The Meta Ads Library
Every ad your competitors run is public. Very few people search it well.
Sevenam installs a Meta advertising system on your own ad account and runs the technology that operates it — written decisions at 7am every morning telling you exactly what to do that day. One fixed setup fee, a fixed monthly, priced to the work.
Four fields, and no call booked yet. We read what you send and tell you whether you qualify for a free marketing technology, systems and performance audit — offered at our discretion and in limited numbers.
What it actually shows you.
Meta calls it the Ad Library. Almost everyone searching for it types the Meta Ads Library or the Facebook Ads Library, and all three are the same tool at facebook.com/ads/library. It lists the ads any advertiser is currently running, along with when each started. It does not show spend, results, or audience for ordinary commercial ads — those details are only published for political and social issue advertising.
That limitation matters, because the most common misuse is treating a competitor's ad as proof that something works. You cannot see whether it is working. You can only see that it exists.
The one signal worth reading.
Duration. An ad that has been running continuously for months is almost certainly earning its place, because advertisers turn off what loses money. An ad that appeared last week tells you nothing at all.
So scan for longevity, not for volume — then look at what those long-running ads have in common structurally. Hook, format, length, the first three seconds. Take the mechanism and build your own version; copying the execution just puts you second in someone else's test.
Three fields, then every ad they are running.
No login, no tool, no trial. Set the country first — the Library defaults to whoever is looking, so an Australian advertiser searched from a US session returns almost nothing and reads as if they are not advertising at all.
- Set the country to Australia Top left. This is the field people miss, and it is the one that makes the search look empty when it is not.
- Leave the category on All ads "Issues, elections or politics" is a different index with different rules. For a competitor you want All ads.
- Search the brand, not the domain It matches page names, so type the business as it appears on Facebook. Pick the page from the dropdown rather than pressing enter, or you get keyword matches instead of that advertiser.
- Sort your attention by start date Every result carries "Started running on". Anything live for months is paying its way — an advertiser turns off what loses money. Last week’s batch tells you nothing yet.
Questions people actually ask.
Is the Meta Ad Library free?
Yes, and it needs no login for basic searching. It is at facebook.com/ads/library, and the search on this page opens it prefilled for Australia.
Can I see how much a competitor spends?
Not for ordinary commercial advertising. Spend and reach ranges are published only for political and social issue ads.
Can competitors see our ads?
Yes, all of them, while they are running. That is worth remembering before you put an aggressive offer in an ad rather than behind a click.
Should we copy ads that have run a long time?
Copy the mechanism, not the ad. Running a close imitation puts you in a worse position than the original — same idea, less credibility, and no idea which part actually did the work.
How often should we look at it?
Monthly is plenty for most businesses. It is a creative research input, not a performance signal, and treating it as the latter leads to a lot of reactive churn.
Turn competitive research into creative output.
Fifteen minutes with Josh, no pitch deck. Research only pays once something gets made from it.
Get started Four fields, twenty seconds →Four fields, and no call booked yet. We read what you send and tell you whether you qualify for a free marketing technology, systems and performance audit — offered at our discretion and in limited numbers.