LONDON: Advertising expenditure in the UK rose at its fastest rate in three years during the third quarter of 2013, new figures have shown.

Data in the quarterly Expenditure Report from the Advertising Association and Warc, the definitive guide to advertising in the UK, show that adspend for the July-to-September period was up 5.5% year on year to reach £4,173m, the highest growth rate since the last quarter of 2010.

Growth was driven by internet and TV advertising, up 13.7% and 14.5% respectively. The latter's recovery followed a comparatively weak third quarter in 2012 when advertisers had shifted budgets to avoid the Olympic Games which were being shown on the licence-fee funded BBC.

All other media saw year-on-year declines, with cinema (-8.1%) and newsbrands (-6.9%), worst hit. Out of home (-4.8%), radio (-4.3%) and magazine brands (-2.2%) suffered to a lesser extent. Out of home actually performed better than expected as a double digit drop had been predicted following an exceptional 25% rise in the equivalent quarter of 2012, again attributable to the effect of the Olympic Games.

A strong overall quarterly performance, coupled with an improving economic outlook, has meant growth forecasts for the full year being revised upwards by 0.5 percentage points to 3.8%, while those for 2014 have edged up 0.1 percentage points to 5.3%.

In monetary terms, UK adspend is now expected to reach a total of £17,838m in 2013 and £18,786m in 2014.

The more optimistic future does not extend to all sectors, however. Newsbrands and magazine brands are still expected to see negative growth in 2014, albeit the respective rates of -1.0% and -1.3% are far less than those for 2013 (-6.6% and -5.0%).

Data sourced from Advertising Association, Warc