Facebook Advertising Pricing: How Much Does It Cost in 2024?
methodology:
- We asked over 270 marketers to share how much their companies spend on various aspects of Facebook advertising, from budget allocation to return on investment (ROI). See what they had to say below!
An Inside Look at WebFX Facebook
Advertising Cost
🔎 Full-funnel ROI tracking As a Meta Business Partner, our Facebook advertising specialists are ready to help you drive revenue with Facebook ads through proven strategies and cutting-edge expertise.
WebFX Expertise
Highlights
🎯 Audience targeting
📈 Campaign performance monitoring and optimization
📝 Professional ad copywriting and design
🎥 Video production
Join the 2,000+ businesses trusting WebFX to drive revenue through Facebook marketing
Too many Facebook advertising providers take a copy-and-paste approach to Facebook ads. That’s not our style.
Key Takeaways
- 81% of business are happy with the ROI they receive from Facebook ads
- 63% of businesses spend $1.00 – $500.00 per month on Facebook ads
- 62% of businesses spend $0.00 – $1.00 per like for Facebook ads
- 58% of businesses spend $0.00 – $1.00 per click for Facebook ads
- 53% of businesses allocate 0% – 15% of their overall advertising budget to Facebook ads
- 48% of businesses spend $1.01 – $5.00 per 1000 impressions for Facebook ads
How much does Facebook advertising cost?
Facebook advertising costs depend on a variety of factors, from your chosen bidding strategy to your budget, target audience, and more. Because Facebook uses an ad auction to select and run ads across the platform, there are few different cost averages to look at.
On average, people can pay the following for Facebook ads:
- $0.26 – $0.30 per click
- $1.01 – $3.00 per 1000 impressions
- $0.00 – $0.25 per like
- $0.00 – $5.00 per download
It’s important to note that these numbers are only averages. Your business may see higher or lower Facebook ad costs due to pricing factors like ad placement, target market, industry, and more.
Use the above amounts as points of reference rather than as a standard.
Getting real about Facebook ad costs
Looking for more than just average Facebook ad costs? You’re in luck — get some real insight from real marketers below!
Data roundup: How do you advertise on social media?
39%
To build brand awarness
Source: WebFX
31%
To drive sales
Source: WebFX
18%
To generate leads
Source: WebFX
12%
To increase webestie traffic
Source: WebFX
FAQs about Facebook ads pricing
Still have questions about how much Facebook advertising costs? Check out our FAQ:
How much do Facebook ads cost per month?
On average, Facebook ads cost $1.00 – $500.00 per month (63% of respondents). However, some companies spend upwards of $3000 per month on their Facebook ad campaign. How much you spend monthly can depend on your advertising budget and how much you pay per click, like, download, or 1000 impressions.
Source Data
| MONTHLY FACEBOOK ADVERTISING COST | % OF MARKETERS |
| $0.00 | 10.11% |
| $1.00 – $50.00 | 13.48% |
| $51.00 – $100.00 | 20.79% |
| $101.00 – $500.00 | 28.65% |
| $501.00 – $1,000.00 | 12.92% |
| $1,001.00 – $3,000.00 | 7.30% |
| Over $3,000.00 | 6.74% |
How much do Facebook ads cost per click?
On average, Facebook ads cost $0.00 – $1.00 per click (58% of respondents). Around 12% of companies spend more than $3.00 per click on their ads. Your cost per click can vary depending on your audience targeting, industry, and budget settings.
Source Data
| COST PER CLICK | % OF MARKETERS |
| $0.00 – $0.25 | 18.95% |
| $0.26 – $0.50 | 22.11% |
| $0.51 – $1.00 | 17.89% |
| $1.01 – $1.50 | 9.47% |
| $1.51 – $2.00 | 8.42% |
| $2.01 – $2.50 | 7.37% |
| $2.51 – $3.00 | 3.16% |
| $3.01 – $3.51 | 7.37% |
| $3.51 – $4.00 | 1.05% |
| More than $4.00 | 4.21% |
How much do Facebook ads cost per 1000 impressions?
On average, Facebook ads cost $1.01 – $5.00 per 1000 impressions (48% of respondents). While the majority of businesses spend less than $5.00 per 1000 impressions, 22% of companies spend more than $10.00.
