Facebook ads allow businesses to reach potential customers and drive results for their business. As you run Facebook ads, it’s important to track how much you’re spending on them. Facebook provides tools to see your total ad spend across campaigns, ad sets, and ads.
View total ad spend in Ads Manager
The easiest way to see your total ad spend is in Facebook Ads Manager. Here’s how:
- Go to Ads Manager and log in to your account.
- In the left column, click on the “Billing” tab.
- Select the date range you want to view spend for. This can be the last 7, 30, or 90 days, a custom range, or all-time.
- The total amount you’ve spent across all campaigns will show at the top. Scroll down to see a spending breakdown by campaign.
This allows you to quickly view your total spend for any time period. You can further break it down by ad set or ad by clicking into each campaign.
See spend for a specific campaign
To see spend for a specific campaign or ad set:
- Go to Ads Manager and select the campaign or ad set you want to view.
- Click on the “Delivery” tab.
- Select the date range to view data for.
- Scroll down to the “Spend” section. This will show you total spend for that campaign or ad set.
This is useful if you want to analyze the performance of specific campaigns and know how much you’re spending on each. The “Results” columns also show metrics like clicks, impressions, CTR, and cost per result.
View spend in Facebook Business Suite
Facebook Business Suite is a dashboard that brings together your Pages, ads, and more. You can also view ad spend here:
- Go to Business Suite and select the ad account you want to view.
- On the left, click “Ads Manager”.
- At the top, click the date range to select a preset or custom range.
- Your total ad spend for that date range will show at the top. Scroll down to see spend by campaign.
Business Suite provides an overview of all your Facebook business assets. Checking your ad spend here allows you to view it alongside your Pages and Instagram accounts.
Check spend in Facebook reporting
Facebook offers reporting features to help you analyze ad performance. You can view spend in these reports:
- Campaign Reports – Downloadable PDF showing in-depth metrics for a specific campaign or ad set.
- Ad Reports – Detailed reporting on an individual ad.
- Marketing API – Pull data and generate custom reports via the Facebook Marketing API.
These provide additional reporting options beyond Ads Manager. Campaign reports offer an overview of performance for a campaign or ad set. You can view total spend along with other metrics like CPM and CPC.
Use Facebook analytics tools
In addition to the above methods, third-party Facebook analytics tools provide ways to track and analyze ad spend. Some examples include:
- Facebook Insights – Free analytics tool built into Facebook Pages.
- Google Analytics – Connect your Facebook account to view cross-channel data.
- WordStream – Paid platform specializing in PPC analytics.
- AdStage – All-in-one reporting dashboard for Facebook ads.
- AdEspresso – Specialized tool for managing Facebook and Instagram ads.
These tools can visualize your Facebook ad spend in different ways and provide comparison across other marketing channels. Many integrate directly with your Facebook Ads Manager account.
Export Facebook ad data
You can export raw ad data from Facebook to connect with external tools. Facebook offers these export options:
- Ads Manager – Download CSV reports for campaigns, ad sets, or ads.
- Marketing API – Pull ad data directly into other platforms.
- Insights Exports – Schedule automated exports from Pages, ads, and more.
Exporting your ad data lets you manipulate it externally. You may want to connect it other business systems, combine it with data from other channels, or perform custom analysis.
View invoices and billing
Your monthly invoices also show your total ad spend on Facebook. To access invoices:
- Go to Ads Manager and click the settings icon.
- Select “Billing” from the menu.
- Click “View Invoices”.
This will display all your monthly invoices. Click on one to see your total spend for that period. Invoices provide an additional way to track your advertising costs over time.
Set up billing notifications
To stay on top of your ad spend, enable billing notifications in Facebook:
- In Ads Manager, click the settings icon.
- Go to Notifications > Account Notifications.
- Turn on “Account Spending Limit Warning” and set a notification threshold.
This will send you an email alert when your account hits the spending amount you defined. Knowing when your account spends a certain amount can help you control costs.
Takeaways
Here are some key tips for viewing your Facebook ad spending:
- Check Ads Manager for total spend across all campaigns and date ranges.
- View campaign metrics to see spend for specific ad sets and ads.
- Use Business Suite for a unified view including Pages and Instagram.
- Generate reports to analyze spend alongside other performance data.
- Export ad data for further analysis and external reporting.
- Review monthly invoices for periodic spend totals.
- Set up spend notifications to monitor your ad costs.
Monitoring your Facebook ad spend is key to understanding campaign performance and optimizing your ad budget over time. Take advantage of all the reporting tools to get a complete picture of how much you’re spending across your ads, campaigns, and business.
