Meta Ads MCP: manage ads from Claude and ChatGPT

Quick answer

Meta and Google both have official MCP servers, plus several third-party ones. Meta's connector (mcp.facebook.com/ads), in open beta since April 29, 2026, covers Meta only. Google's open source server is read-only. Ads Editor's MCP runs Meta Ads and Google Ads in the same Claude or ChatGPT chat and copies campaigns between ad accounts.

What is an ads MCP server?

The Model Context Protocol is an open source standard for connecting AI applications, such as Claude and ChatGPT, to external systems. An ads MCP server publishes tools (list campaigns, change a budget, pause an ad) that the assistant calls when you ask in plain language.

Which ads MCP servers exist, and which ones only read?

On April 29, 2026, Meta announced its ads AI connectors in open beta, to create, manage and analyze campaigns directly in the AI tools advertisers already use, powered by Meta's ads MCP server and command line interface. It is good news for the market and a solid option if you only run Meta.

Google took a different route: on October 7, 2025 it released an open source Google Ads API MCP server, and the initial release is read-only, for reporting and diagnostics. In the repository, checked on September 23, 2026, there are three tools: one that queries the data, one that describes the available fields and one that lists the accounts you can access. To use it, you run the server yourself, create a Google Cloud project, enable the Google Ads API and configure your own credentials. It is a developer tool.

Other third-party MCP servers also claim to cover Meta and Google with write access. When you compare them, look past the tool count: who can reach which account, whether budget changes have a hard ceiling on the server, and whether every action is logged.

Read-only is not a flaw: it is the safest option if you want an analyst, not an operator. What changes is how much work is left for you. With a read-only MCP, the AI tells you which budget to raise and you open Ads Manager to raise it. With an MCP that writes, you confirm and it raises it. The choice is how much of the operation you want to delegate.

What does the Ads Editor MCP do beyond list, read and pause?

Listing campaigns, reading metrics and pausing an ad is the baseline every ads MCP delivers. What actually changes the day-to-day for someone running many accounts is the rest. Every item below was checked against Ads Editor's own code on September 30, 2026; customer lists, audience suggestions and the Google additions on October 16, 2026.

How do you copy a campaign to another ad account from chat?

• Campaign, ad set or ad to another ad account, swapping Page, Instagram account, pixel and WhatsApp number for the destination account's. Before copying, the assistant checks what the destination account has available. Campaigns and ad sets copied through the MCP are created paused.
• Copy while changing the objective: from WhatsApp to website, website to WhatsApp, or to the Instagram profile. Valid combinations come from a catalog of objectives, and Meta validates the combination before anything is created.
• Ad into an ad set with a different objective: the AI reads the destination ad set and adapts the call to action and creative, re-uploading the media.
• Google Ads across accounts: the AI copies a campaign to another account (created paused), moves an ad group with its ads and keywords to another campaign, or duplicates a campaign inside the same account.
• Audiences and AI settings to another account: the AI copies a custom audience and copies a Google AI Optimization setup, with that copy created turned off.

The manual path, without AI, is in copy a Facebook campaign to another ad account.

How do you create ads from a link?

• A Google Drive folder becomes ads: the AI downloads a file or a folder shared as "anyone with the link" (up to 25 media files) and creates one ad per file in each ad set, with sequential names (AD01, AD02) and copy, Page, Instagram account and UTMs inherited from the ad set. It runs through the same queue as the web editor, and ads are created paused by default. You can ask how many were created and why any failed.
• Video by public link: you pass the link and Ads Editor downloads the file (up to 200 MB) instead of pushing the video through the chat.
• An Instagram post becomes an ad from the post's link, inheriting the UTMs the ad set's ads already use.

Which bulk edits can you do in one sentence?

• Turn off automatic creative enhancements (Advantage+) on every active ad in an account, all at once. Above 50 ads it runs in the background.
• Location for many ad sets at once, adding or replacing, without touching age, audiences or placements.
• Device and operating system in bulk, with a preview of the changes before applying.
• Up to 500 changes in one background batch, with progress you can follow from the chat.
• Audiences in bulk: Instagram and Facebook engagement, video views, website events and lookalikes.
• Customer list audiences: create_customer_list_audience reads a CSV pasted in the chat or an XLSX, CSV or TXT file by link (https or Google Drive), recognizes columns by their headers, hashes the data with SHA-256 and creates the audience with a label and description. A value column makes it a value-based audience.
• Audience suggestions: suggest_meta_audiences shows what the account is missing and create_meta_audience_suggestions creates only what you approve.

