In some ad accounts, Meta is testing the removal of the ability to manually exclude placements at the ad set level. The change affects campaigns with the Sales and Leads objectives.
Along with individual placements, Meta plans to remove the ability to exclude entire platforms, device types, and operating systems. For example, it will no longer be possible to completely disable Audience Network or prevent ads from being shown on Android at the ad set level.
It is not yet known when the new restrictions will appear in all ad accounts. Meta has not officially announced the change, so some media buyers still have access to the previous placement settings.
What will change in placement settings
Currently, when placements are configured manually, a media buyer can keep only the required placements and remove the rest. If Meta rolls out the change to all ad accounts, this option will no longer be available at the ad set level.
Instead of full exclusion, Meta suggests using Value Rules. They allow the bid for a specific placement to be reduced by up to 90%. However, it is not possible to completely prevent delivery through Value Rules. In addition, this setting is currently available for only seven placements.
How to completely exclude unwanted placements
At the same time, some restrictions can be configured at the entire ad account level. They are located in Advertising Settings → Account Controls → Placement Controls.
Through this section, you can restrict delivery on certain placements in advance for all ad campaigns in the account. In particular, such restrictions are available for Audience Network, Marketplace, and Facebook Right Column.
However, this option will not become a full replacement for manual placements. The set of available restrictions at the account level is smaller, so it will not be possible to disable any specific placement this way.
What will change for media buyers
The main change is that controlling traffic distribution between placements at the level of a specific ad set will become more difficult. If a certain placement generates expensive leads or poor CR, it will no longer be possible to simply remove it from the ad set once the update is fully rolled out.
Some control will remain through Value Rules. Instead of disabling a placement, a media buyer will be able to reduce the bid for it and thereby reduce the amount of ad delivery. But even the maximum 90% reduction does not guarantee that impressions will stop completely.
Therefore, after the update, media buyers will need to monitor the spend breakdown by placement more closely. If Meta starts directing a significant share of the budget to placements where traffic performs poorly, the remaining options will be to reduce the bid through Value Rules or use the available restrictions at the ad account level.
There is no need to urgently change settings across all ad campaigns yet. The update is being rolled out gradually, and Meta has not yet announced an exact date for disabling manual exclusions.
