LinkedIn Event Ads

This guide is built from LinkedIn's Marketing Solutions Help, starting with its event ads overview and the pages linked in each section below. Campaign Manager's structure and the other ad formats are in our LinkedIn ads basics guide, and setting up the Page that hosts your events is in our LinkedIn Page guide. LinkedIn's help pages now call the level where you choose an objective, audience and budget an "ad set", so this guide does too.

What event ads are

Event ads are a Sponsored Content format. They appear in the LinkedIn feed on desktop and mobile and, in LinkedIn's words, are "optimized to highlight important event details." Each ad promotes one event. That can be a LinkedIn Event created by your Page or, since LinkedIn added off-platform event ads in April 2026, an event hosted somewhere else, such as a webinar platform or your own registration page.

LinkedIn describes the job of the format in three parts: drive registrations before the event, increase live views during it, and reach more people with the replay afterwards. The last two only apply to LinkedIn Live events, as the next sections explain.

The event behind the ad

For a LinkedIn Event, the event has to exist first, created by the LinkedIn Page linked to your ad account. LinkedIn's Events overview lists two types: In person, and Online. Online events are either LinkedIn Live (streamed on LinkedIn through a third-party streaming tool, which needs LinkedIn Live access) or an external event link (streamed elsewhere, promoted on LinkedIn). Three points from LinkedIn's create an event page matter for ads later:

• Once the event is posted, you can't change the organizer, the event type or the event format. If you want the ad to show the livestream, the event must be set up as LinkedIn Live from the start.
• The cover image can be 480x270 or 1280x720 pixels, at least 480 pixels wide, in a 16:9 ratio.
• LinkedIn recommends creating events within one year of the date, because events created further ahead "may not generate notifications for attendees."

Several ad accounts can promote the same event, as long as they are all associated with the Page that created it, according to the event ads FAQs. For an off-platform event you don't create anything on LinkedIn first. You enter the event details in the ad itself (see specs).

Objectives and permissions

To create event ads you need super admin, content admin or Sponsored Content poster access on the ad account's Page, and creative manager access or higher on the ad account. Our Campaign Manager roles guide explains those roles.

LinkedIn's pages don't fully agree on which objectives allow event ads:

• The create event ads for LinkedIn Events steps name brand awareness, website visits or engagement.
• The event ads overview lists those three plus lead generation, while the limitations table on the same page says event ads are "currently only available with the brand awareness, engagement, or website visits objectives."
• The off-platform steps list brand awareness, website visits, engagement or lead generation, and the event ads specifications say you can pick a lead gen form for lead generation event ads.

Brand awareness, website visits and engagement are safe on every page. Check Campaign Manager before you plan a lead generation event campaign. Our LinkedIn objectives guide covers what each objective optimises for.

How the ad changes before, during and after

For a LinkedIn Live event, the ad changes with the event: a static image before, the livestream during, and the video replay after. LinkedIn notes the ad only changes like this when the event is hosted on LinkedIn. An in-person event, an external event link or an off-platform event shows the same static ad at every stage.

A registration form changes this too. If your LinkedIn Live event uses one, members have to complete it before they can watch, so the ad shows a single image at all stages. LinkedIn suggests either leaving the form off to maximise viewers, or turning on the Video preview, which plays a 30-second preview of the livestream or recording before people are asked to register.

The button is chosen for you on LinkedIn Events:

• Register when the event has a registration form or lead gen form.
• Interested before and during the event when it has no registration form, for "single-click interest registration" from the ad, then View event after it.
• View event otherwise. It opens the event page, where people click Attend.

For an off-platform event you pick the call-to-action button from a list.

Event ad specs

From LinkedIn's event ads advertising specifications and the off-platform steps:

Because the introductory text is shared across stages, LinkedIn recommends text that fits all three, three separate ads or ad sets with their own text, or no text at all. Off-platform times are shown in each member's own profile time zone. Ad previews in Campaign Manager are static by device and stage and don't show live video.

One ad set or three, and accelerated delivery

You can run an event ad from one ad set that starts before the event and ends after it, or from three ad sets, one per stage. LinkedIn's overview compares them:

Event ad sets take a start and end time as well as dates. The catch: standard delivery paces spend to use the budget by 11:59 PM UTC on the end date, so if your ad set ends earlier in the day, you will likely have budget left over.

Accelerated delivery spends the ad set budget as fast as possible. According to the accelerated delivery FAQs for event ads, it works with the engagement and website visits objectives, must be switched on when you start creating the ad set (not on a draft later), and can't be turned off after saving. LinkedIn recommends it for short bursts of 1 to 24 hours during the live part of an event, with the bid as the lever (higher speeds delivery, lower slows it), and maximum delivery for longer, evenly paced ad sets. Forecasted results aren't available for accelerated delivery, and LinkedIn says to use forecasts "with caution" for ad sets shorter than 24 hours. Bidding strategies in general are in our LinkedIn bidding guide.