Can it handle lead forms?

• The AI tells you which ads use which instant form.
• It duplicates a form, with questions, privacy policy, thank-you screen and context card, and applies the copy to an ad right away if you ask.
• It swaps an ad's form by name; if the name matches more than one form, the swap is refused and the assistant asks which one.

What does it do in Google Ads beyond reading?

• Performance Max asset groups: the AI reads the assets and adds or removes headlines, descriptions, images, videos and search themes, checking Google's minimums before applying. It also builds a PMax campaign from scratch, paused. The minimums are in Performance Max asset group requirements.
• Search terms and negatives: the AI pulls the actual search queries and adds negatives at the campaign or ad group level.
• Google AI Optimization: approve or dismiss suggestions and undo an action the engine already took.
• Google's recommendations: list, apply and dismiss them, always with your confirmation.
• A new campaign drafted by AI in one step: from the website, budget, city and goal, the AI builds a draft; nothing is created before you review it, and the campaign starts paused.
• Merchant Center on Performance Max: links the Google Shopping store at creation or on an existing PMax; it also creates Shopping campaigns.
• Audiences, experiments and negative keyword lists: website remarketing, custom segments and combined lists, suggestions based on what converted, A/B experiments and negative lists applied to many campaigns.

What else comes from Ads Editor itself?

• Meta and Google account balances in one question, with days remaining.
• Automated rules for Meta and Google, alerts and AI budget scaling, created from the chat.
• Client reports combining Meta, Instagram and Google accounts.

What was added to the MCP in October 2026?

• Rules with the same metrics as the screen: besides spend, CPA and ROAS, a rule created from chat can use new messaging contacts, cost per message, leads, ROI and frequency. Example: pause the ad set that spent $50 without a single new contact.
• Duplicate with frequency control: in a Reach or ThruPlay ad set, the copy gets a Cap or Target (N times every D days). When switching the campaign to Leads on an instant form, the AI picks the copy’s form.
• Free up space at the 50 ad limit of an ad set, ads from an existing Instagram post and bulk catalog ads, with a new ad set per media file.
• Google AI Optimization editable from chat: goals, budgets and automatic actions, including adding keywords that already converted on its own. Switching to automatic mode asks for your confirmation.
• Team and Account Hub: the owner sees who on the team is online, time spent, actions per member and most used pages, and asks for the combined Daily Budget of each Account Hub account.
• Activate and deactivate accounts in your plan, Meta and Google, without opening the accounts screen.

What does Meta's official MCP do, and what does only Ads Editor do?

The Meta column comes from Meta's official ads MCP server documentation (overview, get started and tool lists), opened on September 30, 2026. Not stated means the capability does not appear in Meta's official tool list on that date; the list may grow. Meta's help center page on setup did not load for us, so it is not part of the comparison.

If you run many accounts across Meta and Google and copy campaigns between clients, that is where Ads Editor fits. Nothing stops you from using both: Meta's official MCP and the Ads Editor one can both stay connected in the same Claude.

How do you connect the Ads Editor MCP?

Signing in with OAuth is the shortest path: paste a URL, sign in with your Ads Editor account and authorize. No token to copy, no file to edit, and Claude, ChatGPT and Codex register themselves with the server, so there is nothing to configure by hand. The MCP is available on the Ads Editor Pro plan and up (pricing), and the URL is the same for every AI app: https://app.adseditor.app/mcp.

How do you connect it in Claude?

1. In Claude (web or Desktop), open Customize > Connectors, click + and choose Add custom connector (menu names from the Claude Help Center, checked on September 30, 2026).
2. Paste https://app.adseditor.app/mcp and click Add. Leave Advanced settings empty: Ads Editor registers the connection on its own.
3. When you connect, Claude opens the Ads Editor page. Sign in and click Autorizar (Authorize).
4. In a new conversation, use the + button at the bottom left, under Connectors, keep Ads Editor on and ask something read-only, such as yesterday's spend per account.

