How to Know a Facebook Ad is Delivered
Not sure if your Facebook Ad is actually reaching anyone? It’s a common worry when you hit that "Publish" button. Just because your ad status says "Active" doesn't guarantee it's being served to your target audience. This article will guide you through how to confirm your Facebook ads are delivered, what key metrics to look for, and what to do if they aren't.
Checking Ad Status: Your First Port of Call
The first and most basic step is checking the status of your ad within Facebook Ads Manager. This status tells you where your ad is in the approval and delivery process. You can find this in the "Delivery" column at the Campaign, Ad Set, or Ad level.
Here’s a quick rundown of what each status means:
In Review: You’ve submitted your ad, and Facebook's system (and sometimes a human) is checking to make sure it complies with their Advertising Policies. This process usually takes a few minutes but can last up to 24 hours. Don't panic if it takes a little while.
Active: Congratulations! Your ad has been approved and is eligible to be shown to your target audience. However, "active" does not mean it's being delivered with certainty. It just means it's running.
Learning / Learning Limited: When you launch a new ad set or make a significant edit, Facebook's system enters a "learning phase." It's testing different placements and audiences to find the most efficient way to spend your budget. It needs about 50 optimization events (like conversions or link clicks) in about a week to exit this phase. "Learning Limited" means it isn't getting enough events to optimize properly, which can hurt performance.
Not Delivering: This status indicates there's a problem preventing your ad from running. We'll cover the most common causes for this in a later section.
Disapproved: Your ad violates one of Facebook’s policies. You’ll be given a reason and an opportunity to edit and resubmit your ad or request a review of the decision.
Beyond 'Active': The Four Core Delivery Metrics
An "Active" status simply means the gate is open. To be sure people are actually walking through it, you need to look at specific performance metrics. If you see numbers greater than zero for these metrics, you can be 100% certain your ad is being delivered.
1. Impressions
What it is: Impressions represent the total number of times your ad has been displayed on a screen. This is the most fundamental metric for confirming delivery. If your ad has 1,000 impressions, it means it has been shown 1,000 times.
Why it matters: If you have zero impressions, your ad is not being delivered, period. It doesn't matter what the status says. If impressions are climbing, your ads are being served. It’s your ground-zero confirmation.
2. Reach
What it is: Reach tells you the number of unique people who saw your ad at least once. This metric is different from impressions because one person might see your ad multiple times.
Why it matters: If your Reach is 500 and your Impressions are 1,500, it means 500 individual people saw your ad an average of three times each (this ratio is called Frequency). Like impressions, a Reach number greater than zero confirms your ad is being shown to actual users.
3. Amount Spent
What it is: This one is simple but powerful. It's the total amount of money you have spent on a campaign, ad set, or specific ad during the selected time period.
Why it matters: Facebook doesn't charge you for ads that aren't shown. If you see even $0.01 in the "Amount Spent" column, you have undeniable proof that your ad was delivered to someone. This is often the most reliable indicator that everything is working as it should be from a technical standpoint.
4. Link Clicks / Clicks (All)
What it is: Link Clicks measure how many times people clicked the link in your ad that leads to your website or landing page. Clicks (All) include link clicks plus other clicks, like someone clicking to your Facebook page profile, expanding the ad copy, or reacting to it.
Why it matters: While not a direct delivery metric like impressions, clicks are a secondary confirmation. You can't get clicks without impressions. If people are clicking, your ad is definitely being delivered and it’s engaging enough for people to interact with it.
Step-by-Step Guide: How to Find Your Delivery Data
Now that you know what to look for, here's exactly how to find these metrics in Ads Manager.
Navigate to Facebook Ads Manager: Go to adsmanager.facebook.com.
Select Your Timeframe: In the top-right corner, make sure the date range is set correctly. If you're looking for an ad you launched today, set the date range to "Today."
Go to the Ad Level: Click on the "Campaigns" tab, select the correct campaign, then click the "Ad Sets" tab, select the right ad set, and finally, click the "Ads" tab to see your individual ads.
Customize Your Columns: This is the most important step. Ads Manager has pre-set column views, but you often need to customize them to see the metrics that matter most for delivery.
Click the "Columns" dropdown menu (it usually defaults to "Performance").
Select "Customize Columns..." from the bottom of the menu.
A new window will pop up. In the search bar on the left, type in and check the boxes for: Impressions, Reach, Amount Spent, and Link Clicks. Ensure the main "Delivery" status column is also checked.
Click the blue "Apply" button in the bottom right corner.
Analyze the Data: Now, look at the row for your specific ad. Do you see numbers greater than zero for Impressions, Reach, and Amount Spent? If so, your ad is being delivered!
Common Reasons Your Facebook Ads Are Not Delivering
What if you’ve waited a few hours and your "Active" ad still has 0 impressions and $0 spent? Something is holding it back. Here are the most common culprits:
Budget or Bid Is Too Low: This is a frequent issue. If your ad set budget is too small (e.g., $1 per day) or your manual bid is far below what other advertisers are willing to pay, you’ll constantly lose the ad auction, and Facebook won't deliver your ad.Fix: Try raising your budget or, if using manual bids, switch to automatic bidding and let Facebook do the work.
Audience Is Too Small: If your targeting is extremely narrow, Facebook might struggle to find enough people who meet your criteria. You might see a warning in your ad set that your "potential audience is too specific."Fix: Broaden your targeting by adding more interests or removing restrictive layers of demographic filters.
Significant Ad or Ad Set Edits: Making major changes to your creative, targeting, or budget can reset the learning phase. This can cause a temporary pause in delivery as the algorithm recalibrates.Fix: Be patient. If you must make edits, try to batch them together to minimize disruptions to the algorithm.
Your Ad Was Paused or Part of a Paused Campaign/Ad Set: It sounds obvious, but it happens. Make sure the toggle switches are blue and say "On" at the Ad, Ad Set, and Campaign levels. If the campaign or ad set containing your ad is off, your ad won’t run.Fix: Check each level (Campaign > Ad Set > Ad) to ensure they are all turned on.
Delivered vs. Performing: The Important Difference
Confirming your ad is delivered is just the beginning. Delivery does not equal performance. Your ad could be getting thousands of impressions but generating zero link clicks, leads, or sales. This is where you move from a technical check ("Is it on?") to strategic analysis ("Is it working?").
Once you've confirmed delivery, you should start analyzing performance metrics like:
Click-Through Rate (CTR): What percentage of people who saw your ad clicked on it?
Cost Per Result (CPR): How much are you paying for each conversion, lead, or other desired action?
Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): For e-commerce, how much revenue are you generating for every dollar spent?
Final Thoughts
Confirming your Facebook Ad delivery goes beyond just seeing an 'Active' status. By checking key metrics like impressions, reach, and amount spent in your Ads Manager columns, you get definitive proof that your ads are being served. Understanding this is the first, crucial step toward managing effective and profitable paid social campaigns.
Manually checking delivery metrics in Ads Manager is just the first step, the real work starts when you try to connect those numbers to what's happening in your CRM or on your Shopify store. Instead of spending your Monday morning manually piecing data together, that's where we built Graphed to help. We just simplified the whole process. Connect all your sources once, then ask for a report or dashboard in plain English - like "create a dashboard comparing Facebook Ads spend vs. Shopify revenue by campaign." Graphed generates it for you in seconds with live, up-to-date data. It gives you the time back to focus on strategy, not spreadsheets.