On this page
- 01 · What automated rules do in Meta Ads Manager
- 02 · Actions, conditions, time range and schedule
- 03 · What automated rules cannot do
- 04 · Set thresholds from your margin: a worked example in AUD
- 05 · Five automated rules we set up, with the settings
- 06 · Why a rule turned ads on or off when you did not expect it
- 07 · The weekly rules check we run
- 08 · Questions we get about Meta automated rules
- 09 · Sources
What automated rules do in Meta Ads Manager
Automated rules are Meta's built-in way to watch your ads for you. You choose a condition (for example, cost per purchase above $75 over the last three days), an action (turn the ad off) and the campaigns, ad sets or ads the rule covers. Meta checks the rule on the schedule you set and acts only when every condition is true. Rules sit at the ad account level, so they keep working whoever on your team builds the ads.
Our recommendation: use rules for the jobs a person forgets or does too late. Stopping an ad that has spent well past your break-even cost without a sale, flagging an ad set that is underdelivering, switching off a sale campaign at midnight and stepping a winning budget up in small amounts. Keep judgement calls, such as which new ad to launch or which audience to test, with a person. Meta says the same thing in its own help centre: rules save time, but you still need to watch overall performance.
Create them from the Automated rules page in Ads Manager to cover everything at one level, or by ticking a campaign, ad set or ad in the campaigns table and choosing More then Create a new rule to cover just those items.
Actions, conditions, time range and schedule
Every rule has four parts. Getting each one right is what separates a useful rule from one that causes damage.
| Part | Options | What to watch |
|---|---|---|
| Action | Turn off, turn on, send notification only, adjust budget, adjust manual bid, scale budget or bid | Adjust budget works on ad set daily or lifetime budgets. Adjust manual bid only works where the ad set uses a manual bid. |
| Conditions | Results, cost per result, cost per purchase, cost per lead, CPM, frequency, impressions, reach, estimated budget spending %, hours since creation, campaign name and more | Each condition can be used once per rule, and all of them must be true. The logic options are greater than, smaller than, between and not between. |
| Time range | How many days of data the rule reads, from today only up to lifetime | Today is thin and noisy early in the day. For turn-off rules we use the last three or seven days. |
| Schedule | How often Meta checks the rule, including a custom schedule of chosen days and times | Meta's developer documentation lists every half hour, every hour, daily at midnight in the ad account's time zone, or custom times. |
Two details catch people out. First, rules read results with your ad account's default attribution setting, so if you usually look at a different window in your reports, the rule will see different numbers. Our guide to Meta's attribution setting explains the windows. Second, the schedule decides how quickly a rule can act, not how much data it uses: a rule checked every half hour against the last seven days still judges on seven days.
What automated rules cannot do
These limits come straight from Meta's help centre, and several of them explain rules that seem to be broken.
- 250 rules per ad account, counting active and inactive rules. Delete the ones you no longer use.
- One of each condition per rule. You cannot say cost per purchase above $75 and also below $200 as two conditions; use the between option instead.
- One level per rule. A rule covers campaigns, or ad sets, or ads. To cover two levels, build two rules.
- AND only. To act when any one of several things happens, build a separate rule for each.
- No cost-based on, off or notification rules on ad sets or ads in a campaign using Advantage+ campaign budget (the setting formerly called campaign budget optimisation). Meta blocks these because switching ad sets off on cost can hurt performance and restart the learning phase. You can build the rule at campaign level instead, change the action (for ad sets), or use it on ad sets with their own budgets.
- No rules on ads about social issues, elections or politics, and rules cannot pause reservation campaigns.
- Subscribers need access. To add someone to a rule's notifications, they need admin permission on the ad account and full control of the business portfolio that owns it. Our partner access guide covers how to set that up.
Set thresholds from your margin: a worked example in AUD
A rule is only as good as its number. Copying someone else's threshold (pause at $50 spend, scale at ROAS 3) is how good ads get switched off. Work the numbers out from your own order economics. Here is a worked example for a Shopify store:
- Average order value: $132 including GST, which is $120 excluding GST.
- Contribution margin after product cost, shipping, payment fees and packaging: 50% of $120, so $60 per order.
- Break-even cost per purchase: $60. Spend more than that to win an order and you lose money on the first sale.
- On a standard Shopify pixel setup, the purchase value Meta reports is the order total including GST. Break-even ROAS on that number is $132 divided by $60, so 2.20.
From those two numbers we set every rule below. A turn-off rule fires at 1.5 times break-even CPA without a sale ($90), which gives an ad a fair chance at a first purchase. A scale rule needs ROAS of 2.60 or better, which leaves about $9 profit on each $132 order ($132 divided by 2.60 is a $50.77 cost per purchase). Our break-even ROAS guide walks through the margin side in more detail if your fees or returns are higher.
Five automated rules we set up, with the settings
These use the worked example above. Swap in your own break-even numbers before you copy them.
1. Stop an ad that has spent without selling
- Apply to: all active ads in the prospecting campaign
- Action: turn off ads
- Conditions: spent is greater than $90 and results is smaller than 1
- Time range: last 7 days. Schedule: daily
This is the rule that saves the most money in small accounts. It does not use a cost condition, because cost per purchase is blank when there are no purchases. Add hours since creation is greater than 72 so new ads get three days before the rule can judge them.
