Why transit
Transit puts your message where people travel every day — on the sides of buses snaking through neighborhoods, in subway cars where riders stare at the walls for 20 minutes, and across entire stations. It reaches drivers, pedestrians and riders, and covers whole urban markets on modest budgets.
Bus advertising
King, Queen & Tail panels
Standardized frames on buses: kings (street side, ~30' × 2.5'), queens (curb side, ~12' × 2.5'), tails (rear, ~21" × 70") and headlights (front). Usually sold in packages by route or garage.
- Moving coverage across neighborhoods
- Seen by drivers and pedestrians
- Low CPMs
- Limited route control
- Smaller copy area
Full & partial bus wraps
Vinyl covering the whole bus (windows use perforated see-through film). The most dramatic transit format.
- Rolling billboard impact
- Highly memorable
- Higher production costs
- Long minimums
Interior cards
Car cards above the windows inside buses and trains, read by seated and standing riders.
- Long reading time
- Very low cost per unit
- Smaller audience per card
Subway, metro & commuter rail
Station posters & dominations
Platform posters (2-sheets, 4-sheets), digital urban panels, and "station dominations" that take over every surface — turnstiles, stairs, columns, floors and screens.
- Commuter frequency every day
- Total brand takeover possible
- Premium stations sell out
- Production intensive
Train wraps & car brandings
Exterior and interior wraps of entire trains or cars, including commuter rail like Metro-North and LIRR.
- Immersive, social-media friendly
- Limited availability
- Long lead times
Taxi, rideshare & truckside
Taxi & rideshare toppers
Roof-mounted static or digital toppers on cabs and rideshare vehicles, often GPS-targeted to show ads in specific neighborhoods and hours. Interior back-seat screens are also available in taxis.
- Geo-targeted in real time
- Eye level for pedestrians
- Small creative area
Truckside & fleet advertising
Ads on the sides of delivery trucks and trailers that travel regional routes. See also mobile billboards and vehicle wraps.
- Huge creative area at low cost
- Routes not fully controllable
How transit is sold
Most transit systems contract a single media company to sell their inventory — for example, OUTFRONT Media handles the MTA in New York and several other systems; Intersection, Vector Media, Lamar Transit and others represent many U.S. agencies. Buy packages by number of buses/cards, by route or garage, or by "showing" (percentage of the fleet). Expect transit-authority creative review and longer lead times for wraps.
Recommended tools
QR Code Generator PRO ↗
Dynamic QR codes with scan analytics for transit, shelters, kiosks and place-based ads.
CallRail ↗
Unique tracking phone numbers per board or format to prove which placements make the phone ring.
Some links are partner links; we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. All tools
Price out your campaign
Plug in impressions, CPM and flight length to see a realistic budget.