Ad testing thresholds

How do thresholds affect single ad group testing?

In a single ad group test, a threshold defines the minimum performance each ad must have, or the statistical confidence a test must achieve, before a valid test result is produced.

1. Daily automated single ad group tests: the defined thresholds are used for all test runs. Account thresholds can be overridden at the campaign level.
2. Manual single ad group tests: you can override the defined thresholds for every manual test you run. 

How do thresholds affect multi ad group testing?

In a multi ad group test, a threshold is the minimum performance each set of ads (defined by patterns or labels) must have, or the statistical confidence a test must achieve, before a valid test result is produced.

1. Daily automated multi ad group tests: the defined thresholds are used for all test runs. Account thresholds can be overridden at the campaign level.
2. Manual multi ad group tests: you can override the defined thresholds for every manual test you run.

How do thresholds affect the test metrics?

A threshold is used only when it's relevant to the metric being calculated:

• Click threshold: only used when calculating the CTR and conversion rate metrics. 
• Impression threshold: only used when calculating the CTR, conversions/impressions and conversion value/impression metrics. 
• Conversion threshold: used when calculating all metrics, except CTR. 
• Confidence and date range thresholds: used when calculating all metrics. 

What threshold values should I use?

• The minimum data you should define by testing metric

• How much data should you have before examining an ad test result?
  

Where are the thresholds defined?

You can overwrite the default setting in the Ad testing settings.  

Click the button to open a screen to see the current default ad testing thresholds and change them as needed. 

Related content:

• Working with statistical significance: how confident should you be in your test results?
• Do you have insignificant test results? How to use maximum data in ad Testing