2. Flag rising cost before it becomes a problem
- Apply to: all active ad sets
- Action: send notification only
- Conditions: cost per purchase is greater than $72 (1.2 times break-even) and frequency is greater than 3
- Time range: last 7 days. Schedule: daily
We alert rather than pause here, because rising cost with rising frequency usually means the ad needs a fresh creative, which a person has to make. Our frequency guide covers what to do with the alert. In a campaign using Advantage+ campaign budget, build this one at campaign level.
3. Step up the budget of a proven ad set
- Apply to: ad sets with their own daily budget
- Action: adjust budget, increase daily budget by 15%, with a maximum daily budget of $300
- Conditions: website purchase ROAS is greater than 2.60 and results is greater than 10
- Time range: last 7 days. Schedule: daily
The maximum is not optional. At 15% a day, a $100 daily budget becomes $266 after seven increases ($100 times 1.15 to the power of 7), and a rule without a ceiling keeps going. Large budget jumps can send an ad set back into learning, which is why we use small steps once a day rather than one big change; our learning limited guide lists the edits that reset learning, and the safe scaling playbook covers the pace we scale at.
4. Catch underdelivery on a lifetime budget
- Apply to: ad sets with lifetime budgets
- Action: send notification only
- Conditions: estimated budget spending % is smaller than 80 and hours since creation is greater than 48
- Schedule: daily
This tells you early when an ad set will finish with money unspent. Our guide to ads that are active but not spending covers the usual causes.
5. Switch off sale campaigns when the sale ends
- Apply to: all active campaigns
- Action: turn off campaigns
- Conditions: campaign name contains SALE
- Schedule: custom, the day after the sale at 12:00 am
Name every sale campaign with the same word and one rule closes them all on time. Turn the rule off once the sale is over so it does not catch next season's campaigns early. Our BFCM budget and launch plan shows where this fits in a sale calendar.
Why a rule turned ads on or off when you did not expect it
When an ad switches itself on or off, open Automated rules then Activity first. It lists every action a rule took, such as objects turned off or budgets increased. If nothing is listed, a rule did not do it. These are the causes we find most often:
| What you see | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| An ad you paused by hand is running again | A turn-on rule covering that level, often left over from a past test or sale | Turn on rules should name specific items, never all active ads |
| A brand new ad set was switched off on day one | A rule applied to all active ad sets picks up new ones, and Today data looked bad | Add hours since creation and use a longer time range |
| An ad keeps flicking off and on | Two rules working against each other, one turning off and one turning on | Check Activity for both rule names and delete one |
| The rule acted on numbers you do not recognise | The rule reads the account's default attribution and its own time range | Compare against a report with the same window and dates |
| Ad sets were combined or permanently paused | A Reduce audience fragmentation or Reduce auction overlap template rule | Switch those templates to Send notification only |
| An ad set turned off with no rule in Activity | It spent its budget, reached its end date or underdelivered | Check budget, schedule and delivery status |
The weekly rules check we run
- Open Activity and read every action from the past week. Each one should be something you would have done yourself.
- Recalculate break-even CPA and ROAS if prices, shipping or margins changed, and update the thresholds.
- Turn off or delete rules tied to finished tests and sales.
- Check that every scale rule still has a maximum budget.
- Confirm the people subscribed to notifications still have the right access.
If you would rather hand the rules and the watching to someone else, that is part of how we run Meta ads management for Australian brands.
Questions we get about Meta automated rules
Are Meta automated rules free?
Yes. Automated rules are built into Meta Ads Manager at no extra cost. You can have up to 250 rules on each ad account, including inactive ones.
How often do Meta automated rules run?
You choose the schedule. Meta's developer documentation lists every half hour, every hour, daily at midnight in the ad account's time zone, or a custom schedule of chosen days and times.
Can I use OR conditions in a Meta automated rule?
No. A rule acts only when all of its conditions are true. To act when any one of several things happens, create a separate rule for each condition.
Why can't I create a cost per result rule for my ad sets?
If the campaign uses Advantage+ campaign budget, Meta blocks cost-based rules that turn ad sets or ads on or off or send notifications. Build the rule at campaign level, change the action, or use ad sets with their own budgets.
Do automated rules reset the learning phase?
Rules make the same edits you would make by hand, so a large budget change or switching ad sets off can restart learning just as a manual edit would. Small budget steps once a day are less disruptive than one large jump.
How do I find out which rule changed my ad?
Open Automated rules in Ads Manager and select Activity. It lists each action, such as objects turned off or budgets increased or decreased, with the rule that made it.
Sources
- Meta Business Help Centre: About automated rules in Meta Ads Manager
- Meta Business Help Centre: Limits to automated rules
- Meta Business Help Centre: About actions for automated rules
- Meta Business Help Centre: Available conditions for automated rules
- Meta Business Help Centre: About rules with cost-related conditions
- Meta Business Help Centre: Create an automated rule in Meta Ads Manager
- Meta Business Help Centre: Manage automated rules
- Meta Business Help Centre: About automated rules templates
- Meta for Developers: Schedule based ad rules