Instacart Ads for brands: Sponsored Product and more

This guide is built from Instacart's Ads Manager help center: Advertising on Instacart, Introduction to sponsored products, Sponsored product bidding and Account billing and payment. If you also sell through other retailers, see our guides to Amazon Ads and Walmart Connect.

Who can advertise

Instacart Ads Manager is the self-serve tool where campaigns are created and measured. Its help center marks each feature by advertiser type. Sponsored products, display ads, shoppable video, inspiration ads, Pages, brand promotions, the product library and data and analytics are marked "This feature is available to brands only." Retailers get their own tools, such as retailer promotions.

Before you advertise, your products need to be linked to your brand. In the product library, "you must claim a brand so we know which products are yours." Instacart adds that "we only show UPCs that retailers sell on their virtual stores on Instacart", so a product that no retailer stocks on Instacart cannot be advertised there.

Ad formats and how each is priced

The Ads Manager overview lists the formats with their pricing model:

• Sponsored products (CPC): your products in search results, on the homepage and while customers browse.
• Display ads (CPM): banners on storefronts, departments and aisles.
• Shoppable video ads (CPM): video with add-to-cart item cards.
• Inspiration ads (CPM): recipe ads and curated experiences.
• Pages (free): shoppable brand pages with their own URL, which display and video ads link to.
• Brand promotions: offers such as "Spend X, Save Y" and free gifts.

The introduction to advertising on Instacart says sponsored product ads "work best for sales-based objectives", while shoppable video can serve reach or engagement objectives depending on where it shows.

Sponsored products and the auction

Most brands start with sponsored products. They are organised like search ads elsewhere: "Sponsored product ads belong to ad groups, which belong to campaigns." Dates and budget are set on the campaign; each ad group has its own default maximum cost-per-click bid. Instacart suggests grouping products from similar categories and with similar prices and margins, so one bid makes sense for all of them.

How the auction works, from Instacart's page:

• "We use CPC bids, product conversion rates, and other factors to decide which ads win the auction and show on Instacart."
• Products in the same ad group share a bid but compete separately, because each has its own conversion rate.
• Sponsored products use a second-price auction: "we only charge you $0.01 more than your next-best competitor's bid."

Ads appear in search results and in browse placements, which "can include aisles, departments, Buy it Again, etc." A new campaign "goes live on the start date, usually by noon PST."

Keywords and bidding settings

For search placements you bid on keywords. One rule matters most: "We only support exact match keyword bids." Instacart's example: win the keyword ice cream and your ad will not show for icecream, ice cream bar or ice creams.

There are three bidding settings:

• Maximize sales (optimized): bids toward a target return on ad spend (ROAS).
• New-to-brand (optimized): bids higher for shoppers new to your brand.
• Manual: you set a default bid, which Instacart uses on relevant keywords automatically, and can override bids or add keywords yourself.

With optimized bidding, "you can't manually add or adjust keywords". Target ROAS is entered as a ratio: Instacart's example is a target of 1.1 for $110 in sales from $100. It warns that a high target can mean "lower spend, lower sales, and a lower win rate", and expects larger swings "during the learning phase of about 3-7 days". Only manual bidding is available with a lifetime budget.

Budgets: daily or lifetime

A sponsored product campaign uses one of two budget types:

• Lifetime budget: the campaign enters every eligible auction until the money runs out. It never spends more than the total, but it does not pace, so it "can run out sooner than you anticipate."
• Daily budget: Instacart spends your daily budget on average. It may spend more on busy days and less on quiet ones, but "We never spend more than double your daily budget on any single day and no more than 30.4 multiplied by your daily budget in a given month if you don't set a lifetime budget."

You can raise a budget at any time, but "You can't decrease your campaign's budget below what you've already spent." Instacart publishes no average cost per click; your cost depends on your bids, competitors and conversion rates.

Display, shoppable video and Pages

Display and shoppable video are bought differently from sponsored products. According to Instacart's display ads page, they use "a first-price auction model", you bid per 1,000 impressions, and "Minimum bids start at a $15 CPM." The shoppable video page gives the same $15 minimum.

• "All display ads must link through to a Page", and shoppable video also clicks through to Pages.
• Targeting is by keyword or by behaviour, one type per ad group. Display keyword targeting has exact, narrow and broad match, and "all keyword targeting is subject to Instacart approval."
• Behavioural targeting covers shoppers new to Instacart, people who interacted with a brand, product or category, and past purchase behaviour, with shortcuts such as "Buys X category, not my brand".

