What Are the Key Facebook Ads Updates for 2025? | Red Sun IT

2025-11-12 • RedSun IT Services

What are the Key Updates in Facebook Ads for 2025: Trends and Expert Predictions

The advertising platform of Facebook (currently part of Meta's application family) is in a constant state of development. In 2025, advertisers will need to adjust to some key updates in Facebook Ads if they want to keep their edge. This article outlines the primary differences we will see, from new AI-powered tools and ad formats to new targeting rules and measurement methods, that every business should be aware of. By being aware of these changes, marketers can make the best use of the Facebook (and Instagram) advertising platform regardless of changing algorithms and user behavior.

Major Facebook Ads updates in 2025 include:

• Reels Trending Ads: AI-curated ads appearing alongside the most popular short Reels videos.
• Ads on Threads: Meta is testing ads on its new Threads app, letting campaigns extend to a rapidly growing audience.
• Expanded Advantage+ Campaigns: Meta’s automated “Advantage+” ad campaigns now cover more objectives (like lead generation) and run multiple ad sets with AI-driven optimization.
• AI-Driven Creative Tools: Generative AI for ad design. For example, Meta’s Advantage+ Creative can automatically generate multiple ad variations (different layouts, copy, or even video) from a single asset.
• Targeting & Measurement Changes: New “value rules” let advertisers prioritize high-value audiences, while detailed targeting exclusions have been removed. An Opportunity Score (0–100) now appears in Ads Manager to rate how well campaigns follow Meta’s best practices. Legacy tools like the old Automated Ads builder are being phased out in favor of Advantage+.
• AI Personalization: Meta will begin using people’s interactions with its generative AI (e.g., Meta AI chatbot) to personalize the content and ads they see, further tailoring ad targeting.

In short, these key updates in Facebook Ads revolve around one theme: Meta is leaning heavily into AI, automation, and new short-form content surfaces. Marketers who adapt by using these tools, from leveraging Advantage+ automation to embracing Reels and Threads placements, will be better positioned in the coming year. socialmediatoday.com socialmediatoday.com

New Ad Formats and Placements

Meta is broadening the means advertisers use to reach people. One of the key updates in Facebook Ads is the launch of Reels Trending Ads on Facebook and Instagram. These ads utilize AI to automatically associate your promotion with the most trending Reels videos. In early-stage trials, placing ads alongside top Reels content increased brand awareness by a considerable amount. Meta has made this format available to all advertisers (through their sales rep), making it seamless to tap into the popularity of viral short-format videos. socialmediatoday.com

Another key update in Facebook Ads is the rollout of ads on Threads, Meta's latest real-time messaging app, like Twitter or X. In early 2025, Meta confirmed that select advertisers could now extend their Facebook/Instagram campaign into Threads, simply by checking a box in Ads Manager. There is no need for a new creative. The same ads appear on the Threads feed. Meta has also added new ad formats for Threads, including carousel ads and taller images (4:5 aspect ratio). Shopping advertisers are even able to run Threads Catalog Ads through Advantage+. In a practical sense, this means you can tap into the fast-growing audience of Threads’ user base (over 300 million monthly users recently) without any extra effort. socialmediatoday.com

In general, the message is obvious: advertising is being placed on even more surfaces (short video Reels, social feeds, messaging apps). In particular, advertisers should be creating mobile-first, video-heavy content to utilize these placements. For example, marketing experts say video ads matter, “Facebook video ads should take priority for your business,” in 2025, because short-form content is taking over social feeds. In short, be sure to reach your audience with high-quality video and creative formats, because that is where Facebook’s major updates are aimed. wordstream.com

AI and Automation: Advantage+ Campaigns

Meta's major initiative relates to automation and AI. One of the key updates in Facebook Ads is the increased availability of Advantage+ campaigns. Meta has since renamed and improved their automated ad suite: Advantage+ Sales Campaigns (previously called "Shopping Campaigns") are now dedicated to e-commerce, app installs, and even lead generation. This basically means advertisers can run a fully automated lead-gen campaign with Advantage+, letting Meta's AI optimize targeting, pacing, and budget. You no longer have the one ad-set max! Advantage+ campaigns can have multiple ad sets (up to 50 ads in each) for modern options. These enhancements will allow marketers more control (like simply adding audience preference) while still combining Meta's machine learning. bir.ch

Additionally, Meta has rolled out useful AI-guidance metrics in Ads Manager. There is now an Opportunity Score (0-100), which indicates how well your campaign aligns with best practices suggested by Meta. Using more Advantage+ recommendations (higher score) was linked to slightly lower cost-per-result in tests. In other words, Meta is telling advertisers to “use our AI tools and you will do better”. For instance, Meta now cites to use all placements (Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, Threads, etc.) and that Advantage+ should “dynamically distribute budget.”

