--- title: "Best Practices: Creative Rejections" slug: "best-practices-creative-rejections" description: "Ensure your ad creatives meet inventory guidelines to avoid rejection and optimize campaign performance across platforms like Google and Xandr." tags: ["Best Practices", "Creatives"] updated: 2026-05-08T21:36:55Z published: 2026-05-08T21:36:55Z canonical: "help.quantcast.com/best-practices-creative-rejections" --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.quantcast.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Best Practices: Creative Rejections Quantcast sources the inventory for ad campaigns through publisher and exchange integrations. Inventory sources will have different guidelines for ad creative, and if your creative does not meet those guidelines, it may be rejected by the inventory source. The performance of your ad campaign will be impacted if your creative cannot serve on all available inventory sources. In this article: For information on creative guidelines: - [Creative Specifications (Display)](/v1/docs/creative-specifications-display) - [Creative Specifications (Native)](/v1/docs/creative-specifications-native) - [Creative Specifications (Video)](/v1/docs/creative-specifications-video) ## **Identifying Rejected Creatives** Google and Xandr (AppNexus) will want to review the creative units that are attached to live ad sets before allowing them to be delivered, while other exchanges will have different (often less strict) rejection policies that will apply after the bidding activity has commenced. If one of these two exchanges rejects the creative, this will be visible in the **Creatives** section of the Quantcast Platform. A yellow circle with an exclamation mark icon will populate next to the creative preview image to indicate that the creative has experienced a rejection. Hover over the rejection icon to get details about which exchange has rejected your creative. ![](https://cdn.us.document360.io/9a180fa0-df3b-4942-a5f6-b3905cf917d9/Images/Documentation/mceclip0(34).png?sv=2026-02-06&spr=https&st=2026-11-08T07%3A35%3A37Z&se=2026-11-08T08%3A35%3A37Z&sr=c&sp=r&sig=%2Fyhd23Fj39GlNwRW%2FE8QbQNHvB%2FHVFinabFCqxIa7%2FU%3D) To see the reason for the rejection, click the icon to open the **Audits Info** modal. ![](https://cdn.us.document360.io/9a180fa0-df3b-4942-a5f6-b3905cf917d9/Images/Documentation/mceclip0 (1)(12).png?sv=2026-02-06&spr=https&st=2026-11-08T07%3A35%3A37Z&se=2026-11-08T08%3A35%3A37Z&sr=c&sp=r&sig=%2Fyhd23Fj39GlNwRW%2FE8QbQNHvB%2FHVFinabFCqxIa7%2FU%3D) The **Audits Info** modal includes: - **Exchange:** Inventory partners (Google and Xandr - AppNexus) - **Status:** Pending, Approved, Rejected, or Expired - **Feedback:** The rejection reason - **Resubmit:** Once you are ready, click this to resubmit your creative to the exchange **Things to note:** - Google is divided into 2 policies - **Network Policy:** Creative compliance policy when bidding in open or private auctions, or auction packages (outside of Russia and China). - **Deals Policy:** Creative compliance policy when bidding on Programmatic Guaranteed and Preferred Deals. - Google network policy (open market policy) rejections are typically due to sensitive categories (i.e., online gambling). The creative can be served if you have an active Deal (Programmatic Guaranteed or Preferred Deal) with Google and the creative has been approved under the deals policy. - After 30 days, an unused creative will have an Expired status. The creative will need to be re-audited before use. Click Resubmit. **Note:** Our system will automatically resubmit the creative for auditing when a campaign is scheduled to start. ## **Reasons for Rejection** For more information on the creative rejection reason listed in the platform, you can review the creative guidelines from our inventory partners. These resources also include information on how to adjust the creative to comply with their guidelines. The rejection reason listed in the platform should correlate with the policies listed below. - [Google Ad Exchange](https://support.google.com/authorizedbuyers/answer/6272857?hl=en) - Xandr ([AppNexus) Ad Exchange](https://docs.xandr.com/bundle/xandr-bidders/page/creative-audit-feedback.html) ## **Fixing Rejected Creatives** Once you have identified the reason for the rejection, you will need to update the creative to fix the underlying issue. If you do not, campaign performance may suffer. - For **Quantcast-hosted creative**, you will need to create a new creative that addresses the underlying issues that caused the rejection. Once the new creative is attached to a live ad set, it will be sent to the exchanges for another audit. The guide [here](/v1/docs/uploading-creatives) walks through the process for uploading a new creative. - For **third-party-hosted creative**, you will need to fix the underlying issue in your ad server and save the creative. From there, reach out to the Quantcast team to have the creative manually resubmitted to the inventory source. **Creative does not click through properly / Broken URL** 1. On the preview, click on rejected creative and check if the banner clicks to a working Landing Page 2. Test landing URL in the browser 3. If the landing URL is not functioning, QA the URL 4. Once the URL is fixed, re-submit the creative via the Audits Info modal by clicking on the resubmit button **Blank Creative** 1. Confirm if the creative is rendering blank in the preview, and check the following: 1. 3P tag 1. Confirm if the creative is live on the ad server. 2. The tag is using an ad blocker (IAS or DV), for example, geo-restrictions (in case you use a VPN and check the preview again) In case you feel that the rejection reason or the provided feedback from the SSP is incorrect, please reach out to the Quantcast team or directly to your CSM. They can file an appeal with Google and/or Xandr and ask for manual approval if we have a valid case.