Ads

Why can't I see my ad?Print
There are several common reasons you may be unable to see your ad. To help you determine why, we've developed a great tool:


Use the Ads Diagnostic Tool to learn the exact reason why you can't see your ads.

You can also get an instant diagnosis for any keyword by first clicking the Campaigns tab, and then the Keywords tab. Click the speech bubble icon next to any keyword, and more information will appear.
To preview your ad, use the Ad Preview tool instead of performing a regular Google search. When you search for your ad multiple times on Google, it can affect your ad position by racking up many ad impressions and lowering your clickthrough rate (CTR); so use the Ad Preview tool instead.

Or, click the situation below that best describes you, and review some of the possible reasons why you may not see your ad:

I just created an ad and can't see it yet.

No Billing Information
Your AdWords ads can't begin running until you enter valid billing information in your account. If you pay with credit card or other postpay option, your account will be activated once you submit billing information. Depending on the processing time associated with your payment option, your ads may begin showing and accruing costs immediately. If you pay with bank transfer or another form of prepayment, your ads won't run until we receive and process your first payment. This can take 8-10 days (and occasionally more) after you've submitted your billing information and made your first payment. To enter your billing information, sign in to your AdWords account and click the Billing tab. Then select Billing preferences and enter your billing information.

Ad Approval Status
All ads must comply with our advertising policies. While some ads may run on Google prior to review, others may not run at all before being reviewed and approved by an AdWords Specialist. If your ad is awaiting review, we'll get to it as soon as we can. While your ad is in queue, you can review our advertising guidelines to ensure that your ad complies. Also, note that no ads will show on the Google Network until after being reviewed and approved.

Ad Location
Search network ads typically appear to the right of, or above, search results on Google or search partner sites. If your Ad Rank is not high enough to place your ad on the first page of search results for a certain keyword, it may appear on a subsequent search result page. To see additional pages of ads, click 'Next' at the bottom of the page, or click the 'More Sponsored Links' link below the column of ads.

If you want your ad to show closer to or on the first page more often, you can improve your Ad Rank by optimizing your campaign and/or increasing your cost-per-click (CPC) bids. The First Page Bid column on your 'Ad Group Details' page, under the 'Keywords' tab, estimates the CPC bid you'd need for your ad to appear on the first page. Note that this amount depends on the keyword's Quality Score - the higher the Quality Score, the lower the first page bid estimate, and vice versa.

Server Delay
There may be a brief delay after you create your ads but before the time they are actually shown. Sometimes it takes our servers longer than usual to upload and prepare to serve your ads. Try checking for your ad again after a few hours have elapsed.


I've seen my ad before, but I can't anymore.

Daily Budget
If your daily budget is set lower than the recommended amount, the AdWords system may slow or even stop the delivery of your ad for that day in order to stay within your budget. Depending on the delivery option you've set, your ad delivery may be spread out over the day or your ad may stop showing earlier in the day as soon as your budget is reached. To maximize your ad visibility, consider changing your daily budget to meet the recommended amount.

Disapproved Ad
If an ad doesn't meet our advertising policies, we'll stop your ad from running, and you'll see the word Disapproved listed below that ad.
You can use filters to identify your disapproved ads and why they were disapproved. Then click the 'Edit' link next to your ad to make the appropriate changes. If this is the case, please make the needed edits and save the changes to automatically resubmit your ad to us for review.


Keyword Performance
If a keyword underperforms, its Quality Score will decrease and it may become ineligible to trigger your ads for certain search queries at its current cost-per-click (CPC) bid. This most often happens to keywords that are very general and therefore do not perform very well. For instance, a keyword with a low Quality Score may only be eligible to trigger ads on certain variations of your broad- or phrase-matched keywords. To monitor your keyword's performance, check the 'Quality Score' column on the 'Keywords' tab of your Ad Group Details page. Or, to get a detailed view of performance and Quality Score, visit the Keyword Analysis page by clicking the magnifying glass icon beside the keyword you're interested in.
If your keyword has a poor Quality Score and isn't accruing much traffic, try following these optimization tips to improve your Quality Scores, or try raising the keyword's CPC bid. We want to give users a positive ad experience while keeping your costs low, so we encourage you to try optimizing your account before paying more.



My ad's running and accruing statistics, but I've never been able to see it.

Geo-Targeting
You can target your campaign to specific languages, countries and territories, regions, and cities. If you don't target your own geographical area and the language of your Google interface, you won't be able to see your ad. (For instance, if you're in London and you've targeted your ads to Tokyo only, you won't see your ad when you search for it in London.) If you're targeting a region or city, we show ads based on a user's internet protocol (IP) address. Sometimes we're unable to obtain IP information. In this case, we'd be unable to identify the user's location and therefore wouldn't recognize which regional ads to deliver. If we can't determine the user's location, we'll show nationally-targeted ads instead of regionally-targeted ads. Also see Why can't I see my regionally targeted or customized ads?

Language Targeting
You can target your campaign to specific languages, which means that your ads are only visible to users whose Google interface is set to one of these languages. You can view your Google interface language setting by clicking the 'Preferences' link to the right of the Search Box on the Google homepage. If your Google interface language isn't included in your campaign language targeting selection, you may want to edit your campaign language targeting in order to see your ad. You can also edit your Google interface language setting by selecting the appropriate language from the dropdown menu and clicking 'Save Preferences.'

Campaign Ad Scheduling
If your campaign has ad scheduling enabled, make sure you are looking for your ad during the days and times when it is scheduled to run.


I can't see my ad on the Google Network.

Google Network
Your ad will not show on sites and products in the content and search networks until it has been reviewed and approved according to our advertising policies. Therefore, image ads, video ads, and other multimedia ads won't begin running until after review and approval. Your ad may not appear on Google Network sites if its Ad Rank is too low. In this case, improving your Quality Score through optimization, or raising your CPC or CPM bids, can help increase your Ad Rank. In addition, some sites in our network may restrict advertising or keywords based on their own policies regarding content and editorial standards. In this case, your ad may not appear on a content or search site even if you have chosen keywords which seem to match it. Also see How can I make sure my ads appear on the Google Network?


Image Ad
Image ads will only run on content network sites, and must be reviewed and approved before they will appear. The format of the ad you're running must match the size and format accepted by each website. For example, if you've uploaded a 160x600 wide skyscraper ad, make sure the site you're looking for your ad on runs ads in that format. Also see Why isn't my image ad showing?

Placements
If you are targeting placements in your campaign, and your campaign setting is 'Relevant pages only on the placements I target', your ad will appear only on the websites you specify. Those websites must be part of the Google Network. Make sure you're looking for your ad on one of the sites you selected. In addition, your bid may be too low to win impressions on the site or sites you have chosen. This is especially likely if you have targeted popular sites that many other advertisers may also have targeted. Raising your bids may help your ad appear more often. It's also possible that your ad simply isn't showing at the moment you view the page.