Lights, Camera, AI Action: Key Takeaways from Wistia’s 2025 ‘State of Video’ Report

“Video isn’t the future. It’s today.”

No, this line didn’t emerge on a slip of paper from a fortune cookie. It’s the opening salvo in Wistia’s 2025 State of Video Report, which just hit the airwaves this morning.

Oracles and crystal balls aside, the observation can’t be overstated. Video has never been more relevant or relied on by marketers and brands. According to Wistia’s research, there were more videos created, played, and watched in 2024 – reflecting the world’s voracious appetite for moving pictures.

And why not? Our brains are built to consume video content more efficiently. In fact, some prolific research from 3M concluded that we process visual elements 60,000 times faster than text. That means brands can pack a lot more content into video knowing we can handle the workload.  

If you’re not familiar with Wistia, it’s a complete video marketing platform that helps teams create, host, market, and measure their videos and webinars – all in one place. They’ve been tapped into the video game since 2006, when founders Chris Savage and Brendan Schwartz launched the company from their living room with an early focus on hosting and analytics. 

Since then, Wistia’s ecosystem of capabilities has grown. Today, the company supports over 425,000 marketers around the world to make professional videos, facilitate webinars, collect and send leads to marketing automation platforms, and other resources that leverage video as a growth activator. 

Wistia’s State of Video report is always comprehensive and enlightening, and the latest edition is no exception. The data was culled from over 14 million videos, 100,000 businesses, and a customer survey of 1,300 professionals. The package is attractively designed (dare I say “fun”?) and easy to digest – and this year’s 45-page PDF gives you quick exposure to the big picture takeaways. It also includes insights from leading service providers like 3Play Media, DropBox, Semrush, and Superside.

To borrow from an old-school NBC tagline, it’s “Must See TV.”  

What really pops in this year’s research? The undeniable surge in the use of AI in video production and how it’s empowering marketers to create high-quality videos faster and more seamlessly. There are some other juicy data morsels, but it’s clear that AI is having a sort of ripple effect on marketers and how they make videos – literally enabling anyone, at any technical level, to produce video content.

“AI is completely changing the game for video. The barriers to video creation are disappearing. Now, anyone (not just pros) can make high-quality videos.”

"AI is completely changing the game for video," said Savage, who, in addition to co-founding the company, serves as Wistia's CEO. "The barriers to video creation are disappearing. Now, anyone (not just pros) can make high-quality videos. And it's not just creation. AI-driven tools like dubbing and translation are making it easier than ever for brands to reach global audiences. We're at a turning point. Video is about to get a whole lot more dynamic, engaging, and impactful."

Video is central to a majority of modern digital experiences, and thus a connected resource for marketing platforms like HubSpot, Adobe Marketo, Salesforce Pardot, and more (all platforms that integrate with Wistia, BTW). So there’s a clear benefit to analyzing the impact of video trends and how it’s shaping the broader martech ecosystem.

Aside from the early economic turmoil we’ve experienced in 2025 (vis-à-vis tariffs and the like), the report suggests that video budgets are continuing to march higher as marketers realize strong engagement and conversions across their lead generation programs.

Let’s unpack more of the hits on the video playlist.

The AI effect: Faster, smarter, more accessible videos

We all know how AI is roiling across the DX toolkit at a breakneck pace. Every CMS, DXP, and related technology in our corner of the ecosystem has introduced its own flavor of AI-enhanced features – with a maturing focus on high-utility applications. 

As open-source models for video generation have exploded, AI video tools are becoming less complex with a much smaller learning curve. In essence, AI is making up the shortfall for marketers who don’t have the technical know-how to leverage more complicated production tools Adobe Premiere or After Effects. This empowers them to become video creators without the need for expert resources. 

Wistia’s 2025 report codified that brands are investing quickly and heavily in AI. 41% are using it for video creation, more than doubling from 2024. For brands and teams using AI, the focus has been on pre-production planning – things like scripting and brainstorming – or post-production editing, which includes voice dubbing, captioning, or visual creation. 

Source: Wistia report

Captions are a big one, specifically from an ADA accessibility perspective. AI tools have been saving practitioners huge amounts of time by directly auto-generating transcripts in tools like Canva and natively in social platforms like YouTube or LinkedIn. Since 2021, the use of captions in videos has increased by an astonishing 572% – making it the most widely adopted video accessibility feature among marketers. 

According to the report, over 60% of respondents said they have used or plan to use AI captions for their videos, followed by voice dubbing at 38% and language translation at 31%. Generating clips might be far behind at 24%, but we can expect to see that increase as video platforms like Sora and even foundation models like Amazon Nova become more widely adopted.

Focusing on engagement and conversion rates

There are some solid bits in the report about the impact of video on engagement and conversion rates. These terms are used broadly across the marketing landscape but have specific meaning within the video lexicon. 

Here’s a quick primer: The engagement rate is determined based on the average amount of a video that a viewer has watched; the conversion rate is the percentage of viewers who take action based on a video’s interactive element (like a button or link). These metrics serve as key indicators of what video types and lengths perform best.

As video marketing continues to evolve, 34% of respondents rank engagement rate as the number one success metric for their videos, with conversion rates falling slightly behind at 29%. 