Here is a summary of the key points:
Ways to view Facebook ad spend
- Ads Manager – See total and breakdown by campaign.
- Campaign metrics – View spend for specific ad sets/ads.
- Business Suite – Combined view with Instagram, Pages.
- Facebook reports – Campaign, ad, and API reports.
- Analytics tools – Insights, AdStage, WordStream, etc.
- Data exports – CSV and API data exports.
- Invoices – Monthly totals for billing periods.
- Notifications – Spend limit alerts.
Tips for monitoring spend
- Check Ads Manager frequently for overall spend.
- Compare spend across campaigns to find best performers.
- Use dashboards and custom reports to visualize data.
- Analyze spend alongside other metrics like CTR and conversions.
- Set up real-time notifications when reaching spending thresholds.
- Schedule exports for ongoing analysis and reporting.
- Review invoices to reconcile monthly bills.
By regularly monitoring your Facebook ad spend through all available methods, you’ll be better able to optimize campaigns, allocate budget effectively, and make data-driven decisions.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I view Facebook ad spend by date?
In Ads Manager or Business Suite, you can view spend for any custom or preset date range. Select the calendar icons to choose a start and end date, or use shortcuts like last 7, 14, or 30 days. The total spend and breakdown will show for that date range.
Can I see daily spend for Facebook ads?
Yes, Facebook Ads Manager and Business Suite both allow you to view daily spend. Choose a date range of 1 day in the calendar picker, then use the arrows or calendar to cycle through each individual day. This will show the spend for each day for deeper analysis.
Does Facebook show CPM and CPC costs?
When viewing campaign metrics in Ads Manager, you can add columns to show CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and CPC (cost per click) data. Click the columns icon, add CPM and CPC, and the costs will display alongside spend for each campaign.
How do I know if my Facebook ad spend is working?
Compare your ad spend to important performance indicators like clicks, impressions, conversions, ROI, and your target CPA. If you’re getting your desired results within your target CPA, the ad spend is working. If not, you may need to adjust bidding, targeting, creatives, or overall budget.
Can I view Facebook ad history older than 2 years?
Unfortunately Facebook Ads Manager only shows data for the past 2 years. For older ad history, you would need to reference your downloaded reports or invoices. Facebook deletes older than 2 years of aggregated reporting data but invoices are available for 7 years.
Facebook Ad Spend Table
Here is an example data table visualizing Facebook ad spend by campaign:
| Campaign | Impressions | Clicks | CTR | Spend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fall Sale | 1,552,000 | 42,300 | 2.7% | $1,250 |
| Summer Promotion | 965,100 | 32,200 | 3.3% | $785 |
| New Arrivals | 782,600 | 25,500 | 3.2% | $612 |
| Brand Awareness | 1,235,300 | 28,700 | 2.3% | $1,014 |
This table breaks down ad spend alongside other key metrics like impressions, clicks, and CTR for each campaign. This makes it easy to see the performance and spending for each part of your strategy at a glance.
How to Reduce Facebook Ad Spend
If your Facebook ad spending is higher than expected, there are ways to help optimize your costs:
Set campaign budgets
Use campaign budget optimization features to cap your spend at specific amounts. This prevents campaigns from overspending.
Use bids strategically
Optimize bids for when your target audience is most active. Set lower bids for non-peak times to save money.
Refine targeting
Tightly target your best customer demographics and interests. Avoid broad targeting that wastes spend.
Test ad variations
Test different images, copy, layouts, etc and only invest in what gets best results.
Analyze data frequently
Stay on top of reporting so you can spot check poor performers and continuously improve.
Set rules to stop low-ROI ads
Use rules to automatically pause or stop ads that aren’t performing well.
Optimize for conversions
Prioritize conversion campaigns over reach/visibility to get more tangible returns.
Review relevancy scores
Ads with low relevancy scores won’t perform well and waste spend.
Conclusion
Monitoring and optimizing your Facebook ad spend is crucial for running effective and profitable ad campaigns. Take advantage of the detailed metrics and reporting in Ads Manager, Business Suite, and third-party analytics tools to analyze spend across all your campaigns, ad sets and ads.
Look at spend data on a granular daily level, break it down by campaign, ad, and keyword, and compare it to KPIs like conversions to get the full picture of performance. Use this data to identify waste, reduce inefficient spend, and improve campaign outcomes over time.
With comprehensive and regular analysis of ad spend, you’ll gain insight to enhance your Facebook advertising results and make sure your budget is being used to maximum effect.