Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Delivering? Expert Tips To Fix [2025]

Facebook Ads not delivering can drive any advertiser crazy. In reality, most people with little experience optimizing ads go through this situation. So why does it happen and how can advertisers get rid of it? This article discusses common causes behind this issue and suggests corresponding solutions.

What Does Not Delivering Mean On Facebook Ads?

Let’s take an example:

You launch a test campaign with a small daily cap of $25. Your ads run normally and spend their full daily budget.

However, when you increase the budget to $200, they no longer spend, even though you are paying money for them.

This means your Facebook ads are not delivering.

So, Facebook ads not delivering means your ads are not spending. They cannot reach your intended target audience, get impressions, or drive sales.

This can happen to both new ads and existing ads that were performing well in the past.

Multiple causes can lead to this issue, such as ads stuck in review, low bids, wrong targeting options, etc.

How To Check Facebook Ads Delivery Status?

To check the delivery status of Facebook ads, log into Facebook and go to Ads Manager.

Look at the message in the delivery column next to the Campaign/ Ad set/ Ad column, as in the screenshot below. 

If it says Active or Learning, your ads are running smoothly.

If it states as one of the following, there may be something unusual about your ad, account, or any other aspect:

• Not delivering
• Rejected
• Learning limited
• Scheduled
• In review
• Processing
• Preparing

This can also apply to Instagram ad not delivering errors.

The thing is, the delivery status doesn’t really pinpoint what needs fixing. It also doesn’t reveal why it’s happening in the first place.

But don’t worry, we’re about to dive deep into the reasons behind this and how to get your ads back on track.

Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Delivering?

Multiple causes can result in this frustrating situation. Let’s have a glimpse at the table below.

Quick review: Common causes for Facebook ads not delivering

Now, we will take a closer look into the most common reasons behind not delivering Facebook Ads. For each cause, I will also suggest solutions to fix it.

Ads still under review or disapproved

For those who don’t know, Facebook reviews every ad before showing it to audiences.

This is to make sure all displayed ads comply with Facebook’s policies and terms of service.

There are two types of ad reviews:

• Automated reviews by the system
• Manual reviews by Facebook’s human team.

According to Facebook’s Business Help Centre, most ads are reviewed within 24 hours. Nevertheless, some cases can take longer.

This means that sometimes it can take longer than 24 hours to review an ad. Example: during special occasions like Christmas or Black Fridays

So if your ad is still in this review process, you should wait a little longer.

Next, if your ad is rejected and not delivered, Facebook will notify you by email and in Ads Manager. Typically, the reason is because your ad violated Meta Ads Policies:

Some Meta ads policies that you may violate:

• Prohibited content: Advertising products or services that are illegal or harmful. For example: drugs, weapons, tobacco, cryptocurrency, etc.
• Misleading claims: Making false or exaggerated claims, using deceptive tactics to attract clicks.
• Personal attributes: Targeting audience based on sensitive personal attributes. For example: race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or health conditions.
• Low-quality or disruptive content: Promoting irrelevant, spammy, or disruptive content. This can worsen the user experience.

>>> Related: Let’s Find Out Facebook Ads Policy 2024 Updated

Suggested solution

Check Facebook’s notification, audit your ad, and resubmit the revised version.

Double-check Meta Ads Policies and compare them against your ad.

Make absolutely sure your ad copy, website link, or landing page comply with Meta Ads Policies.

If auditing doesn’t help, consider appealing to Facebook. (I’ll guide you through that later). It’s entirely possible that Facebook has simply misunderstood something about your ad.

Post no longer available

This is a common headache for advertisers running PPE (Page Post Engagement) campaigns.

If your post has been deleted or removed from Facebook, your ad delivery will come to a screeching halt.

Maybe you accidentally deleted the post, or perhaps it violated Facebook’s Community Standards. It’s easy to overlook with so many posts and ads running simultaneously.

Suggested solution

Make it a habit to regularly check, manage, and track your Facebook posts and ads. Don’t let any posts or ads slip through the cracks!

