Google DV360 vs Halliard: Which Media Planning Tool Is Right for You? (2026)

Google Display & Video 360 (DV360) occupies a specific and powerful position in the media buying stack: it’s the enterprise DSP that gives advertisers and agencies exclusive access to YouTube inventory while connecting programmatic buying to Google Analytics 360, Google Ads, and Campaign Manager 360 in a unified platform. If your media ecosystem runs on Google Marketing Platform, DV360 is the natural home for programmatic execution.

Halliard doesn’t compete for YouTube inventory or Google ecosystem integration. It competes for the strategic planning layer that sits upstream of DV360 — where you’re deciding how to allocate budget across YouTube, the open internet, linear TV, CTV, paid social, and audio before any DSP is activated.

The comparison is worth making because many media teams default to doing their planning inside DV360 or Google Ads simply because it’s where they already live. That often means planning decisions get made within the constraints of a single ecosystem when they should be made across the full media landscape.

What Is Google DV360?

Google Display & Video 360 is Google’s enterprise demand-side platform within the Google Marketing Platform. It provides end-to-end campaign management across media planning, programmatic buying, creative development, audience management, and measurement — all tightly integrated with Google’s broader marketing stack.

DV360’s core advantages are its YouTube exclusivity, its integration depth within Google’s ecosystem, and its AI capabilities. The platform provides access to 90+ ad exchanges for open internet buying, plus exclusive YouTube placements (including YouTube TV) that aren’t accessible through other DSPs. AI Audience Persona tools and targeting templates streamline campaign setup. Demand Gen campaigns extend into Gmail and Google Discover.

Pricing is contract-based: DV360 charges 10–15% of media spend with a minimum monthly commitment typically starting at $50,000+. The platform is designed for enterprise organizations running significant programmatic budgets with dedicated platform operations teams.

What Is Halliard?

Halliard is a media planning and buying platform built for independent agencies and in-house teams managing $10M to $500M+ in annual spend. Built by Matthew Jacobs — 15+ years across Starcom, Dentsu (SVP Product), Amazon DSP (Senior PM), and Paramount — the platform puts planning first.

Halliard starts with the strategic question — how to allocate budget across 18+ channels — and provides the cross-channel reach and frequency analysis to validate that allocation via a proprietary 10,000-person panel across 210 DMAs. Approval workflows, budget tracking, and native channel integrations complete the plan-to-proof workflow. In December 2025, Halliard completed the first fully autonomous media buy via Model Context Protocol (MCP) with PubMatic.

Halliard starts free with no credit card required.

Comparison Table

Where Google DV360 Wins

YouTube at scale. DV360 is the only DSP that provides full programmatic access to YouTube’s inventory at enterprise scale. YouTube is the world’s largest video platform — 2+ billion monthly active users, with engagement data that makes audience targeting uniquely effective. For brands where YouTube is a material line item in the media plan, DV360’s exclusive access is a real advantage.

Google Marketing Platform integration. The native connections between DV360, Google Analytics 360, Google Ads, and Campaign Manager 360 create a closed-loop data system. Audience segments from Analytics activate in DV360. Conversion data from Campaign Manager flows back into bidding optimization. Attribution models span search, display, and video in a unified view. For organizations that have standardized on GMP, this integration is genuinely valuable.

Scale of exchange access. 90+ ad exchanges in a single platform, plus exclusive Google inventory, gives DV360 reach across virtually every programmatic inventory environment. For campaigns where scale of reach is the primary objective, DV360’s exchange relationships matter.

AI Audience Persona tools. The AI-generated audience targeting personas and templates reduce the complexity of setting up sophisticated programmatic campaigns. For teams running high volumes of campaigns, this kind of operational efficiency multiplies quickly.

Demand Gen campaigns. DV360’s Demand Gen format reaches users across YouTube, Gmail, and Google Discover simultaneously — a Google-exclusive advertising unit that extends video and display campaigns into Google’s owned properties beyond YouTube.

Where Halliard Wins

Cross-channel planning that includes Google but doesn’t stop there. DV360 is excellent at planning within the Google ecosystem. It doesn’t help you decide how much of your total media budget should go to DV360 vs. Amazon DSP, vs. The Trade Desk, vs. Meta, vs. linear TV. Halliard answers the allocation question before any single platform is activated.

Cross-channel R+F beyond the Google walled garden. DV360’s audience forecasting works within Google’s data environment. Halliard’s proprietary 10,000-person panel across 210 DMAs provides unduplicated cross-channel reach modeling — how many unique people will your combined DV360 + Amazon DSP + Meta + linear TV plan reach, without double-counting overlap? That’s the question that determines media plan efficiency, and it can’t be answered within DV360 alone.

No $50K monthly minimum. DV360’s minimum commitment is $50,000+/month. For independent agencies and mid-market in-house teams, that threshold is prohibitive. Halliard’s free plan has no minimum.

Walled-garden agnosticism. DV360 is built to favor investment in Google’s ecosystem — that’s its function and its business model. Halliard is channel-agnostic: it connects to Google, Meta, TikTok, Spotify, Netflix, YouTube, Twitch, and Amazon with equal weight in the planning workflow. For advertisers trying to make unbiased allocation decisions, a planning tool with no inventory interest is more trustworthy.

