Comply with Google Play’s Families Policy using AdMob

If your app targets children as an audience and you show ads in your app, you need to ensure your app complies with Google Play’s Families policy. AdMob offers the following tools for publishers to show ads that are compliant with Google Play’s Families policy. 

AdMob publishers are required to adhere to the AdMob and AdSense policies. Additionally, advertisements must comply with applicable laws and regulations (including any relevant self-regulatory or industry guidelines).

Note that Google Play recently updated the Families Policy to clarify that if one of the target audiences for your app is children, your app must not transmit certain identifiers (including the advertising ID) for children or users of unknown age.

Update your SDK to Android 20.6.0 GMA SDK or later and/or iOS GMA SDK 7.67.0 to ensure that the advertising ID is not transmitted when an ad request is tagged for child-directed treatment. You can also choose to disable the advertising ID for your entire app by preventing the advertising ID permission from being merged into your app.

Apps for children

If your app is in Google Play's Designed for Families program and you show ads in your app, you need to ensure those ads comply with the Designed for Families program requirements and ad policies.

Once your app is in the program, AdMob will automatically begin serving Designed for Families-compliant ads for all ad requests coming from the app.

Ads that are deemed child- and family-friendly are a subset of the broader ads pool. If your app was not previously in the Designed for Families program, you might notice fewer filled impressions after your app is added to the program.
 

Apps for everyone, including children and families 

If your app is targeted towards everyone, including children and families, you’ll need to include code that calls the setTagForChildDirectedTreatment()method for ad requests served to children and specifies the maximum ad content rating. 

Learn about additional ways to stay compliant with Google Play’s Families policy. 

Code sample for implementation in apps for everyone, including children and families

Use the following code sample to invoke setMax_ad_content_rating() and setTagForChildDirectedTreatment() to send child-directed ad requests in a mixed-audience app:

RequestConfiguration requestConfiguration = MobileAds.getRequestConfiguration()
    .toBuilder()
    .setTagForChildDirectedTreatment(
        RequestConfiguration.TAG_FOR_CHILD_DIRECTED_TREATMENT_TRUE)
    .setMaxAdContentRating(RequestConfiguration.MAX_AD_CONTENT_RATING_G)
    .build();
MobileAds.setRequestConfiguration(requestConfiguration);

The setMax_ad_content_rating() method is invoked with the value MAX_AD_CONTENT_RATING_G. Additionally, the tagForChildDirectedTreatment() method is invoked with the value true. The RequestConfiguration object should then be passed to MobileAds.setRequestConfiguration() prior to loading ads. Then, all future ad loads will be compliant with the Designed for Families policies.

If you are using Ad Manager rather than AdMob, you can construct a AdManagerAdRequest rather than an AdRequest by using the corresponding methods in the AdManagerAdRequest.Builder class.

AdMob is not responsible for webview content. It is solely the developers’ responsibility to ensure ads on webview follow Google Play policy.

Comply with Google Play’s Families Policies using AdMob mediation 

All Android apps classified as Designed for Families, and all ad requests with setTagForChildDirectedTreatment(true), must use a Google Play certified ad network. To ensure your compliance with Play, AdMob will automatically block any ad sources that haven’t been certified by Google Play from serving ads to apps classified as Designed for Families. 

In most cases, you’ll be alerted in your AdMob account if you’re using a non-certified ad source to serve ads to apps classified as Designed for Families. Ad serving will continue from certified ad sources.

Custom events that target apps classified as Designed for Families need to use certified ad sources. To stay compliant with Google Play policy, you must ensure that your custom events only use certified ad sources.

Some publishers may be interested in using AdMob mediation for apps that include children as an audience. 

If you want to use AdMob to mediate, you must configure your mediation group to only use certified ad networks. 

Given that the advertising relationship in AdMob mediation is between the developer and the third-party ad network, and AdMob simply serves as a platform, it is the developer's responsibility to ensure that the third-party ad network serves ads that are compliant with the Designed for Families policies.

Apps for children

Apps in the Designed for Families Program must use a Google Play certified ad network to fill ad requests. 

For your app to receive Designed for Families policy-compliant ads from third-party ad networks, you will need to call setTagForChildDirectedTreatment(true) and set max_ad_content_rating to G for every ad request. Also, the third-party ad networks you select must serve Designed for Families policy-compliant ads.

The Google Mobile Ads SDK will forward ad requests to third-party ad networks to serve Designed for Families policy-compliant ads. It is the developer's responsibility to ensure that the third-party ad networks serve ads that are compliant with the Designed for Families policies.

Apps for everyone, including children and families 

Apps for everyone, including children and families, must use a Google Play certified ad network to fill ad requests. 

For ad requests that are served to children audiences, in order to receive Google Play’s Families policy-compliant ads from third-party ad networks, you will need to call setTagForChildDirectedTreatment(true) and set max_ad_content_rating to G for every ad request.

The Google Mobile Ads SDK will forward ad requests to third-party ad networks to serve Designed for Families policy-compliant ads. It is the developer's responsibility to ensure that the third-party ad networks serve ads that are compliant with the Designed for Families policies.

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Learn more about the Designed for Families program at Google Developers.