Ad spent over budget

Not monitoring and optimizing your ad budgets carefully can lead to delivery issues.

This can also happen if the number of people clicking on your ads suddenly spikes. When your ads burn through your entire budget, they’ll stop running and won’t be shown to anyone else.

This can seriously hurt your advertising efforts as you miss on a lot of potential customers.

Suggested solution

If you have little experience, enable the Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO) feature. If you use Daily Budget, check out ads regularly every day.

Your budget or bid too low

Setting your budget or bid too low can lead to Facebook Ads not delivering for a few key reasons:

• Lack of competitiveness: Facebook’s ad delivery system works like an auction. Ads with higher budgets and bids are typically prioritized over lower budgets. When bidding too low, your ads may lose the competition and cannot be delivered.
• Limited reach: Your budget directly affects the number of people your ads can reach. A low budget will significantly restrict your ad reach and results.
• Insufficient learning: Facebook’s ad delivery algorithm relies on data to optimize your campaigns. A low budget might not provide enough data for the algorithm to learn. Thus, it cannot show your ads to the right audiences, leading to inefficient delivery.

Suggested solution

To avoid this issue, set a budget that aligns with your campaign goals and target audience size.

Consider the average cost per result in your industry and allocate a suitable budget.

It should be enough to allow your ads to reach a significant portion of your target audience.

Your account spending limit is too low

Check your account spending limit. It might be too low compared to your ad budget. As a result, you hit the limit and your ads stop until the budget resets.

Suggested solution

Raise your cap to keep your ads running.

Audience size is too small

Facebook requires a minimum number of target audiences to deliver ads effectively. If the audience is too small, there aren’t enough users for the ad to reach and display, leading to no delivery.

Besides, Facebook uses algorithms to display ads to responsive people. When the audience size is too small, the algorithm cannot learn to function properly.

Suggested solution

Review your target audience. Make sure the number of people you are targeting is greater than 1000.

Wrong ad scheduling

Ad Scheduling is directly related to your budget and ad delivery. If you accidentally set the wrong ad schedule, your ad will not be delivered.

Suggested solution

Pay attention to Ad Scheduling under ‘Budget & Schedule’. You need to make sure that the start and end dates have not passed. While the ad is running, you also need to monitor how it performs to ensure it runs and spends the budget properly.

Audience overlap

Audience overlap means your ads are targeting the same group of people. As a result, you are not only competing against other businesses but also yourself.

When your audience overlaps, Facebook only delivers ads with higher quality scores. Other ads with lower quality and overlapped audience won’t deliver.

Suggested solution

Go to the Audience section in Meta Ads Manager and check the audience overlap percentage.

Tick the Audience List boxes of not delivering ads, then click Show Audience Overlap.

Right here, you can see how many percent overlap the selected audience. If this number is higher than 40%, you need to eliminate these overlapping audiences. However, according to leading advertising experts, it is best to keep this number below 20%.

Wrong target audience

Targeting the wrong audience can be a major culprit behind your ads not delivering. To understand why, let’s take a quick dive into how Machine Learning works:

After you create your ad and hit Publish, it enters the Machine Learning Phase.

During this learning phase, your ad is shown to a few different audiences.

If they don’t interact, Facebook considers your ads to be not qualified and relevant. This leads to poor delivery.

You might be wondering why they wouldn’t interact. It’s very likely because your ad is targeting the wrong people. If your audience isn’t interested or engaged, your ad won’t get delivered.

Suggested solution

Revisit your potential audience research. You’ll need a solid strategy and the right tools for this, like Ad Relevance Diagnostics and Quality Ranking.

They help understand your potential audience’s behavior, interests, and demographics.

Additionally, to improve your ad score, you can follow Facebook’s guidelines below:

Broken website, link, or landing page

The website link or landing page you use for advertising must also comply with Ads Policies.

If any element violates the policies, it will affect the entire ad campaign. For example, inappropriate content can prevent your ads from being delivered.

Suggested solution

Review all the links to your ads, whether they are product links, website links, or landing pages.

Make sure they are working properly.

Check all the images and text in those links and make sure they comply with Meta Ads Policies.