On Claude Team or Enterprise, the organization owner adds the connector under Organization settings > Connectors, and each person clicks Connect and signs in with their own Ads Editor login. That way each team member only sees the accounts they have been given access to.

How do you connect it in ChatGPT?

1. In ChatGPT on the web, turn on Developer mode in settings. Where the switch lives and which plans include it change between ChatGPT versions, so check your own account.
2. Create an app for a remote MCP server, paste https://app.adseditor.app/mcp and choose OAuth as the authentication method.
3. Sign in with your Ads Editor account and click Autorizar (Authorize).
4. In the conversation, pick Developer mode from the + menu and select the app. By default, ChatGPT asks for confirmation before every action that changes the account.

Menu names change between ChatGPT versions; if you cannot find it, search for "Developer mode" in settings.

How do you connect it in OpenAI Codex?

1. Run codex mcp add adseditor --url https://app.adseditor.app/mcp.
2. Codex detects that the server requires sign-in and prints an authorization link (in Codex CLI 0.155.1, tested on September 30, 2026, this happens as soon as you add the server). Open it, sign in and click Autorizar (Authorize).
3. If the link expires or you need to sign in again, run codex mcp login adseditor.
4. Open a new session and ask something read-only, such as the list of your Meta accounts.

Open the link in a browser on the same computer that runs Codex: the login flow returns to that machine to finish.

When does a token make sense?

For Cursor, Windsurf and VS Code, or if you prefer a fixed key, generate a token in MCP Server inside Ads Editor and add it as the authorization key for the same URL, in whatever field your AI app provides for it. In Codex: codex mcp add adseditor --url https://app.adseditor.app/mcp --bearer-token-env-var ADSEDITOR_MCP_TOKEN, with the token saved under that name on your computer. The token is shown only once and can be revoked on the same screen.

Which ready-to-use prompts work with the Ads Editor MCP?

The prompts below are built around the tasks Ads Editor users hand to the AI most often (details in Meta Ads MCP usage data). Replace the brackets with your account or campaign name. The last column says whether the prompt only reads the account or acts on it; whatever the assistant runs is logged in recent activity, so you can check it.

Which Meta Ads and Google Ads prompts go beyond the basics in ChatGPT and Claude?

Searching for "Meta Ads prompts for ChatGPT" or "Claude prompts to analyze a campaign" usually turns up analysis requests any AI can answer from an Ads Manager screenshot. The prompts below only work with an MCP that acts on the account, and most of them only exist in Ads Editor's: copying across accounts, launching creatives from Drive, bulk audiences and lead forms, cutting spend by a CPA rule. For anything that changes the account, the AI shows the plan and waits for your confirmation.

What is not obvious about the Ads Editor MCP?

• One winning campaign to several clients in one conversation. Ask it to read each destination account's resources and copy the campaign swapping Page, pixel and WhatsApp. Everything is created paused, so you review account by account before turning it on.
• Change the destination without rebuilding. "Duplicate campaign X, switching WhatsApp to website" creates the copy with the new objective, and Meta validates the combination before anything is created.
• Search terms become negatives after you approve them. Ask for the terms that spent without converting, approve the list, and the AI adds them one by one. Adding negatives is one of the two actions users hand to the AI most often (usage data).
• To change a published form, duplicate it. Ask for the copy with the change and the swap on the ad in the same sentence: the AI duplicates the form and applies the copy to the ad right away.
• New client account, Advantage+ creative off in one sentence, across every active ad, instead of opening ads one by one.
• New tools only appear in new conversations. If the assistant says it cannot do something on this list, open another conversation before concluding it is not possible.

Is it safe to let AI change the account?

• The MCP token is yours and can be revoked on the MCP Server screen; when you sign in instead, the access credential is valid for one hour and the app renews it on its own.
• Every action is logged in recent activity, and most calls in Ads Editor's MCP data only read the account.
• A team member only has access to the accounts and screens they have been granted, through the MCP too (see give access to Facebook ad accounts).
• Daily budgets created or changed by AI have a fixed ceiling on the server.
• Campaigns created by the MCP, and campaigns or ad sets it copies, start paused.

For where MCP fits next to copilots and budget automation, read AI for media buying.