How do you get advertising-library data into a research workflow?
Ten advertisers, four ad libraries, every route we can reach, one day. Raw responses published.
100 calls · 100 valid · $1.56
run 2026-10-26
Decision guides
Choose an ad-library API for competitor research
Ten advertisers sent through every third-party ad-library route reachable on one day, across Meta, Google, TikTok and LinkedIn: what each returned, what it cost, how long it took, and which one fits a weekly monitoring agent.
Platform guides
Meta Ad Library: official API versus third-party routes
What Meta's own Ad Library API returns for commercial advertisers, who can get access, and what the three third-party routes returned for the same ten advertisers on the same day, field by field, with prices and latency.
Google Ads Transparency Center: what an API can get you
Google offers an API only for ads served in the EEA, so competitor research elsewhere runs through third-party routes. What two of them returned for ten advertisers on the same day, what the Center shows and does not show, and what it costs.
Field guides
What ad-library data can and cannot tell you
Field by field, what came back on 1,600 ads across ten routes and four platforms: creatives, dates, placements, status, landing pages, and the fields people assume exist and do not, such as spend, targeting and performance.
Can you see which competitors run ChatGPT ads? What the ChatGPT answer APIs return
There is no official ChatGPT ad library. Twelve commercial prompts through three ChatGPT answer APIs, in the US, UK and Canada, 42 answers and not one sponsored ad: why the scrape routes miss the ads, and what is left if you want to watch a competitor.
Is this prospect running ads? Checking a list of domains against the Google and Meta ad libraries
40 local-business domains through three Google Transparency Center routes and two Meta Ad Library routes: how many were running ads, why you look them up by domain and not by name, which date counts as running, and what a check costs per domain.
"This ad has multiple versions" in the Meta Ad Library: what it is, and how to read the versions through an API
The label marks a dynamic-creative ad. In an ad-library response it is display_format DCO, with each version in snapshot.cards. Counted on 2,347 ad records from three runs: what the versions vary, how they differ from 'ads use this creative and text', and which route returns them.
How long Meta Ad Library creative URLs last, measured on 10,355 links
Every image and video link the Meta Ad Library returns carries its own expiry in the URL. Decoded across three runs and probed live: about 106 hours for ordinary ad media, 32 hours for a minority of videos, 30 days for dynamic-creative images, the same through every third-party route.
Comparisons
Apify vs ScrapeCreators for ad-library data: what each returned on the same ten advertisers
The two routes most people compare for pulling competitor ads, measured on the same day against the same Meta and TikTok advertisers: ads returned, fields filled, latency, and what each actually costs per page.
How this site works
Each platform page says what that ad library exposes, who is allowed to access it, and what every route we can reach returned for the same ten advertisers on the same day, with the raw responses published. No route is scored on ad counts alone: a library that hides spend for commercial ads hides it for every route.
Read the methodology for what these numbers can and cannot tell you, and the about page for who writes here and how relationships with the routes compared are handled.