Ads on more than 50% of the page
Ad Density Higher than 50% · experience 05 of 23
Add up the height of all the ads in the main content and divide by the height of that content. If it comes to more than half (50%), the page has too many ads.
Understand it in 1 minute
Ad density is how much of the page's main content is taken up by ads. The Coalition for Better Ads calculation works like this: add up the height of all the ads inside the main content and divide by the total height of that main content. On desktop, when ads take up more than 50% of the height, that is, more than half, the page falls below the standard. It is like a newspaper where more than half the page is advertising and less than half is news.
One important detail: the measurement is made on the main content of the whole page, not just the part visible on screen (the browser window). That is why the first screen can look full while the page as a whole stays within the limit, or the other way around. The main content does not include the site's header, footer and navigation, and that includes related article blocks. Ads below the main content are not counted.
Ads on the sides of the main content, on the other hand, are counted. All formats count, both sticky ads and those in the middle of the text. The height of each sticky ad is counted only once. Finally, video ads that play before (pre-roll) or in the middle (mid-roll) of a video related to the page's own topic are not part of the measurement. Because the division is by the content height, short texts with many ads are the ones that exceed the limit most easily.
Allowed
- A page where the ads in the main content add up to 50% or less of the height of that content.
- Ads below the end of the main content: they are not counted.
- Header, footer, menu and related article blocks: they are not part of the main content.
- Pre-roll or mid-roll of a video related to the page topic: not part of the measurement.
- A first screen full of ads, but with the whole page adding up to 50% or less: the measurement is on the main content, not on the screen.
Not allowed
- A short text with so many banners that the combined height of the ads exceeds half of the content height.
- A sidebar next to the text full of stacked ads that, added to those in the text, exceed 50%.
- A sticky ad added to the ads in the text exceeding 50% (the sticky ad counts once).
- A page with one sentence and several ads, where the ads take up more than half of the content height.
In practice
Imagine a horoscope site with very short texts that uses the same ad layout as its long articles. Because the text is short, the combined height of the ads exceeds half of the main content height, and the page falls below the standard. On a long article, the same ads may stay below 50%, because the calculation divides by the content height.
Why it's annoying
When half the page is ads, the content becomes an afterthought and reading gets hard.
How to fix
- Add up the height of the ads in the main content and compare it with the height of the text.
- Remove repeated spaces until you are at 50% or less.
- Keep useful content between one ad and the next.
In ConsentMode
Measures the height of each ad slot and of the content, page by page.
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