Find ads in the Ad review centre

The Ad Review Centre offers several features to help you find specific ads to review and block.

Filter or search

The search box at the top of the Ad review centre lets you restrict which ads you see, for example, by language, ad type, ad size, etc.

You can search for ads using the following:

• Text: Find ads with matching ad text or destination URLs.
• Click string: Search for ads based on their tracking URL.

You can filter ads using one of the following:

• Publisher domain: Filter ads based on which of your sites they appeared on.
• Newest ads: Filter for ads that have appeared on your site in the last 1 to 30 days.
• Ad network: Filter for ads from a specific ad network. Note, this filter only shows ads from real-time bidding (RTB) so it can't be combined with the 'language' filter.
• Creative ID: Filter for an ad based on its unique identifier.
• General ad category: Filter ads based on their general category or subcategory.
  Note: Our system classifies ads automatically, and we don't rely solely on advertiser-provided categorisation. Our technology makes its best attempt to filter ads from the possible categories; however, we don't guarantee that it will filter every related ad.
• Language: Filter based on the language that has been detected for ads. To determine ad language, we look at various factors including the landing page of the ad and its content, which means that you might see ads with images or text in a different language to the one you filtered on. The list is ordered by the percentage of ads in each language. Note, this filter only shows ads from the Google Display Network (GDN) so it can't be combined with the 'ad network' filter.
  Example

  Let's say that you have ads in five languages (English, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Japanese), and the distribution totals for each language are: English (20), Spanish (40), Italian (25), Portuguese (5) and Japanese (10). The list would then display the languages in the following (descending) order: Spanish, Italian, English, Japanese and Portuguese.

• Size: Filter based on the size of the ads shown on your site. The list is ordered by the percentage of ads of each size.
• Ad type: Filter by image, text or rich media ads.

Note that some filtering options are hidden until you start typing in the search box and we determine what you're searching for.

Image search

You can use the Ad review centre's image search function to help you find and review image ads. For example, you could upload a picture of a competitor's logo and use it to search for image ads containing their logo.

To search for ads that match an image:

1. Click Search by Image .
2. Click Choose image and upload your image.

   Notes:

   • Your image must be a PNG file that's less than 3 MB in size, and only contain one ad. Ad matches can only be identified with an original PNG.
   • Distorting the image will affect the search results. Make sure that you haven't distorted the image by zooming in or out. Also, if you are using an image that was emailed, be sure that you download the image to your computer rather than copying the image to avoid distortion.

During the search, the Ad Review Centre may find ad matches, as well as visual matches, for the creative that you're searching for. Creatives will be labelled as ad matches or visual matches in the search results.

• An ad match is the instance of the creative that you uploaded. Search finds the creative that you uploaded based on the creative and time that it served. AdSense then allows you to block it, or lets you know the source of the creative.

  An ad match may or may not be visually exact to the uploaded creative. Blocking the ad match can prevent it from showing in your app, however it may still serve from your other ad sources.

• A visual match is a creative that's visually exact or very similar to the uploaded creative that you're searching for, but may or may not be an exact ad match.

Note: While image search supports most file types and ad types, it might not always return all available images ads.

You can also use image search to identifying the source of a creative.

Similar ads

The Ad Review Centre also offers the ability to find similar ads. Ads are considered related if they have a similar destination page, or are connected by a similar subject (e.g. a brand, a person, an object, etc.).

To view similar ads:

• Hover over an ad, click More Find similar ads by and select an option.

  Similar ads appear in a new filtered page. From here you can choose to block ads, mark as reviewed, etc.