You need to know these Facebook Ads formats!

The Online-Marketing of your company includes ads on social media platforms? If not, you should use this opportunity to gain more reach in the right target groups. For the Show on Facebook and Instagram you can different placements to present your brand in the social media area. For these, different Ad formats and image sizes for the advertising materials so that they can be optimally displayed on social media platforms.

Which placements and image sizes are particularly relevant depends partly on the target group dependent. We have summarized the most important formats and information for presenting your products in this article.

Facebook Ads Placements

You are probably familiar with the most common rankings, as you can read about them on a daily basis sponsored content encounters.
These include:

• Facebook News Feed
• Facebook Right Column
• Facebook and Instagram Stories
• Instagram Explore
• Instagram Feed
• Audience Network
• Facebook Messenger

To find the right placement for your Marketing to reach your customers, it is important to have the necessary Pictures taking into account the ad formats in the Ads Manager. This way you can achieve the maximum Range achieve.

For the ads, a maximum text length recommended. This includes the text above (Facebook) or below (Instagram) the ad (primary text), the text next to the call to action button (title) and the description, which is not displayed for all placements and is optional.

Recommendations for maximum text length:

Primary Text: 125 characters
Title: 40 characters
Description: 30 characters

In principle, more text can be inserted. However, whether this produces good results should be determined for each individual target group be tested. Some potential customers prefer longer textswith important information about your company or your product. Others, however, are short ad text more.

To ensure that your ads, whether image or video, are displayed correctly and nothing is cut off or distorted, the different placements certain dimensions be respected.

Facebook News Feed

The ads in the Facebook News Feed are very similar to the organic contributions in your presentation. This means that users do not immediately perceive a good ad as annoying advertising.

The following should be considered for the desired display of the ads:
Dimensions: 1,91:1 bis 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

To save space in the feed on the Desktop To fully utilize the screen, we recommend choosing the aspect ratio 1.91:1. mobile device the 1:1 variant is displayed optimally.

Facebook News Feed Ad

When creating the ads, you can Ads Manager store multiple formats so that the correct format is used for each placement. To do this, first upload an image or video and then click on “edit” in the ad preview. There you can upload an additional format by clicking on “change”.

For more tips on working in Ads Manager, see our separate Blog article about Ads Manager.

After uploading the additional format, the variants will be displayed in the Ads Manager to the left of the preview for the respective placement. You can read how to create your first campaign in our Facebook Ads guide.

Story Ads

The Story ad offers the advantage of taking up the user’s entire screen with your advertising. You don’t pay any more for this placement than for other placements, so you should take advantage of this benefit of undivided attention. Whether you use a video or a static image for your ads is irrelevant for the dimensions. They are the same for both variants.

The following dimensions are necessary for the Story Ad on Facebook and Instagram:

Dimensions: 9:16 Portrait
Resolution: mindestens 1080 x 1080 Pixel

In a story ad, a primaries Text displayed, but the text can only be placed to a limited extent. We recommend embedding the text on the ad image or in the video.

When using the story format, it is also important to note that the top and bottom 250px clear and no text should be inserted there. Otherwise, it can happen that the account logo and the call to action with the swipe up cover it in the final display on the platform.

Facebook Story Ad

Instagram Story Ad

Facebook right column

Die right column Users encounter it on the homepage and remain static while scrolling through the news feed.

Only images can be used in this placement. The text shown on the right corresponds the title the ad.

The following measurements are required here:

Dimensions: 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

Instagram Explore

Instagram Explore is the placement in the feed of the page that the user can see via the Lupe below in the Menu bar This is based on posts you have interacted with and which accounts you follow. Instagram Explore suggests content and accounts to users that you might be of interest.

The dimensions for this placement are standard for Instagram content:

Dimensions: 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

Instagram Feed

In the Instagram feed, sponsored posts are displayed between the organic posts and especially when the user has viewed all new posts and is “up to date”. Since the posts are placed in the feed, the same applies here:

Dimensions: 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

In-Stream-Videos

Advertising on Facebook can also be done in between in Videos The in-stream video placement is used for this. After the ad has been displayed, a Bannerwhich for example leads to a landing page while the original video continues to play normally.

The dimensions are the same as for a normal feed ad:

Dimensions: 1,91:1 bis 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

Messenger Placement

In Facebook Messenger, you can also send messages in the story and between the Chats Advertisements are placed. The advertisements can clicked so that they appear a little larger. Facebook uses the following dimensions for Messenger placement:

Dimensions: 1:1
Resolution: 1080 x 1080 Pixel

For the Messenger Story As with the other stories, the aspect ratio is 9:16.

With the Messenger placements you can also reach your target group in the Messenger App The messenger is used to communicate with friends when the user is not checking the news feed for the latest posts.

Audience Network

The Audience Network consists of various apps and websites on which Facebook displays the ads outside the platform can play out. Which sites belong to the Audience Networkanyone with a business profile can view it by downloading the publisher list.

The following dimensions are used:

Dimensions: 9:16
Resolution: 398 x 208 Pixel

By the Audience Network You are not only dependent on Facebook as a platform to display your ads and achieve high Range This means your advertising will also be shown on websites outside of Facebook that are relevant to your target audience.

Recommendation for preparing Facebook and Instagram Ads

To prepare for running ads on Facebook and Instagram for your business, make sure you have creatives for the ad available in 9:16 and 1:1 formats. These are the best to use because they cover the most and best placements. The dimensions apply equally to video and image. Use the different placements to maximum range to reach your target group not only in the news feed, but also to be present in messengers, explore areas and stories.

Let your creativity run wild with the images for your next ad. As long as you right ad formats nothing stands in the way of you drawing attention to your brand on social networks. Regarding the Videos there is further information and Best Practicessuch as how many seconds a video should ideally last, that we would like to share with you. You can find further information about the structure in our blog article on Facebook Video Ads.

If you have any further questions about Facebook Ads, please contact us as your Facebook Ads agency.

Frequently asked questions