Google introduces support for app-ads.txt in AdMob and Google Ad Manager

Google today announced that it is introducing support for app-ads.txt in AdMob and Google Ad Manager. Google is encouraging publishers to create an app-ads.txt file and publish it to the developer domain in App Store and/or Google Play store listings.

Tappx, in April, launched a free hosting tool for the new app-ads.txt.

Starting August 27, 2019, Google will block ad serving of unauthorized app inventory in both AdMob and Ad Manager as identified by a publisher’s app-ads.txt file.

App-ads.txt prevents unauthorized and domain-spoofed app inventory. Publishers who do not implement an app-ads.txt file will see no changes to their ad serving, but they do not benefit from the protection. app-ads.txt works for all non-web inventory like app mobile, connected TV, and other devices. App-ads.txt extends the original ads.txt standard that was first published by the IAB in 2017, and works for web.

Steps to implement app-ads.txt

1. Provide a developer website URL in app store listings on Google Play or the App Store;
2. Publish an app-ads.txt file in the root directory of your site (e.g. example.com/app-ads.txt);
3. Include all authorized publisher codes for the networks your app sells through in the file;
4. Once the implementation of the app-ads.txt file is done, Google encourages publishers/app owners to review it to ensure that it contains lines in the following format: google.com, pub-0000000000000000, DIRECT

Google will roll out verifications and warnings in the user interface for both AdMob and Ad Manager when errors are detected. The warnings will appear if we detect your publisher ID is missing from your app-ads.txt file:

Example of error notifications in Ad Manager

Example of error notification in AdMob

It can take up to 24 hours for Google to crawl and verify your app-ads.txt files.