Understanding The Ad Library

In a new series called Securing Our Technologies with More Authenticity and Transparency, we take a look at the industry-leading level of transparency we provide around political, electoral and issue advertising. In this edition, we discuss the Ad Library, Report and application programming interface (API).

The Ad Library is our most comprehensive ads transparency resource, providing a searchable view of ads, inclusive of ads about social issues, elections or politics, across Facebook and Instagram. This includes spend range, reach and key details about the organization or person responsible for each ad.

For longer-term transparency and to help hold advertisers and Facebook accountable, we store all active and inactive ads about social issues, elections or politics with "paid for by" disclaimers in the Ad Library for seven years. Ads that run without a disclaimer will also be added to the Ad Library.

Viewing ads about social issues, elections or politics

Your community can search ads by Page name or keyword, and filter by:

• Country
• Page Name
• Status (Active or inactive)
• Disclaimers

When a person clicks on "See Ad Details" for an ad, they'll see some of the following information:

• Active or inactive: People can see when an ad started running and whether or not it's currently running.
• Disapproved notice: If an ad in the Ad Library was active but then became disapproved (e.g., for not including a necessary "Paid for by" disclaimer or for violating Advertising Policies), it'll show as "disapproved" in the Ad Library.
• Impressions: People can see a range for the number of impressions the ad received (e.g. 1K-5K), not the exact number.
• Amount spent: People can see a range for the amount spent on the ad (e.g. $1K-$5K USD), not the exact amount.
• Demographic information (age and gender): People can see the percent of people by age and gender who saw an ad.
• Location: People can see information about the location(s) where the ad was viewed.

For more information on the Ad Library, you can visit our Help Center. If you have questions, reach out to our team.

For more information on the Ad Library, you can visit our Help Center. If you have questions, reach out to our team.