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Reference library · Cross-media measurement
Net Reach (Deduplicated Reach)
Net reach is the unduplicated count or percentage of individuals in the target audience exposed at least once to a campaign across all channels combined, with anyone exposed on multiple channels counted only once. It answers 'how many different people did this plan touch,' not 'how many exposures did it generate.'
Formula
Worked example
A campaign runs on TV and digital video against a target audience of 5,000,000 adults 18-49 in a mid-size European market. TV reaches 45% (2,250,000 people), digital reaches 30% (1,500,000 people), and single-source panel data shows 15% (750,000 people) were exposed on both. Net reach = 45% + 30% − 15% = 60%, or 3,000,000 people — meaning the plan touched 3 million distinct individuals, 750,000 fewer than the 3,750,000 you'd get by naively adding the two channel reaches.
How it is used
Net reach is calculated from single-source panel data, data fusion, or probabilistic device-graph modeling that can identify the same person across TV and digital exposure logs; it is the headline metric for justifying a cross-channel plan over a single-channel one, since it shows incremental audience rather than incremental impressions. The recurring mistake is treating channel-level reach as additive and skipping the overlap term entirely, which happens when planners don't have (or don't ask for) actual cross-channel identity matching and just add percentages from separate media reports.
The common mistake
Net reach is not the sum of each channel's individual reach; it is that sum minus the overlap, and skipping the overlap term overstates true audience reach.