Facebook Ads Glitch Sends Brands Into Panic

UPDATE 4-24-23

Meta shows the issue with ad delivery has been resolved and service has been restored. Still no official word on refunds or other compensation for impacted advertisers.

Meta has acknowledged an ad delivery issues causing major disruptions and ads running over budget across Facebook and Instagram today.

https://metastatus.com/adsmanager

Issue Affecting Delivery of Ads

We are aware of an issue that began today (April 23, 2023) at 1AM PT that is causing some ads, primarily on Facebook (and to a lesser extent on Instagram) to have higher variability in spend and delivery. We have stopped serving ads on Audience Network temporarily as a result of this issue. Campaign optimizations including offsite conversions, mobile app installs, click-to-messenger or return on ad spend are most likely to be impacted by this issue.

We can confirm that reporting is not affected by this issue. You can monitor your campaign delivery in Ads Manager to understand any specific impact to your ads.

We are actively working to identify the cause of this issue and get it resolved as quickly as possible. We have put temporary measures in place to help reduce the impact this technical disruption has caused on our systems and to our advertisers. We appreciate your patience as we work to restore our services. We will continue to provide updates when we know more.

FAQs

Q: Is delivery impacted by the issue?
A: Yes. This issue is causing some ads, primarily on Facebook (and to a lesser extent on Instagram) to have higher variability in spend and delivery. We are actively working to identify the cause of this issue and get it resolved as quickly as possible. We will share an update once we know more.

Q: Which placements are impacted by this issue?
A: Ads on Facebook are primarily impacted. To a significantly lesser extent, ads on Instagram are also impacted. We have stopped serving ads on Audience Network temporarily as a result of this issue.

Q: Which campaign objectives are impacted by this issue?
A: Campaign optimizations including offsite conversions, mobile app installs, click-to-messenger or return on ad spend are more likely to be impacted by this issue.

Q: Is reporting impacted by this issue?
A: No, we can confirm that reporting in Ads Manager is not impacted by this issue and will show actual spend.

Q: Will there be refunds?
A: We are still investigating the overall impact of this issue, including the possibility of refunds for advertisers. We hope to share more when available.

Q: What caused the issue?
We are still investigating the issue, and are working to understand the cause.

Ecommerce data platform TripleWhale tweeted a thread with their observations on the massive impact this issue may have had for brands who advertise on Facebook.

And some impacted advertisers say they have been able to get a refund by reaching out to their rep or Facebook business support.

Meta Industry Manager, Enterprise Commerce Yoni Levy also said they are "on it" and "when things go wrong, Meta has a history of making things right."

Have you been impacted by this Facebook ads glitch? Let us know in the comments below!