Glossary
The terms of the trade, defined plainly, with links to the pages that go deeper. Sizes and limits are the ones the platforms publish, checked on their own pages.
A
- Ad server
- A system that stores your creatives and delivers them to the sites and apps where your ads run, counting impressions and clicks along the way. Campaign Manager 360, Adform and Microsoft’s Xandr are ad servers.More: Campaign Manager 360 and DV360
- ad.size meta tag
- A line in the head of an HTML5 banner that states its width and height. Google Ads requires it in every uploaded HTML5 ad; Campaign Manager 360 recommends it.More: Google Ads
- Animated GIF
- An image file that plays a short sequence of frames. Ad platforms limit its weight, its length and how fast it may change: Google Ads accepts animated GIFs up to 150 KB that stop within 30 seconds and run slower than 5 frames per second.
- Aspect ratio
- A banner’s width compared with its height, written as 6:5 or as a width per unit of height such as 8.09:1. Sizes with the same ratio share a shape; a banner composed for one shape does not fit another by scaling.More: Banner sizes
B
- Backup image
- A still image that an ad server shows where an HTML5 banner cannot run. Campaign Manager 360 and Display & Video 360 take it as a separate upload beside the ZIP, never inside it.More: Campaign Manager 360 and DV360
- Billboard
- A large display banner at the top of a desktop page, usually 970 × 250. The German OVK standard also lists 800 × 250 for publishers with narrower layouts.More: 970 × 250 Billboard
C
- Call to action
- The button or line that tells the viewer what to do next, such as “Book a test ride”. In a banner it is usually a button, kept inside the safe zone and large enough to read at a glance.
- Click-through rate (CTR)
- The share of the people who saw an ad that clicked it: clicks divided by impressions. It says how well an ad drew attention, not what happened after the click.
- clickTag
- A variable in an HTML5 banner that holds the landing page address. The ad server fills it in when the ad is served, so clicks are counted and the address can change without a new banner. Adform reads it as clickTAG through its own library.More: Campaign Manager 360 and DV360
- Creative
- The ad itself, as a file: an image, an HTML5 package or a video, in one size. A set of creatives in every size makes a campaign’s banner set.
D
- Demand-side platform (DSP)
- Software that buys ad space for advertisers across many sites and apps, usually in automated auctions. Display & Video 360 is Google’s DSP.More: Campaign Manager 360 and DV360
- Display advertising
- Ads shown as images, HTML5 or video in set spaces on websites and in apps, as opposed to search ads made of text. Its standard sizes, such as 300 × 250 and 728 × 90, come from the IAB and the ad platforms.More: Banner sizes
F
- Frame rate
- How many frames an animation shows per second (fps). Google Ads asks animated GIFs to run slower than 5 fps; Adform caps them at 5 fps.
H
- Half Page
- A tall display banner of 300 × 600, about half a screen high beside the content on desktop pages.More: 300 × 600 Half Page
I
- IAB
- The Interactive Advertising Bureau, the industry body whose Tech Lab publishes the standard display sizes and their weight and animation guidelines, the New Ad Portfolio.More: Banner sizes
- Initial load
- What a banner downloads before the page around it has finished loading. Guidelines cap it separately from the rest (the subload): the IAB sets 150 KB for a 300 × 250, and Adform 5 KB for its standard mobile ads.More: Adform
- Interstitial
- A full-screen ad shown between two pages or app screens, such as the 320 × 480 mobile interstitial.More: 320 × 480 Mobile Interstitial
L
- Layout family
- In Sizewright, a composition designed for all five shapes, such as Split Field or Full Bleed. Every concept is built on one, so each size of a set is composed for its shape rather than scaled from another.More: Templates
- Leaderboard
- A wide display strip of 728 × 90 across the top of a page or between sections; on mobile, the 320 × 50 mobile leaderboard.More: 728 × 90 Leaderboard
- Loop
- An animation that plays again from the start. Ad platforms limit looping by time rather than count: Google Ads lets an animation loop as long as it stops within 30 seconds, and the IAB within 15.
M
- manifest.json
- A small file Adform requires at the root of every HTML5 banner’s ZIP. It names the banner and states its size, its events, its click tags and its main HTML file.More: Adform
- Medium Rectangle
- The 300 × 250 display banner, set inside or beside content on desktop and mobile. Its near-square frame holds a headline, an image and a button.More: 300 × 250 Medium Rectangle
- MRAID
- The IAB’s standard way for an HTML5 ad to talk to the mobile app it runs in. Adform asks in-app banners to use it instead of its own web library.More: Adform
O
- OVK
- The Online-Vermarkterkreis, the group of German online publishers within the BVDW. Its standard ad formats are what German publishers sell, such as the Billboard Ad in 800 × 250 and 970 × 250.More: 800 × 250 Billboard (OVK)
P
- Performance Max
- A Google Ads campaign type that takes your images, headlines, descriptions and logos as separate assets and combines them into ads across Google’s channels. It takes no finished banners: its images are 1200 × 628, 1200 × 1200 and 960 × 1200.More: Google Ads
- Programmatic advertising
- Buying and selling ad space by software, impression by impression, usually in real-time auctions between demand-side platforms and publishers’ sell-side platforms.
R
- Responsive display ad
- A Google Ads format that assembles ads from your images, logos, headlines and descriptions to fit the space available. Google advises against putting text on its images.More: Google Ads
S
- Safe zone
- The part of a banner where text, logo and button can sit without being cut off or covered. In full-screen Stories and Reels, Meta asks to keep roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom and 6% of each side free.More: 1080 × 1920 Meta Stories and Reels
- Skyscraper
- A tall, narrow display banner beside the content: 120 × 600, or the 160 × 600 wide skyscraper.More: 160 × 600 Wide Skyscraper
T
- Trafficking
- Setting up creatives in an ad server or buying platform: uploading them, attaching backup images and landing pages, assigning them to placements and checking they serve.
U
- UTM parameters
- Labels added to a landing page address, such as utm_source and utm_campaign, so analytics tools can tell which campaign, platform and size a visit came from. Sizewright can add them to every banner’s click address on export.More: How it works
V
- Viewability
- Whether an ad had a chance to be seen. By the IAB and MRC standard, a display ad counts as viewable when at least half of it is on screen for at least one continuous second.
W
- Weight
- A banner’s file size, in kilobytes. Ad platforms cap it so pages stay fast: 150 KB for a Google Ads image, 600 KB for its HTML5 ZIP, 300 KB unpacked for an Adform desktop banner.More: Banner sizes
Banners that follow the specs
Paste your website address. Sizewright composes every size within each platform’s limits and checks every file before you download it.