Source Data
| COST PER 1000 IMPRESSIONS | % OF MARKETERS |
| $0.00 – $1.00 | 9.30% |
| $1.01 – $3.00 | 26.74% |
| $3.01 – $5.00 | 22.09% |
| $5.01 – $7.00 | 9.30% |
| $7.01 – $10.00 | 10.47% |
| $10.01 – $13.00 | 8.14% |
| $13.01 – $16.00 | 6.98% |
| $16.01 – $20.00 | 2.33% |
| More than $20.00 | 4.65% |
How much do Facebook ads cost per like?
On average, Facebook ads cost $0.00 – $1.00 per like (62% of respondents). A smaller percentage of businesses (8%) spend more than $2.00 per like.
How much do Facebook ads cost per download?
On average, Facebook ads cost $0 – $5.00 per download (72% of respondents). Around 2% of companies spend more than $10.00 per download on their Facebook ads. How much you pay per download can depend on your ad budget, quality, and company industry.
Source Data
| COST PER DOWNLOAD | % OF MARKETERS |
| $0.00 – $1.00 | 19.15% |
| $1.01 – $2.00 | 12.77% |
| $2.01 – $3.00 | 8.51% |
| $3.01 – $4.00 | 12.77% |
| $4.01 – $5.00 | 19.15% |
| $5.01 – $6.00 | 8.51% |
| $6.01 – $8.00 | 8.51% |
| $8.01 – $10.00 | 8.51% |
| More than $10.00 | 2.13% |
How much of your overall advertising budget should you allocate to Facebook ads?
On average, businesses allocate 0 – 15% of their total advertising budget to Facebook ads (53% of respondents). How much you allocate towards Facebook ads depends on your company’s unique goals and needs, along with the results you receive from your Facebook ad campaign. For example, if you earn a high ROI from your ads, you may allocate more of your budget to Facebook ads in the future.
Source Data
| PERCENTAGE OF OVERALL ADVERTISING BUDGET | % OF MARKETERS |
| 0% – 5% | 19.10% |
| 6% – 10% | 16.29% |
| 11% – 15% | 17.98% |
| 16% – 20% | 15.73% |
| 21% – 30% | 11.80% |
| 31% – 40% | 4.49% |
| 41% – 50% | 5.06% |
| 51% – 60% | 5.62% |
| 61% – 70% | 2.25% |
| 71% or more | 1.69% |
How does the Facebook ad auction work?
Here’s an overview of the steps you’ll take leading up to the Facebook ad auction:
- Log into Facebook Ad Manager to create a campaign and ad
- Choose your daily budget (or the maximum you’ll spend each day)
- Select what actions you’ll pay for (views, clicks, or downloads)
- Build your audience using demographic, interest, and device targeting options
- Add your ad copy, images, and/or video
- Approve your ad and get ready to launch!
Once there’s a chance to show an ad, it’s time for the Facebook ad auction to begin. To land an ad spot, Facebook evaluates ads based on certain criteria:
- Ad bid
- Ad quality
- Ad relevance
- Ad’s estimated action rate
When you optimize for these metrics, you can potentially lower how much your Facebook ads cost.
What factors influence Facebook advertising costs?
As we mentioned earlier, there’s a lot that goes into the total cost of Facebook advertising. Now, let’s take a look at what those factors are and why they’re important:
Audience
An in-depth study by AdEspresso on Facebook advertising costs revealed that your target audience has a significant impact on the prices of your Facebook ads. Whether you’re focusing on a specific age, gender, or interest, you can expect a shift in your ad expenses.
For example, if your ad campaign targets women, your CPC may increase by $0.55. That’s $0.15 more than if your ad campaign targeted men. When you look at age, ads that target individuals 55-65 years or older tend to have substantially higher costs than campaigns focusing on users 25-34 years old.
That’s because Facebook only has 26 million users between the ages of 55 and 64. While that may seem like a high number, it doesn’t come close to the more than 58 million people (between the ages of 25 and 34) that use Facebook.
When you advertise on Facebook, you can also target specific interests or audience attributes, including:
- Outdoor recreation
- Meditation
- Philanthropy
- College football
- Commuters
- And more
This useful feature can impact how much it costs your business to advertise on Facebook, as you may target high-value attributes or broad interests. For example, if you target frequent travelers, versus frequent international travelers, you have a broad audience that may incur additional expenses.
While high-value attributes can help you reach your specific market, broad interests can inflate your target audience with low-value users. Since these users often click on your ads, but don’t act on your calls-to-action (CTAs), targeting them can result in a low-performing campaign.
Focus your campaign on the people that matter and offer the most value to your business. You don’t want to pay for clicks or views that offer zero value when it comes to your long-term goals, like driving a sale or generating a lead.
