Why are my Facebook ads not spending?
An ad set that spends nothing almost always has one of six causes: the ad is still in review, the schedule has not started, the audience is too small or over-narrowed by exclusions, the bid cap or cost cap is below what the auction clears at, the daily budget is too low relative to your target CPA, or there is a billing or account-quality problem. Check them in that order, because the first three account for most cases and take seconds to rule out.
Last updated 2026-08-04
Review and schedule first
An ad in review does not deliver, and a scheduled ad set does not start early. Both show plainly in the delivery column, and both are mistaken for a targeting problem more often than anything else.
Bid and budget floors
A bid cap or cost cap set below the clearing price means you simply lose every auction, which looks identical to zero delivery. Separately, a daily budget below roughly 2x your target CPA cannot produce the ~50 weekly optimisation events an ad set needs to stabilise, so delivery stays throttled and erratic.
Audience size and exclusions
Stacked exclusions (purchasers, engagers, lookalike overlaps) can quietly reduce a large audience to almost nothing. Meta shows an estimated audience size at the ad set level; if it is tiny or the meter sits in the red, that is your answer.
Account-level problems
A failed payment method, a spending limit that has been reached, or a restricted account will stop delivery across everything at once. If every ad set went quiet simultaneously, look at the account before you touch any targeting.
A brand-new ad set that has spent nothing for under an hour is usually not broken, it is just starting. Give delivery a few hours before diagnosing, or you will change three variables at once and learn nothing.