Advertiser-friendly content guidelines

Advertiser-friendly content is content that's appropriate for all audiences. It has little to no inappropriate or mature content in the video stream, thumbnail, or metadata (such as in the video title). If the video does contain inappropriate content, the context is usually newsworthy or comedic and the creator’s intent is to inform or entertain (not offend or shock).

Content that may be acceptable for YouTube under YouTube policies may not be appropriate for Google advertising. Google's program policies provide additional guidelines for what can be monetized, and advertisers also have their own standards and requirements for content.

Content that is considered inappropriate for advertising

Content that is considered "not advertiser-friendly" includes, but is not limited to:

Sexually suggestive content, including partial nudity and sexual humor
Violence, including display of serious injury and events related to violent extremism
Inappropriate language, including harassment, profanity and vulgar language
Promotion of drugs and regulated substances, including selling, use and abuse of such items
Controversial or sensitive subjects and events, including subjects related to war, political conflicts, natural disasters and tragedies, even if graphic imagery is not shown

If any of the above describes any portion of your video, then the video may not be approved for monetization. If monetization is approved, your video may not be eligible for all available ad formats. YouTube reserves the right to not monetize a video, as well as suspend monetization features on channels that repeatedly submit videos violating our policies.

Best practices for creating advertiser-friendly content

Remember: Context is key. We understand that high-quality content isn't always sanitized, especially when it comes to real world issues. If your video has graphic material in it, you can help make it advertiser-friendly by providing context.

Use these best practices to successfully monetize your content on YouTube:

Do follow YouTube’s policy guidelines.
Do use a title and thumbnail for your video that represents the content.
Do create content that appeals to brand advertisers looking to engage with your content. This can increase the chances of finding an advertiser sponsor for your channel.
Don't use explicit language or imagery in your title or thumbnail.
Don't embed promotions for your own sponsors in your video since this can create advertiser conflict. Learn more about paid product placement policy.

How content is approved for ads

YouTube uses technology and policy enforcement processes to determine if a video is suitable for advertising. A video’s availability in Restricted Mode does not affect its ability to be monetized.

Automatic checks: We have trained systems that automatically check features of a video, like the video title, metadata, and visual imagery, to decide how appropriate the video is for general advertising.
Community flags: We depend on our user community to flag inappropriate videos to us for our review. Learn more about how to flag content.
Advertiser controls: Brand advertisers have tools in their campaign settings to control where their ads may appear on YouTube, including targeting and/or excluding by audience demographics, topics, category, and content appropriateness. If we receive a complaint from an advertiser whose ad served against your video, we reserve the right to disable monetization on your video if we determine that it did not meet our policy guidelines.

Depending on the nature of the policy violation, videos can be removed from the site or age-restricted. Monetization is disabled on age-restricted videos and Google will immediately stop serving ads on these videos.

Request video review

If the content of a video you uploaded has been flagged as inappropriate for advertising ("not advertiser-friendly") and you believe that your video is eligible for monetization, you can request a manual review.