertising revenue approached nearly $35 billion, up 6 percent from last year, according the most recent data from the trade group TVB.
TV stations enjoyed another prosperous period in the third quarter as money poured in from political campaigns heading into November's elections.
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