There's more, and I love how actionable these data points are. So grab your virtual highlighter – here are some key stats you can sink your teeth into: 

• Short and sweet is the winner: The report found that videos under 1 minute had the highest average engagement rates (50%), followed by 1 to 3 minutes (46%) and 3 to 5 minutes (45%). 
• Overall video engagement is dragging at a four-year low: It turns out that 3-to-5-minute videos have seen the steepest decline (10%). Why? The report suggests this precipitous drop could be a result of growth in short-form content (think micro videos for social) as well as viewers developing higher standards for quality video content. That said, marketers continue to realize high levels of engagement on medium-length (5-30 minutes) and long-form videos (30-60 minutes).
• “How-to videos” are still riding high with the best engagement: Shorter videos (under 1 minute) have reached an 82% engagement rate, while longer videos (5-30 minutes) are holding steady at 58%. Company culture, educational, and product videos also saw around 50% engagement rate for videos under a minute, 1 to 3 minutes, and 3 to 5 minutes.
• Marketers are seeing the highest impact from well-placed CTAs: For example, in short videos under 60 seconds, CTAs placed in the first quarter of the video converted nearly 40% of viewers. Also, despite a decline in lead gen forms within videos, conversion rates have jumped by 11% over the past year. 

Economic winds shift, but video keeps sailing 

As I stated earlier, this first quarter's economic crash – largely a reflection of uncertainty regarding U.S. fiscal policy – has had an immediate chilling effect on a range of business investments. As is traditionally the case, marketing and advertising budgets realize an outsized impact during these periods. 

A pullback typically manifests in cuts to a brand’s marketing budgets. However, creative agencies are often canaries in the coal mine. In fact, Manga Group (part of media giant Interpublic) just trimmed its 2025 forecast, citing economic factors and the corresponding dip in consumer confidence. 

All that said, video appears to be a diamond in the recessionary rough. Wistia’s report stated that only 5% of companies are reducing their video budget this year, while over half (57%) are investing more in video. 

The report also dives into some of the main drivers influencing video production. Last year, brands were prioritizing educational, product, and social media videos – which was reflected in the explosion of platforms like TikTok. From a strategic perspective, 60% of these initiatives were energized by company goals and objectives, with slightly less on product or service launches.

Despite the significant potential for AI to expand video creation, businesses are still getting clogged up in a few key areas. According to the report, 58% of respondents said that company size and the availability of resources is a common inhibitor, with 38% citing cost and 25% technical capabilities and proficiency. 

On an encouraging note: Most companies aren’t treading whitewater with generating ideas or even securing buy-in from executives or team leaders for creating more videos.

Webinars are still rollin'

While product videos remain at the top of the popularity list, webinars continue to be one of the most impactful forms of video for brands and organizations. True, they might have lost some luster in recent years – but the rise of more accessible tools (like ON24, Wistia, and Zoom), a lower bar to manage and facilitate, and a cheaper price tag have made them undeniably attractive as part of an integrated mix.

According to the report, nearly half of all companies host a webinar at least once a month. The most popular types of webinars focus on educating viewers, with 60% of content focused on training or coaching sessions. This is followed by thought leadership and product demo content.

Source: Wistia report

Statistically, webinars continue to draw, which is also a big part of their success. In general, 30%-40% of people who sign up for a webinar actually show up. And unlike ads, webinars keep delivering value long after they’re over, serving as marketing assets in expanded campaigns.

If you’ve attended a number of webinars, you might notice some variability relative to quality. That might be due to lean resources, given the cost to operate and deliver a decent product. According to the data, even though webinars do deliver results, many companies still run them on slim budgets – often with just one person in charge.

Why it matters

There’s a quote early in the report from Piotr Smietana, Director of Brand and Marketing Creative at Superside:

“Video is no longer just a part of the strategy. It is the strategy.”

That couldn’t be truer. Video is an immersive sensory experience, and it continues to differentiate its value on a multitude of levels. Given the efficiencies of modern tools, it has never been more accessible to a wider breadth of organizations. In fact, a single practitioner can now deliver the same quality of video output as a large, well-funded enterprise – so this represents a tipping point in expanding video production.

As reflected in Wistia’s findings, AI is already proving to be a force multiplier, making the technical bar much lower and almost non-existent in some cases – thus democratizing the video creation ecosystem. 

We can expect further disruption in the months ahead, and the 2026 report could feature some startling advancements. I would expect significant gains in the field of generative clips, which will face many of the same questions around copyright that generative images do. Pay close attention to Adobe and stock platforms like Shutterstock that are training their models on existing catalogs to instill confidence in their AI output.

Automation aside, you still need real creativity driving the ship – and keeping a “human in the loop” aligns with what we see in the broader content industry, where AI is enabling creative professionals to do more with the less.

Wistia’s State of Video report is always a welcomed review of where video is at, and how we might predict where it’s heading. It’s a quick and enjoyable read, chock full of actionable insights that can impact your video efforts today. I highly recommend downloading the full report here. 

Upcoming Events

The Composable Conference 2025

April 22-24 – Chicago, USA

Experience the future of composable and MACH principles in “The Windy City” and dive even deeper into the innovative world of MACH architecture and its benefits for your business. Building on the momentum of MACH THREE, this conference will provide your teams with the expert, impartial guidance needed to craft a winning transformation strategy and leverage the latest advancements in automation and Al to maximize efficiency and drive your organization forward. This event is ideal for executives, business leaders, technologists, and everyone in between who is looking to harness the power of composable. Secure your spot today.

CMS Summit 25

May 13-14, 2025 – Frankfurt, Germany

Don't miss the first European edition of our prestigious international conference dedicated to the global content management community! CMS Summit 25 will bring together top-notch speakers, our renowned learning format, and engaging social events. Hear from leading practitioners like Deutsche Bahn, Dr. Oetker, and more – and join customers, agencies, and CMS vendors as we discuss current trends and what's ahead for the content and digital experience fields. Connect and network at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference focused on CMS. Space is limited for this exclusive event, so book your seats today.

CMS Connect 25

August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, Canada

We are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, so book your seats today.