Wrong ad goal

Your Facebook ad optimization goal is the action you want your target audience to take. Choosing the right goal is crucial for ad performance.

Facebook uses your goal to analyze user behavior and find the perfect audience.

For example, with Add to cart, Facebook will target people who used to add similar products to their cart. Experts often call this Audience value signals, and it works like this:

If there are no signals, in other words, your audience doesn’t take the action you want, then your ad won’t deliver.

Suggested solution

Switch to a more easily achievable goal, you can choose different CTAs.

Temporarily change the optimization goal to Link Clicks. This allows Facebook to optimize ad delivery to people who usually click through ads.

Facebook’s server error

In case you are sure that you do not make the above mistakes. Probably Facebook is having some new updates and their server is having problems.

Suggested solution

In this situation, there is nothing else you can do but wait.

Normally, these updates take only a few hours, at most a day. Please stay calm and try to wait until the update is completed and you can use Meta Ads Manager as usual.

>>> You also may like: Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Spending? How To Fix It Quickly?

Step-by-Step Process To Fix Facebook Ads Not Delivering

The flowchart below shows step-by-step instructions when your Facebook ads are not delivering.

Here is the detailed guide.

Check your ad again

There are 4 important things you need to review if you encounter an ad that is not delivering or being rejected. It includes:

• Ad content: This includes everything in your Ad Copy: images, videos, and primary text. You need to review and make sure they don’t violate Meta Ads Policies. You can also use ad compliance checker tools to double-check.
• Audience: Your target audience is the next thing to consider. If you’re targeting children, minors, or sensitive groups, your ad won’t be delivered.
• Budget and bidding: This is another aspect you need to review. Make sure your bid is competitive enough compared to other advertisers. Also, ensure your budget is sufficient for the ad to be delivered and function normally.
• Website link and landing page: Finally, double-check the link in your ad. Is it working properly? Does it contain any elements that might violate Ads Policies? If so, modify the information accordingly and ensure your link is fully functional.

After reviewing and editing your ad, resubmit it and wait for Facebook to review it. If the status persists, continue reading the next section right below.

Send a request to the Facebook support team

You can send a request to Facebook to check your account. I will share the steps to do this below:

Please try to upload a picture of the condition you are experiencing. At the same time, describe carefully the duration of the problem and the remedies you have tried but to no avail.

You have to wait about 1 day for Facebook to approve the request and contact you via Email.

How To Prevent Facebook Ads From Not Delivering?

Last but not least, here are some tips to prevent Facebook ads from not delivering.

Understand and comply with Meta Ads Policies

To avoid violating Facebook’s advertising policies, familiarize yourself with their policies and guidelines. They are mandatory to follow to ensure a clean and civilized Facebook environment.

Pay attention to audience size when targeting

When targeting, don’t be too specific or too broad, Let’s aim for a green balance.

You need to try to adjust the audience so that it is neither smaller than 1000 people nor too large.

The important thing here is to target enough so that the ad can be delivered to the right people at the right time.

Set reasonable budgets and bids

Research your target audience and campaign goals thoroughly. Start with a minimum budget and gradually increase it based on performance data.

Choose the bidding type that suits your experience level and campaign objectives.

Next, you can utilize Facebook’s suggested bids and automated features for optimization.

Continuously monitor and adjust your budget and bids based on real-time performance data.

Join Facebook groups to find support

Join groups about advertising for troubleshooting guides, new updates, and Q&A sessions. This is a treasure trove of knowledge that you shouldn’t miss.

Contact GDT Agency

GDT Agency is a leading Facebook partner. We are ready to help you with any challenges, including not delivering Facebook ads.

Facebook Agency Account For Rent is one of our best services to help you avoid this situation in the future. You can check it out to start your professional advertising journey.

Epilogue

Hopefully, this article can help you overcome the Facebook Ads not delivering status. Remember, mastering Facebook Ads is a long process that requires patience and knowledge. So, keep exploring new insights in our Facebook Ads Blog. Good luck to all advertisers and happy advertising!

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