Ad budget
When you launch an ad campaign on Facebook, you set an advertising budget.
No matter your budget, whether it’s $200 or $800 per month, it will impact how much Facebook advertising costs your business. If you set a budget of $200, that affects your ad bids, ad performance, and the overall results of your social media advertising campaign.
As an example, if your company launches an ad campaign with a $100 monthly budget, you may set a maximum bid of $1 per click. As the average CPC for Facebook ads is $0.94, it’s easy to see that your bid isn’t competitive and will probably result in a low number of impressions and clicks.
Not to mention, social media strategists recommend a daily budget of at least $5 for businesses. If you’re spending $5 a day on your campaign, however, you’ll use up your $100 budget by day 20. With this amount of funding, you don’t have the money to even run your ad campaign for the month.
While a large ad spend provides your business with additional flexibility, you can still make a small budget work for your company. Your company decision-makers need to realize, however, that a low ad budget provides fewer conversions because of its performance limitations.
Ad bid
Your ad bid also impacts the cost of Facebook ads. Facebook offers a few bidding strategies, including:
- Lowest cost bid strategy: This option, also known as automatic bidding, helps your business achieve the lowest possible cost per click or action. It also aims to make efficient use of your budget, which is why companies tend to start with this strategy.
- Target cost bid strategy: This option, also known as manual bidding, works to reach your desired cost per click or action. You can only use this strategy for app install, conversion, lead generation, or product catalog sale campaigns.
Depending on your bid strategy, as well as bid amount, you may have higher or lower Facebook advertising costs. In most cases, manual bidding comes with higher advertising costs, while automatic bidding tends to make the most of your budget.
Before you decide on a bidding strategy, it’s vital that you understand how the ad auction works on Facebook. When you understand the algorithm behind the company’s advertising services, you can build a better ad strategy and advertising budget.
In an ad auction, Facebook rates each bidder (and their ad) with these three factors:
- Bid: A bid is how much you’re willing to pay for a user to interact with your ad. For example, you may bid $1.50 for every click. According to Facebook, your bid is one of the most powerful tools for improving your ad’s performance.
- Estimated action rates: Your estimated action rates demonstrates the likelihood of users to interact with your ads, like by clicking on your ad or downloading your app. For a competitive ad, you need a high estimated action rate, which means creating a relevant ad for your audience.
- Ad quality and relevance: The positive and negative interactions of users with your ad determine its quality and relevance. A high ad quality and relevance score can improve the success of your ad in auctions.
If your ad comes away with the highest total value (based on the above three factors), you win the auction. In response, Facebook shows your ad, rather than a competitor’s, to the person in your target audience.
While an aggressive bid can increase your total value, it also raises your Facebook advertising costs. That’s why your business wants to focus on creating a relevant, high-quality ad first. Then, you can assess your bidding strategy and bid investment.
Ad objective
When you create an ad on Facebook, you need to choose one of the following main ad objectives:
Once you pick your main objective, you need to select a specific goal:
- Awareness
- Consideration
- Conversions
In most cases, more valuable ad goals, like a store visit or product purchase, lead to higher ad costs. That’s because these actions, like a product purchase, have immediate value for businesses. A product catalog sale, for example, generates immediate revenue for your company.
As you build your ad campaign, however, it’s important to remember the value of brand awareness and consideration. When you reach and connect with users in the early stages of the buying funnel, you can grow their interest in your brand and move them further down the sales funnel, resulting in a purchase.
Even though this action occurs later, it offers your business real and tangible value. It can also decrease your Facebook advertising costs, as most companies pay less for awareness- and consideration-related goals than for conversion-related goals.
The only difference is the turnaround time for a conversion. With a conversation-related goal, you connect immediately with a user looking to buy. In comparison, users in the awareness and consideration stage need a little more time before converting.
Ad placement
Ad placement also shapes the cost of Facebook ads. With Facebook, your ads can appear in six spots:
- Instagram Stories
- Facebook desktop newsfeed
- Facebook right column
- Facebook Messenger
- Audience Network
When it comes to social media advertising, Facebook offers a competitive advantage with its ownership of Instagram. Via Facebook, you can create Facebook and Instagram ads with ease, which saves your team time.
Instagram maintains the highest CPC when it comes to Facebook advertising costs. On average, companies spend an additional $0.80 per click to appear on Instagram. For Instagram Stories, the CPC increase is around $0.78.
