Recommendations, not limits
Meta's Ads Guide lists primary text, headline and description counts under text recommendations for each placement. They are the lengths Meta suggests for that placement, not the most a field accepts.
Where the counts differ
Facebook Feed is the outlier: 50 to 150 characters of primary text and a 27-character headline. Instagram Feed and Facebook Stories recommend 125 and 40. Reels runs shorter, with 40 characters of primary text on Facebook and 44 on Instagram. A Facebook Feed carousel recommends 80 characters of primary text, a 20-character headline and an 18-character description.
Testing two lengths of copy shows what a placement needs; the CTR calculator and the CPC calculator compare the results. For the picture that goes with the words, see Facebook ad size and Instagram story size.
Questions
Meta recommends 50 to 150 characters of primary text for Facebook Feed, and 125 characters for Instagram Feed, Facebook and Instagram Stories, Marketplace image ads and Audience Network.
Meta recommends 27 characters for Facebook Feed and 40 characters for Facebook Stories, Instagram Feed, Marketplace image ads and the right column.
Meta recommends 30 characters for descriptions in Marketplace image ads and Audience Network, and 18 characters on a Facebook Feed carousel.
Up to 30, according to Meta's Ads Guide for Instagram Feed.
Sources
Every figure on this page comes from Meta's own pages, read on 3 November 2026. Meta changes these specs from time to time, so check the source before a large production run.
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Feed, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Business Help Center: Best practices for aspect ratios in Meta ads · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Feed, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Feed, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Feed, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Business Help Center: Safe zones for ads · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Stories, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Stories, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Stories, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Stories, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Reels, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Reels, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Reels, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Reels, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Marketplace, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Marketplace, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Right Column, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Messenger Stories, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Messenger Stories, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Business Help Center: About ad placements across Meta technologies · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Audience Network native, banner and interstitial, image · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Audience Network native, banner and interstitial, video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Audience Network rewarded video · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Feed, carousel · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Instagram Feed, carousel · checked 2026-11-03
- Meta Ads Guide: Facebook Feed, collection · checked 2026-11-03