One very exciting innovation is AI-generated creative. Meta’s Advantage+ Creative will take one uploaded image or video and automatically create many ad variations. AI can alter backgrounds, crop formats, change copy, and even convert a still image into a short animated video. Marketers should be using this, and Meta points out that combining Advantage+ Creative and Advantage+ placements should be combined, so each audience/clusters see the most relevant creative. These generative tools enable quick creative testing at scale.

Most importantly, Meta has removed the old “Automated Ads” feature in favor of Advantage+. As of late 2025, Meta has announced that it would sunset Automated Ads next year, leading all advertisers towards its AI-enabled Advantage+ experience. Practically, any new campaigns will default to the Advantage+ workflow, and the old automated tools will disappear. Meta is clear about its vision for the future of Facebook Ads: full automation. According to Mark Zuckerberg, soon a business should be able to say their objective, and simply let Meta’s AI build the.

Targeting, Privacy, and Measurement

With new ad formats come important targeting and privacy changes in 2025. Advertisers will notice that detailed targeting exclusions (the old way of excluding certain demographics/interests) have also been removed. Instead of fine targeting exclusions, Meta is focused on advertisers finding broader audiences and relying on its new Value-Based Rules. With value rules, advertisers tell Meta's algorithm what types of customers they value most (e.g., high spenders or repeat customers), and the AI will start to prioritize those customers - this is meant to help guide the system now that detailed targeting exclusions have been removed. In short, another key update in Facebook Ads is the shift to targeting based on value and AI, rather than based on manual exclusions.

Privacy trends are also driving Meta toward its own data. In confirming that it will use engagement with its Meta AI assistant for ad personalization, this means literally leveraging the things people do with the Meta AI (asking questions and other interactions) into what ads they see. This is part of the equation: as external tracking (cookie fatigue, iOS privacy changes) gets accordingly tighter, Meta will leverage its own AI signals for targeting purposes.

Measurement tools are also being updated. Meta completely updated attribution windows (e.g., engaged video views count after 5 seconds) and renamed objectives (for example, a Post Engagement objective is now referred to as Maximize Interactions). These metric updates are based on how users engage today. Advertisers need to check their conversion settings (e.g., update the Conversions API, attribution, etc.) to be aware of these updates. All said, expect you to see more AI-driven optimizations happening in the background and fewer manual adjustments to targeting and bidding. socialbee.com

Trends and Predictions

There are some clear trends for Facebook Ads 2025, which many industry experts are predicting. First, the creative quality of your ads is increasingly important. As one source noted, users are “savvy” and will expect high-quality visuals and creativity, which means you need to spend money on compelling ads. Additionally, video (particularly short-form video) is still king, and Facebook and Instagram will continue to prioritize Reels and Stories. One guide observed, “Facebook video ads should be a priority for your business.” In addition, with social commerce on the rise, features such as Instagram Shops and WhatsApp CTAs (like letting users sign up for deals on WhatsApp) will be more prevalent with ads.

On targeting, automation, and AI will take the lead. Meta’s machine learning will get better at guessing the correct audience for us. As one trend article from 2025 noted, we should continue using Advantage+ audience suggestions (the broad inputs) and let the system go outside the lists we pre-set, which we used before. Advertisers are realizing that a hybrid approach works best: they use advantage+ for broad prospecting (getting high-value users and new users) and complement the advantage+ prospecting with manual ads only for niche audiences or retargeting. wordstream.com bir.ch

Meta's future vision is an advertisement ecosystem powered by AI. Zuckerberg sees a world with a "one-click ad format" where advertisers just pay money and Meta’s AI would optimize everything for them. It's not yet 100% that way today, but moving into 2025, we are seeing those directions: Advantage+ automations, AI creative, and broad opt-in strategies are all pointing toward fully self-driving ads. Businesses should be preparing for this future by experimenting with Meta's AI tools today, embracing automation, testing new formats, and optimizing for engagement.

By staying on top of these key updates in Facebook Ads, businesses can keep their marketing relevant and efficient. Meta’s latest tools are designed to help your ads run smarter; the advertisers who adapt to these changes first will have an edge in 2025 and beyond.

You can contact Red Sun IT Services if you want professional assistance and help in adjusting to these recent changes. At Red Sun IT Services, we handle and coordinate Facebook Ads on your behalf. We stay updated with Meta-related news, developments, and updates. Moreover, we can help optimize your campaigns using the latest features for Facebook advertising. We look forward to working with you at Red Sun IT Services in order to help you leverage these industry trends to benefit your maximum ROI and growth efforts.