The average CPC for ads on Facebook is around $0.30 less than Instagram. It offers a versatile platform for advertising your business. Your ads can appear not only on Facebook, but also Facebook Messenger, a popular messaging app for the social media network.
Audience Network
The Audience Network, which allows your ads to appear on websites and mobile apps, maintains an even lower CPC than Facebook and Instagram. In most cases, companies spend an additional $0.20 (based on the average advertising cost for Facebook) per click.
While you can modify where your Facebook ad appears, Facebook recommends Automatic Placements. This tool allows the social media platform’s delivery system to make the most of your ad spend by placing your advertisements on platforms that offer the most potential for results.
If you want to reduce your Facebook advertising costs, however, you can turn off this feature. When you turn Automatic Placements off, you enable your team to select where you want your ad to appear, whether on Facebook, Instagram, or the Audience Network.
Ad quality
The quality and relevance of your ads (as rated by Facebook) also affects how much Facebook advertising costs your business. If you create ads with a high relevance and engagement score, you will see lower ad costs.
Hootsuite demonstrated the power of an ad’s quality or relevance score in a recent study. The company created two versions of the same ad: one with a relevance and engagement score of 2.9 and another with a relevance and engagement score of 8.
The low-scoring ad had an average CPC of $0.14, while the high-scoring ad’s CPC was $0.03.
When it comes to your relevance and engagement score, your ads can receive a rating between 1 and 10. Ten is the best possible score, while one is the worst possible score. Facebook assigns a relevance and engagement score based on positive and negative ad feedback.
If you want to make the most of your ad spend on Facebook, it’s critical for your team to create ads with high relevance and engagement scores. For the best results, monitor your relevance and engagement score on a routine basis.
Access your relevance and engagement scores with the following steps:
- Go to Ads Manager
- Select the ad you want to view
- Choose the Columns dropdown menu
- Click Customize Columns
- Select Relevance Score
- Hit Apply
- View your Relevance and Engagement Score
Keep in mind that Facebook requires around 500 ad impressions or views before assigning a score.
As long as your ad is live, Facebook will continue to monitor user interactions, determining if it’s relevant. That’s why you need to check-in and adjust your ad to feedback regularly. With this proactive approach, you can improve the performance, results, and costs of your Facebook advertising campaign.
Season
The time of year can also impact how much Facebook ads are.
In peak shopping seasons, businesses tend to spend more on advertising. The increased demand for ad space results in a competitive marketplace, which can lead to aggressive bids and bigger campaign budgets that inflate the cost of advertising on Facebook.
A few of the most expensive days to advertise on Facebook include:
- Thanksgiving
- Black Friday
- Cyber Monday
- Christmas
- Boxing Day
- New Year’s Eve
- New Year’s Day
While seasonal factors can increase your Facebook ad costs, your business probably wants to take advantage of increased demand from consumers. In response, you may increase your budget for those high-demand months or audit your ad strategy to improve the quality of your ads.
Industry
While the average cost of Facebook ads is $0.94, you can gain more insight into your expected Facebook advertising costs by looking at the average price of Facebook ads for your industry. This data offers a more accurate estimate, which can help your team build your social media marketing budget.
Find out how much Facebook ads cost in your industry below:
Depending on your industry, Facebook advertising can offer a cost-effective option for building brand awareness, generating leads, driving conversions, and more. Even if you’re in a competitive market, like consumer services, you can benefit from a social media strategy.
Competitors in your industry advertise on the social media platform because they get results from it, whether it’s more followers on their social media page, purchases from their online store, or calls to their physical location.
It’s also helpful to mention that these prices for Facebook advertising are averages.
That’s why you should only use these numbers as benchmarks for your business. When you adopt this perspective, your team and company’s decision makers can approach your campaign with realistic expectations.
Data roundup: How effective has social media advertising been for your company?
38%
Very effective
Source: WebFX
37%
Somewhat effective
Source: WebFX
14%
Not very effective
Source: WebFX
11%
Not effective at all
Source: WebFX
Are Facebook advertising costs worth the price?
For the majority of companies, the answer is yes. In fact, 81% of businesses say they are happy with the ROI they receive from Facebook ads.
Source Data
| SATISFIED WITH FACEBOOK ROI | % OF MARKETERS |
| Yes | 81% |
| No | 19% |
For companies that can generate a return on investment from Facebook ads (which can take trial and error), Facebook advertising is worth the price.
Tools that can improve your ad campaign targeting, like AdTechFX via MarketingCloudFX, can help your business improve its paid advertising performance by reaching the audience members closest to your ideal client.
