Facebook Ad Character Limits for Text and Headlines

Write your ad as if only the first 125 characters of body copy and the first 40 of the headline will be read, because on most placements that is what Meta designs for. Those figures are Meta’s recommendations for avoiding truncation, not a ceiling the form enforces. The useful work is matching the length to the placement: Reels shows far less body copy than Feed, and carousel cards carry shorter headlines than single-image ads.

What character counts does Meta recommend for Facebook ads?

Meta’s help page on creative best practices for text in ads gives one set of numbers for most placements:

• Primary text (above the image or video): 125 characters.
• Headline (below the media): 40 characters.
• Description: 25 characters.

The same page adds that text “may be truncated if it exceeds the character limitation” and “may be further truncated across various placements and devices”, and recommends keeping text as short as possible. Its style advice is blunter: primary text should span 1 to 3 lines at most.

Are these hard limits or only recommendations?

They are recommendations. Meta presents every figure above as a “recommended text length”, and its Ads Guide files them under “Text recommendations”, separate from “Technical requirements” such as file size and minimum width. Meta’s help and Ads Guide pages checked on 2 Oct 2026 do not publish a hard maximum for the primary text, headline or description fields.

That distinction matters in practice. Meta describes text over the recommendation as text that gets truncated, not text that gets refused. What changes is what people see before the cut-off: copy past the first lines sits behind the truncation point on most placements, so your offer and call to action belong in the first 125 characters.

How many characters show in each Facebook placement?

Meta’s Ads Guide gives placement-level text recommendations that differ from the general 125/40/25. The figures below were read on each placement page on 2 Oct 2026.

Two patterns stand out. Reels shows the least body copy (40 characters on Facebook, 44 on Instagram), so a Reels ad has to carry its message in the video itself. And the Facebook Feed headline recommendation, 27 characters, is shorter than the general 40, which is the figure most spec sheets repeat.

“Not listed” means the Ads Guide page gives no figure for that field; it does not mean the field is unavailable.

Where does Facebook cut off ad text?

Meta does not publish a fixed truncation point per device. It says text can be truncated beyond the recommended length and “further truncated across various placements and devices”. The reliable way to see the cut-off is the ad preview, which shows how the ad may look across placements and devices before you publish (Preview an ad during ad creation).

Three things change the text people see, beyond length:

• Blank fields. If you leave text empty, Meta may pull text from the destination URL, and you may not be able to edit it.
• Existing posts. If you build the ad from an existing Page post, you can’t edit the text in the ad creative.
• Advantage+ creative enhancements. Text improvements can move phrases from your copy into overlays, footers or headlines, and Meta turns that enhancement on by default (Enable text improvements; About Advantage+ creative).

How do I check and fit ad text before publishing?

1. Write the hook, offer and call to action inside the first 125 characters of primary text, and keep the headline to 27 characters if Facebook Feed is your main placement.
2. In Ads Manager, at the ad level, open Ad creative and enter your primary text, headline and description in their own fields.
3. Click Expand in the Ad preview section to open Advanced preview, then check each placement tab for cut-off text.
4. Edit placement groups under Ad creative to give Stories and Reels shorter primary text and headlines through asset customisation for placements.
5. Open the Advantage+ creative tab in Advanced preview and turn off any text enhancement you don’t want applied to your wording.
6. Publish, then go to Ads Manager > Ads, select the ad, click Edit and open Advanced preview to check the live text on each placement.

Steps 3 and 5 follow Meta’s guide to turning off Advantage+ creative enhancements, which notes that some enhancements can only be turned off in Advanced preview. Step 4 follows asset customisation for placements, where Meta says Instagram Stories “work well with short copy”.

Can I give Meta several text options instead of one?

Yes. Meta’s text best-practices page says you can enter multiple text options for the primary text, headline and description fields when creating single image or video ads, and the delivery system tests variations of them. Meta’s text generation feature can also produce up to five variations of primary text and headline from your inputs. Each option should still fit the placement recommendations above, because every variation is subject to the same truncation.

What to put in those 125 characters is a copywriting question, covered in what makes Meta ad copy convert for a D2C brand? If text enhancements keep rewriting your wording, see which Advantage+ creative enhancements should I turn off? For hooks that carry a Reels ad with only 40 characters of body copy, read what makes a good hook for a Meta Reels ad? The Facebook ad creative testing hub covers how to test the versions you write.

FAQ

What is the character limit for a Facebook ad headline?

Meta recommends 40 characters for the headline on most placements. Its Ads Guide recommends 27 characters for Facebook Feed single image and video ads, 20 for Feed carousel cards and 55 for Facebook Reels. These are recommended visible lengths; Meta’s pages checked on 2 Oct 2026 publish no hard maximum.

Does Facebook reject ads with long primary text?

Not for length alone, on Meta’s own description. Its text best-practices page treats 125 characters as a recommended length and warns that longer text “may be truncated”. The risk of long copy is that your offer sits behind the cut-off, not that the ad is refused. Ad review checks text against Meta’s Advertising Standards, and Meta’s review page lists no length rule.

How long should a Facebook ad description be?

Meta recommends 25 characters for the description field on most placements. Its Ads Guide lists 30 characters for Facebook Marketplace and search results, and 18 for a Facebook Feed carousel card. Many placements don’t list a description at all, so don’t put information there that the ad needs.

Do emojis and spaces count toward Facebook’s character count?

Meta’s help and Ads Guide pages checked on 2 Oct 2026 don’t say how emojis or spaces are counted. Treat every visible character as part of the count and check the result in Advanced preview, which shows where each placement cuts the text.

Sources

Sources: Meta Business Help Center, Creative best practices for text in ads, About Advantage+ creative, Enable text improvements, Turn off Advantage+ creative enhancements, About asset customisation for placements, Preview an ad during ad creation, Preview a published ad and About ads in review; Meta Ads Guide placement pages linked in the table (checked 2 Oct 2026).