Campaign objectives

New campaigns start with an objective: Reach, Engage, Maximize sales, Grow, Acquire or Build your own. Each objective offers a preset path of formats and targeting; Build your own lets you pick the format and targeting yourself. Sponsored products sit under Maximize sales and Build your own; display under Reach and Build your own.

Billing and payment

Instacart either charges a card or sends a monthly invoice. From the billing page:

• Card billing: your card is charged during the month whenever spend reaches your payment threshold. Thresholds "typically start at $500 and automatically increase after 1 successful payment", and you can lock the threshold.
• Card hold: adding a card triggers a one-time authorisation hold equal to the threshold, released after 2-3 business days.
• Failed payments: "If a credit card payment fails, we pause all of your ad campaigns". Instacart retries daily for up to 7 days, then weekly.
• Invoicing: "Only qualifying advertisers, as Instacart determines, can switch from credit card payments to monthly invoicing." Invoices go out on the 10th for the previous month, one line per campaign, so split campaigns if you need separate lines.

The account's billing address must be in your country.

Reporting and attribution

The sponsored product reporting page lists spend, attributed sales, attributed units and ROAS, by campaign, ad group, product and keyword. Points to know:

• Attributed sales count purchases "within 14 days of a customer clicking on a sponsored product ad."
• Data is in Pacific Time and "Metrics update within 24 hours".
• Since August 1, 2022, reports primarily use linear attribution, splitting credit across the ads a shopper interacted with; a last-touch view is available for comparison.
• Reports separate direct sales (the products in the campaign) from halo sales (related products such as other flavours or pack sizes of your brand).

Impressions and clicks are accredited by the Media Rating Council (MRC). Instacart's November 2025 announcement says it "first earned MRC accreditation in 2024" for Marketplace and extended it to Carrot Ads partner sites.

Beyond Instacart: partner sites and Carrot Ads

Instacart sells ads beyond its own app. Its introduction says the ads ecosystem reaches "customers on Instacart Marketplace, grocery ecommerce sites, and on AI-powered smart carts in-store." When you create a campaign, you choose a scope: an ecosystem campaign or a campaign for a specific partner.

Carrot Ads is the technology behind the partner sites. Instacart describes it as powering "white-label retail media for more than 240 ecommerce partners", naming Hy-Vee, Sprouts, Thrive Market and Uber Eats. It is a product for retailers: "Carrot Ads is available to retailers using Instacart's Storefront Pro, Connect, or their own e-commerce storefronts and apps." As a brand, you reach those sites through your Instacart campaigns.

How we start an Instacart campaign

This is our own practice, not Instacart's guidance:

• We claim the brand and check the product library first: images, names and which UPCs retailers actually list.
• We start with one sponsored product campaign on a daily budget with manual bidding, so we can see which exact-match keywords bring clicks before moving to optimized bidding.
• We group products by margin, not only by category, so one ad-group bid works for all of them.
• We judge results on attributed sales and ROAS over at least a month, and look at halo sales separately.

If you want help with retail media or ecommerce advertising, see our services.

Frequently asked questions

Who can advertise on Instacart?

Brands use Instacart Ads Manager for sponsored products, display, shoppable video and Pages, after claiming their brand in the product library. Retailers have separate tools, and Carrot Ads is a white-label product for retailers.

How much do Instacart Ads cost?

Sponsored products are paid per click in a second-price auction, so you pay $0.01 more than the next bid. Display and shoppable video are bought per 1,000 impressions, with minimum bids starting at $15 CPM. Instacart publishes no average click cost.

Can Instacart spend more than my daily budget?

Yes, on busy days, but never more than double the daily budget in one day, and no more than 30.4 times the daily budget in a month without a lifetime budget.

What keyword match types does Instacart use?

Sponsored product keyword bids are exact match only. Display and shoppable video keyword targeting offers exact, narrow and broad match, subject to Instacart approval.

How are Instacart ad sales attributed?

Sponsored product sales count purchases within 14 days of a click, and since August 2022 reports use linear attribution by default, with a last-touch view for comparison.

For other retail and marketplace advertising, see Amazon Ads, Walmart Connect and Uber and Uber Eats ads. To plan a campaign with us, see our services.