Are You Spending Your Marketing Budget Wisely?
Download our guide to learn how to plan your budget, set goals, track performance, and more!
Get My Free Guide
Get better results from your Facebook ads
Looking to improve your ad campaign performance, as well as decrease your Facebook advertising costs?
Partner with WebFX, an award-winning digital marketing and advertising agency that offers social media management and social media advertising services. Whether you’re looking to build brand awareness, discover qualified leads, or generate sales, our decades of experience and AI-powered software can help.
Learn more by contacting us online today or call us at 888-601-5359!
WebFX helps companies like yours reach their business goals.
See Case Study“WebFX has always worked hard to make sure that we’re getting what we need out of the partnership, not just what may seem like the best result.”
Browse Facebook advertising packages from WebFX
Get an in-depth look at our Facebook advertising services and plans below!
Source Data
| Features | Pro | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|
| Included Networks | ||
| Number of additional networks included | Pick up to 2 in addition to AdTechFX programmatic campaigns | Pick up to 3 in addition to AdTechFX programmatic campaigns |
| Facebook Advertising Campaigns | ||
| Instagram Advertising Campaigns | ||
| LinkedIn Advertising Campaigns | ||
| Twitter Advertising Campaigns | ||
| TikTok Advertising Campaigns | Available with Ongoing FuelFX Assets | Available with Ongoing FuelFX Assets |
| Pinterest Advertising Campaigns | Available with Ongoing FuelFX Assets | |
| AdTechFX Programmtic Channel | Access Included | Access Included |
| Management Deliverables | ||
| Dedicated Social Media advertising account manager | ||
| 500+ SMEs behind campaign driving results | ||
| Initial campaign strategy development | ||
| Number of advertising campaigns | Up to 8 | Up to 10 |
| Audience analysis | ||
| Ad campaign copywriting | ||
| Ad copy and design performance testing | ||
| Ongoing campaign testing and optimization | ||
| Dynamic ad format testing | ||
| Consultations per month | Up to 2 | Up to 4 |
| International campaign management (networks dependent on international policy – addtl. fees may apply) | Upon request | |
| All social assets managed through client-owned accounts | ||
| Monitoring clicks, conversions and fraud activity | ||
| Monitoring of social ad comments | Add $300/month | Add $600/month |
| Social Platform Targeting Capabilities (Specifics Vary By Platform) | ||
| – Interests | ||
| – Demographics | ||
| – Professional Characteristics | ||
| – Custom Audiences | ||
| – Lookalike Audiences | ||
| AdTechFX Programmatic Targeting Capabilities | ||
| – 3rd Party Audience Targeting | ||
| – Account-Based Retargeting | ||
| – CRM Pipeline Retargeting | ||
| Social Platform Creative Deliverables | ||
| Social Ad Creatives – Copywriting & Design | Up to 2 sets | Up to 4 sets |
| AdTechFX Programmatic Creative Deliverables | ||
| Display Ad Creatives (One Time) | One Time: Up to 2 sets of rapid display creatives – 16 ads total (8 per set) | One Time: Up to 3 Sets of Custom Layout Display Ads – 24 Ads Total (8 images per set) |
| Connected TV Commercial Ads (One Time) | One Time: 1 15-second rapid ConnectedTV ad | One Time: 1 Set of Rapid CTV Ads 15 + 30 Seconds (2 videos total) |
| Ongoing AdTechFX Programmatic Advertising Creative | Add 1 FuelFX Asset | Add 1 FuelFX Asset |
| Audio Commercial | Coming Soon | Coming Soon |
| FunnelsFX Landing Pages | ||
| Setup of 1 FunnelsFX Landing Page template (One Time) | ||
| Performance Reporting | ||
| Monthly performance & analysis reporting | ||
| Website conversion analysis reporting | ||
| IntegrationsFX: Conversion Based Smart Bidding | Included with MarketingCloudFX License | Included with MarketingCloudFX License |
| IntegrationsFX: Automated Lookalike + Custom Audiences | Included with MarketingCloudFX License | Included with MarketingCloudFX License |
| Initial Campaign Investment (Month 1) | $1,975 | $4,250 |
| Ongoing Monthly Campaign Investment (Months 2+) | $975 or 15% of ad spend, whichever is greater | $4,500 or 12% of ad spend, whichever is greater |
| Required Ad Spend Range | $1,000 – $30,000 | $30,000+ |
Meet WebFX
A world-class digital marketing agency with thousands of reviews applauding our transparency.