Registration forms and leads

Page admins can add a registration form to a LinkedIn Event, pre-filled from members' profiles. There are two kinds: a standard form set up while creating the event, which isn't reviewed, and a custom registration form built in Events Admin with your own questions, which goes through review before you can use it. Points from LinkedIn's page:

• Members can tick a consent box to receive marketing from you. LinkedIn says organizers "shouldn't send communications about their products" to members who didn't.
• Add the form when you create the event. People who registered before a form was added aren't asked to fill it in, and replacing or removing a form only affects future registrations.
• There can be a four to five-day delay before a registrant appears in the downloaded file, and registrant data can only be downloaded for one year from the day they registered.

To move registrants into a CRM, LinkedIn's marketing integrations page names Zapier as the supported integration, with a CSV download from your Page as the fallback. LinkedIn also notes you can't split event leads into organic and paid, because the leads belong to the registration form, not the ad set. For lead gen forms on other formats, see the lead generation section of our LinkedIn ads basics guide.

Reporting on event ads

Event results sit in the normal Campaign Manager dashboard (our LinkedIn reporting guide covers it). LinkedIn's event ads reporting page adds:

• Event Registrations counts people who registered for your LinkedIn Event after clicking or seeing the ad. Find it in the Performance or Conversions & Leads column views, or a custom view.
• The Event Stage breakdown splits results into pre-event, during and post-event rows. "Uncategorized" means LinkedIn can't tell which stage an impression fell in.
• Spend, impressions, views and clicks are real time. Registrations can lag, and the performance metrics FAQs say they can take 24 to 48 hours.
• Since April 2025 the attribution windows for event registrations are 30 days after a click and 30 days after a view (previously 7 and 1).
• During a LinkedIn Live, only video views and completions are reported. View percentages (25%, 50%, 75%) appear after the event.

Two things often confuse clients. Campaign Manager counts only registrations and views driven by the ads, while the event page counts everyone, including organic attendees. And if an ad set launches during or after the event, there is no pre-event stage, so registrations from it will be 0.

Retargeting people who engaged

An event audience is a Matched Audience built from past or upcoming events of your Page. You can target people who chose to attend, registered and attended, registered but didn't attend, or engaged without registering or attending. Create it under Plan, Audiences, Create audience, Matched Audience, Event. It needs at least 300 members before you can use it. In LinkedIn's FAQ, "any interaction with your event ad" means clicks, not views. The other audience types are in our Matched Audiences guide.

Thought leader event ads

You can also sponsor a member's post that promotes your event. LinkedIn's thought leader event ads page sets three conditions: the post must link directly to a LinkedIn Live Event created by your company's Page, the member must approve the sponsorship, and only brand awareness or engagement objectives are allowed. Approval requests and the rest of the process are in our thought leader ads guide.

How we run event ad campaigns

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

• We decide the event format with the client before the event is created, since it can't be changed later. If the goal is live viewers, we use LinkedIn Live; if it is registrations for a third-party webinar, an off-platform event ad.
• We use three ad sets when the event has a live stream, with separate text per stage, and a single ad set for in-person events.
• We leave out introductory text that only makes sense before the event, such as "Register now", in single ad set campaigns.
• We build the "registered but didn't attend" event audience before the event so the replay can go to it straight after.
• We report registrations from Campaign Manager next to the event page total and say which is which.

If you want help planning event promotion, see our services.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a LinkedIn Event to run LinkedIn event ads?

Not anymore. Since April 2026 you can create off-platform event ads for events hosted outside LinkedIn by entering the event details in the ad. Only LinkedIn Live events created by your Page get an ad that shows the livestream and replay.

Which objectives can I use for LinkedIn event ads?

Brand awareness, website visits and engagement. Some of LinkedIn's pages also list lead generation, but others say event ads are only available with the first three, so check Campaign Manager.

What size image does a LinkedIn event ad use?

For an off-platform event, upload a 16:9 image such as 480x270 or 1280x720 pixels, at least 480 pixels wide. For a LinkedIn Event the ad uses the event cover image, which has the same limits, unless you upload a separate ad image.

Why don't Campaign Manager registrations match my event page?

Campaign Manager only counts registrations driven by your ads, within 30 days of a click or view. The event page counts every attendee, including people who found the event organically.

Can I change the event URL in a LinkedIn event ad?

No. The event destination URL can't be edited once the ad has been saved. Create a new ad for a different event.

For more on LinkedIn advertising, see our guides to LinkedIn video ads, LinkedIn document ads, LinkedIn conversation ads and LinkedIn ads targeting.