Glossary/P
Placement
What it meansA place where an ad can run: a feed, a Story, a Reel, a search result, a banner on a website. Meta calls the places where you can run ads on its apps placements, and groups them by how people experience the ad there. Each placement has its own shape, size and rules, which is why one ad becomes a set of sizes.
- Applies to
- Every ad
- Set by
- The platform; chosen in the media plan
How Meta groups them
| Group | Examples |
|---|---|
| Feeds1 | Facebook Feed, Instagram Feed, Threads feed, Marketplace |
| Stories, Status and Reels1 | Facebook and Instagram Stories, Instagram and Facebook Reels, WhatsApp Status |
| Search1 | Facebook and Instagram search results |
| Apps and sites1 | Audience Network native, banner, interstitial and rewarded video |
From Meta’s list of ad placements, which says some are still in development.1
Meta notes that people have similar experiences with Stories ads across Facebook, Messenger and Instagram, which is why it groups them.1 The same is true of shapes: placements in one group usually share a shape and can share a layout.
What it means in practice
Start every set from the list of placements in the media plan, and turn it into a list of shapes: each placement’s shape and size, then the shapes grouped. Three placements that all want 9:16 are one layout; one placement with its own shape is a layout of its own.
Name each file by its placement and size. The person uploading the set chooses files by placement, and a file named only “ad_v3_final” is a guess.
Placements also change what is drawn over an ad. A Story or a Reel carries the platform’s profile icon and call-to-action over the picture, while a feed ad sits in a frame of its own. That is why the same shape can still need a different layout in a different placement.
Common mistakes
- Making one size and letting the platform crop it for every placement.Each placement crops differently, and the parts at the edges go.
- Forgetting placements nobody looks at.A placement in the plan runs, whether or not anyone checked its size.
Sources
- About ad placements across Meta technologies, Meta Business Help Center. The places an ad can run, grouped as feeds, Stories and Reels, search and apps.Checked 26 Oct 2026