Political content

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Display & Video 360 users must comply with this Google Ads policy. Visit the Display & Video 360 help centre for additional restrictions.


An image showing the legend for Political content.

Learn more about the 'Eligible (limited)' status.


We support responsible political advertising, and expect all political ads and destinations to comply with local legal requirements. This includes campaign and election laws and mandated election 'silence periods' for any geographic areas that they target. 

Google has different requirements for political and election advertising based on region.

In some regions, election ads may run only if the advertiser is verified by Google.  In these regions, election ads are subject to disclosure requirements and targeting restrictions; see below for additional information. Google Ad Grants accounts are not eligible to run election ads or apply for election ads verification in these regions. Check the information under the applicable regional heading for verification and restriction information.

In other regions, there are restrictions on political ads. See below for a list of these regions and what's prohibited. There may be additional prohibitions or requirements listed in the local legal requirements policy.

If your ads contain political content that is not restricted here or by the local legal requirements for a given region, your ads may run as long as they are compliant with all other Google Ads policies and local laws and regulations.

Non-compliance with our political content policies may result in information about your account and political ads being disclosed publicly or to relevant government agencies and regulators.

Election Ads

In these regions, election ads are allowed to run only if the advertiser is verified by Google. See below for how we define 'election ads' in these regions and the advertiser requirements that apply.   

To run election ads in the region to which the ad content pertains, an advertiser must be verified under that region’s Election Ads verification process. For example, an advertiser must complete the Australia Election Ads verification process to run Australia Election Ads in Australia.   

To run election ads outside the region to which the ad content pertains, an advertiser must be verified under either the Election Ads verification or Advertiser Identity verification process for the region in which the advertiser is located.  For example, a UK-based advertiser must complete a UK verification process to run New Zealand Election Ads in any region outside New Zealand.

Restricted targeting for election ads

Only the following criteria may be used to target election ads:

Green checkmark, allowed Geographic location (except radius around a location)

Green checkmark, allowed Age, gender

Green checkmark, allowed Contextual targeting options such as: ad placements, topics, keywords against sites, apps, pages and videos

All other types of targeting aren't allowed for use in election ads.

Disclosure requirements for election advertising

All election ads run by verified election advertisers in regions where election ads verification is required must contain a disclosure that identifies who paid for the ad. For most ad formats, Google will automatically generate a 'Paid for by' disclosure, using the information provided during the verification process. Please note that this disclosure isn't a replacement for any other disclosures that you may be required to include in your ad by law.

Allowed with restrictions For the following ad formats and features available across Google, the advertiser is responsible for including a 'Paid for by' disclosure directly in the ad, followed by the name of the organisation or individual paying for the ad. For visual formats, the disclosure must be visible at all times and be of a sufficient size to be legible to an average viewer. For audio-only formats, the disclosure must be substantially similar in pitch, tone and speed to the rest of the ad.

Please note that this disclosure isn't a replacement for any other disclosures that you may be required to include in your ad by law.

Disclosure requirements for synthetic or digitally altered content

We believe that users should have information to make informed decisions when viewing election ads that contain synthetic or digitally altered content, specifically images, video or audio that inauthentically depict real or realistic-looking people or events.

Ads that contain content that is synthetic or digitally altered in such a way that is inconsequential to the claims made in the ad are not considered in scope of this policy. This includes editing techniques such as image resizing, cropping, colour or brightening corrections, defect correction (for example, 'red eye' removal) or background edits that do not create realistic depictions of actual events.

Examples of ad content that are considered to be in scope include (non-exhaustive):

  • An ad with synthetic content that makes it appear as if a person is saying or doing something they didn’t say or do
  • An ad with synthetic content that alters footage of a real event or generates a realistic portrayal of an event to depict scenes that did not actually take place

Advertisers must disclose all election ads that contain synthetic or digitally altered content by selecting the tick box in the 'Altered or synthetic content' section in their campaign settings.

For the following formats, Google will then generate an in-ad disclosure based on that tick box, and advertisers are not required to include their own in-ad disclosure.

  • Feeds on mobile phones
  • Shorts on mobile phones
  • In-stream (computers, mobile phones, mobile web and TV screens)

For all other formats, the advertiser is responsible for selecting the tick box and providing a prominent disclosure. The disclosure must be clear and conspicuous, and must be placed in a location where it is likely to be noticed by users. Acceptable disclosure language will vary depending on the specific context of the ad, but some examples may include:

  • Altered or synthetic content.
  • This audio was computer generated.
  • This image does not depict real events.
  • This video content was synthetically generated.
Violations of this policy won't lead to immediate account suspension without prior warning. A warning will be issued, at least seven days, prior to any suspension of your account. Learn more about suspended accounts.

Regional restrictions

In these regions, there are restrictions on political ads. See below for a list of these regions and what's prohibited for each region. There may be additional prohibitions or requirements listed in the local legal requirements policy.

Need help?

If you have questions about our policies, contact Google Ads Support.

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