Agentic buying from the plan. DV360’s AI operates within the programmatic execution layer. Halliard’s December 2025 PubMatic MCP integration executed the actual buy — from plan to transaction — autonomously. These are different layers of automation.

Approval and governance infrastructure. The structured approval workflow, version history, and budget authorization documentation in Halliard address a real operational need that DV360 doesn’t serve. Getting a multi-channel media plan approved by a CMO before launch requires organizational infrastructure beyond what a buying platform provides.

Feature-by-Feature Breakdown

Programmatic Buying

Google DV360 provides access to 90+ ad exchanges plus exclusive YouTube and Google-owned inventory. Supports display, video, CTV, audio, DOOH, and native formats with AI-powered bidding optimization.

Halliard connects to 18+ channel platforms for execution including Google (YouTube, programmatic), Meta, TikTok, and others. Agentic buying via PubMatic MCP enables autonomous plan-to-buy transactions.

Audience Targeting

Google DV360 integrates Google’s first-party data, Analytics 360 audiences, and AI Persona tools for targeting. Access to Google’s cross-device identity graph for audience resolution.

Halliard uses a proprietary 10,000-person panel for cross-channel reach modeling at planning stage, and connects to platform-specific audiences through integrations.

Creative Development

Google DV360 includes Studio for dynamic and rich media creative development, and integrates with Google’s creative optimization tools for A/B testing and dynamic creative.

Halliard focuses on planning and workflow; creative production is handled within channel platforms.

Measurement

Google DV360 provides attribution across the Google stack — connecting impressions, clicks, and conversions through Campaign Manager 360 and Analytics 360.

Halliard provides real-time plan-to-delivered spend tracking across all channel integrations, with historical benchmarking against past campaigns.

Pricing

Google DV360 charges 10–15% of media spend with a $50K+/month minimum commitment.

Halliard offers a free plan for individual planners with no credit card required, and premium tiers for teams and agencies.

Best Fit Scenarios

Choose Google DV360 if:

• YouTube is a significant part of your media plan and you need programmatic access at scale
• Your organization has committed to Google Marketing Platform as the media infrastructure
• Enterprise integration between DV360, Analytics 360, and Campaign Manager 360 is a priority
• Your monthly programmatic budget clears $50K, making the minimum commitment viable
• Cross-device measurement and attribution within Google’s identity ecosystem matters

Choose Halliard if:

• You need to plan across all channels — Google and non-Google — before deciding how to allocate
• Cross-channel reach and frequency analysis across TV, CTV, digital, social, and audio is a planning requirement
• Your media budget doesn’t support the $50K+/month DV360 minimum
• You want a channel-agnostic planning tool that doesn’t have an inventory interest in where you spend
• Approval workflows, institutional knowledge retention, and organizational governance matter

The Conflict of Interest Question

There’s a structural question worth raising directly: when you plan media inside DV360, you’re using a tool built by a company that benefits from your investment in Google’s inventory. That doesn’t make DV360 a bad tool — it’s excellent at what it does. But it does mean the planning recommendations and forecasting models are built by a party with a financial interest in where you allocate budget.

Halliard has no inventory. The platform doesn’t benefit from you allocating more budget to Google versus Meta versus The Trade Desk. The planning analysis is channel-agnostic by design, which is a meaningful distinction when you’re trying to make unbiased decisions about a $10M media budget.

FAQ

Does DV360 require a minimum spend? Yes. Google Display & Video 360 typically requires a minimum monthly media spend commitment of $50,000+, plus a 10–15% platform fee on that spend. This makes DV360 inaccessible for smaller agencies and brands with limited programmatic budgets. Halliard offers a free plan with no minimum.

Can DV360 access all YouTube inventory? DV360 provides programmatic access to YouTube inventory at enterprise scale, including YouTube TV. Some YouTube advertising (such as basic video campaigns) is also available through Google Ads directly, but DV360 provides the most comprehensive programmatic access to YouTube’s full inventory.

Is DV360 part of Google Marketing Platform? Yes. Display & Video 360 is one of several products in Google Marketing Platform (GMP), which also includes Google Analytics 360, Campaign Manager 360, Search Ads 360, and Data Studio. GMP is Google’s enterprise marketing suite for large advertisers and agencies.

Does Halliard compete with DV360 for programmatic inventory? No. Halliard is a planning and workflow platform, not a bidding platform. It doesn’t compete for programmatic inventory. The relationship is complementary: Halliard handles upstream planning and cross-channel R+F analysis; DV360 handles programmatic execution within the Google ecosystem.

Can I start Halliard without a DV360 account? Yes. Halliard works independently of any DSP or platform account. Start at halliardmedia.com/trytoday — no credit card, no platform prerequisites required.

Explore More Comparisons

• Adobe Advertising Cloud vs Halliard — Another enterprise DSP vs. planning OS
• The Trade Desk vs Halliard — Independent DSP vs. planning-first workflow
• Amazon DSP vs Halliard — First-party data DSP vs. cross-channel planning
• Basis vs Halliard — Agency DSP vs. planning workflow
• Full Media Planning Tools Directory — All platforms rated and compared

Planning a media mix that includes YouTube and much more? Start cross-channel planning for free at halliardmedia.com/trytoday.