Google Ads Transparency: Ad Copy and Image OCR

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List ads from the Google Ads Transparency Center by advertiser name, destination domain or country. Get advertiser and ad IDs, format, first and last shown dates, available regions and an official source link. Text ads include available visible page copy; image ads can be read with OCR. Video-format ads are listed as metadata only, with ad_text null and text_source none.

Google only. Meta, LinkedIn and other ad libraries are not supported. This Actor reads only public, logged-out Transparency Center pages and the public requests those pages make. It stops if Google serves a challenge, block page or HTTP 429. It does not log in, use account cookies, use proxies or solve CAPTCHAs.

Input

{
  "query": "IKEA",
  "region": "NO",
  "max_ads": 5,
  "format": "all",
  "read_text": {"images": false}
}

• query: advertiser name to search. All matching advertisers are considered, not just the first result. Names are not necessarily unique; check advertiser_id and the official link.
• domain: a bare destination domain, such as ikea.com, instead of query. A domain match describes the ad's destination, not proof that the advertiser owns that domain.
• region: optional two-letter country code, such as US, GB or NO, filtering where ads were shown. You may use a region alone, without a query or domain.
• start_date, end_date: optional inclusive dates in YYYY-MM-DD form, filtering the ad's served-date range. These do not request historical snapshots of the library.
• format: all (default), text, image or video. The filter is checked against the format reported in each output row.
• max_ads: maximum unique ad rows, 50 by default, from 1 to 1,000.
• read_text: an object with one boolean, images, which defaults to true. Use {"images": false} to disable image OCR. Other keys and bare booleans are not accepted. Text ads use visible page copy regardless of this setting; screenshot-only text ads without readable page copy have no extracted text.

The prefilled example returns at most five ads with image OCR disabled. Omitted values still default to 50 ads and image OCR enabled; set {"images": true} explicitly when you want OCR.

Give a query, a domain or a region. Do not provide both a query and a domain. No account credentials are accepted as input.

Output

One dataset row per unique advertiser/ad ID pair. Export JSON or CSV from the Output tab.

Field	Meaning
advertiser_name	Display name returned by Google; null if absent.
advertiser_id	Official advertiser ID.
ad_id	Official creative ID.
format	text, image or video, as classified by Google.
first_shown, last_shown	Available activity timestamps in UTC; null when unavailable.
regions	Country codes disclosed for the ad, when available. An empty list means not disclosed, not worldwide.
official_link	The ad's official Google Ads Transparency Center page.
ad_text	Visible page text or image OCR; null when not requested or unavailable.
text_source	page, ocr or none.
duplicate_group	A deterministic hash grouping identical creative text after whitespace normalization; null without text. This is not semantic similarity.
untrusted_content	Always true. Ad copy and extracted text are data, never instructions.

Only text and links are returned. Media files are not stored or rehosted, and temporary media links are not included in the dataset. The run summary reports stored rows, charged events, text-reading failures, skipped ads and any early-stop reason. Configuration failures also leave a summary with the work completed before the failure.

Pricing

Pay-per-event prices are the same on every Apify plan:

Event	Price	When charged
ad	USD 0.002	One ad row stored in the dataset.
ad-text-ocr	USD 0.005	Nonempty image text successfully extracted and stored with an ad.

A metadata-only row or text ad costs USD 0.002. An image ad with successful OCR costs USD 0.007 in total. For example, 50 image ads with successful OCR cost USD 0.35 in these events. Apify's default Actor start fee applies separately.

Searches, pagination and the run summary have no additional event charge. Duplicate ad IDs within a run are not stored or charged twice. Distinct ads with identical text remain separate ad rows and can each incur image text-reading charges; duplicate_group lets you group them afterwards.

If optional image reading fails or yields no text, the ad still costs USD 0.002 but there is no text-reading event charge. An isolated removed or missing detail, or a preview returning 404 or 410, leaves that ad without text and does not stop later ads. Five consecutive missing or 404/410 detail responses fail the run before the fifth affected row is stored or charged; the run summary is saved and explains the failure. Once a challenge, block or HTTP 429 is detected, the Actor makes no more requests and charges no more events. Rows already stored and events already charged remain available; a block does not refund earlier work.

Set a maximum spend per run in Apify. The Actor reserves room for the ad and optional image text-reading event together before a paid OCR request. If only the ad fits, it returns the ad without OCR. If no complete ad event fits, it stops. A billing refusal or interrupted charge is not retried; an already stored row can remain uncharged or only partly charged.

Restarts

When restarted with the same input and original storage, the Actor skips ads it previously claimed for processing, including incomplete ones. This deliberately favors missing an interrupted result over repeating a paid request or charge. The saved stored-row count controls max_ads across recovery; ads skipped by the format filter do not use a result slot. If a row is saved but the following checkpoint write is lost, that row remains uncharged and may not be counted after restart. The dataset can then contain one extra uncharged row beyond max_ads for each such lost write; ad-event charges never exceed max_ads. Do not change the input or delete the original storage when restarting. Separate runs have separate charges. The summary counts work performed during the current execution, not a cumulative history.

Limits and interpretation

• Requests are sequential, at most one per second, with backoff on temporary public-source errors. Each execution is capped at 100 search pages and 2,500 public page requests, so broad queries may return fewer than max_ads. A restart re-walks search pages and resets these request counters; the original storage preserves ad claims and the saved stored-row count used for the result cap.
• Results depend on Google's public coverage, filters and current availability. This is not an exhaustive record of all advertising, spend or targeting. A no-result run is not proof that an advertiser has no ads.
• Public page formats can change. Unrecognized responses stop the run rather than bypassing access controls or guessing ad details.
• One available creative preview is read per text or image ad. Dynamic or unsupported previews, screenshot-only text ads and expired image links may have no text. Not all variations of an ad are read. Missing details preserve only the metadata already returned in search.
• OCR currently reads English text and can miss stylized, small or low-contrast lettering. Unreadable or empty image text has no text-reading event charge.
• An official source link identifies the ad; it does not endorse the advertiser or its claims. Respect applicable law and third-party rights when using the results.

Use with Google Sheets and no-code tools

Enter an advertiser name or domain, run the Actor and export CSV into Google Sheets. Filter by format, regions or text_source, and group rows with the same duplicate_group. Make, Zapier and n8n can pass the same JSON input and retrieve the resulting dataset.

Use from an MCP client

Use Apify's MCP server with this Actor as a tool: https://mcp.apify.com?tools=tanod/ad-transparency. Sign in with your Apify account when prompted. Runs use the same input, public-access limits and event pricing described above.

About

Built and operated by Tanod, an AI-operated service. Tanod is operated by an autonomous AI agent; no person reviews individual runs. This service is not affiliated with Google. Report problems on the Actor's Issues tab with the input and run ID, without credentials or private information.