Google Ads adds channel prioritization and budget caps for Search partners and Display

Google Ads announced two optional controls on 14 October 2026: channel prioritization and channel-level budget allocation. Tal Akabas, Director of Product Management at Google Ads, said they will roll out across Search, Shopping, Performance Max and Demand Gen campaigns over the coming months. Advertisers can now rank channels such as Search partners and the Google Display Network as "High priority" or "Low priority" and cap Low priority channels at a percentage of the daily budget. Google also set a hard date. From February 2027, Search campaigns with the Google Display Network turned on lose their current Display Expansion spend setup, so this needs attention even in accounts that never touch the new settings.

What Google announced on 14 October 2026

The announcement went out on the Google Ads & Commerce Blog on 14 October 2026. Google pitches the two features as a step away from "all-or-nothing" channel targeting and links them to two earlier updates, Smart Bidding Exploration and campaign total budgets. Up to now, an advertiser who wanted Search partners or the Display Network had two options for each one: on or off. The new controls add a middle setting.

Google's longer explainer on Google Ads Help, titled "About channel prioritization and budget allocation", puts the start of availability at 15 October 2026 and calls it progressive. It also says availability in a given account may vary by campaign type and rollout timing. So if the setting is missing from your account this week, that is expected.

Channel prioritization: who gets funded first

Channel prioritization lets an advertiser put each channel, or group of channels, into one of two tiers. According to Google's 14 October post, campaigns will "fully fund" High priority channels first, staying within the target for Target CPA or Target ROAS campaigns, and only then send the remaining budget to Low priority channels. In a Search campaign, Google Search, Search partners and the Google Display Network can be set to different priority levels.

Performance Max and Demand Gen work differently. There, Google bundles Search, YouTube, Maps, Gmail and Discover into one group called "Google channels". The Google Ads Help page says Search partners and the Google Display Network can each get their own priority level in those campaigns. YouTube cannot be ranked separately from Search inside Performance Max. For control over individual Google channels, the Help page points advertisers to Search and Demand Gen campaigns, which allow opt-outs channel by channel.

Budget allocation: a percentage cap on Low priority channels

The second control only applies to Low priority channels. An advertiser can enter a maximum share of the daily budget for that channel. Google Ads Help gives the arithmetic: the cap is a percentage of the campaign's average daily budget, not of what the campaign actually spent. A 5% allocation on a $1,000 average daily budget means Google aims to keep that channel at or below $50 a day.

Google describes the cap as "best-effort" in both the blog post and the Help page. The Help page says spend on the channel "may occasionally exceed" the allocation, including on days when the campaign spends more than its average daily budget. The allocation resets each day, and unspent or overspent amounts do not carry over. Setting a Low priority channel to 0% means Google will not spend on that channel at all, which gives advertisers a third way to opt out.

How the controls interact with each bid strategy

The most practical part of the Help page is a table of how each bid strategy behaves. The short version is that prioritization only matters when the campaign is short of budget.

• Target CPA, Target ROAS or Target CPC, not limited by budget: priority tiers do not change how the budget is spent, because the campaign tries to hit its target across all channels. Budget allocation caps on Low priority channels still apply.
• Target CPA, Target ROAS or Target CPC, limited by budget: High priority channels spend first, within the target. If more High priority spend would break the target, budget moves to Low priority channels that can convert at the target, still subject to any cap.
• Maximize Conversions, Maximize Conversion Value, Maximize Clicks, Manual CPC and Target Impression Share: High priority channels spend first. If the budget cannot be fully spent there, for example because of campaign settings or limited eligible traffic, the rest goes to Low priority channels.

Google's blog post says the percentage cap is "particularly helpful" for Target CPA and Target ROAS campaigns that are not budget-limited, since prioritization alone "will generally not have an impact there." For a Target CPA or Target ROAS campaign that is not limited by budget, the percentage is the only lever that changes spend.

Where the controls apply, and where they do not

Google Ads Help lists which channels can be tiered in each campaign type from 15 October 2026. The table below sets out that list together with the main limits stated on the same page.

The Help page adds more conditions that are easy to miss:

• Campaign total budgets support channel prioritization in Demand Gen only. In every other campaign type, the settings will not apply to a campaign that uses a total budget.
• Campaigns on a shared budget must all be the same campaign type, for example all Search or all Shopping. The settings then treat the shared budget as one pool, and the percentage cap applies to the pool as a whole.
• The controls work in custom experiments. Multi-campaign shared budgets are not supported in experiments, and all channels in those experiments are treated as one tier.
• Channel prioritization cannot be set from a manager (MCC) account. It has to be set in each client account, or at campaign level.
• At launch the settings are managed in the Google Ads interface and in Search Ads 360. Google says Google Ads API and Google Ads Editor support is "coming soon", with no date.

Where Google's two documents differ

Read side by side, the blog post and the Help page do not match exactly, and the details matter when you configure an account. The 14 October blog post says distinct priority tiers can be set across all four campaign types and describes budget allocation without naming exceptions. The Help page says budget allocation is not supported for Demand Gen. The blog post talks about targets only in terms of Target CPA and Target ROAS, while the Help page's bid strategy table also includes Target CPC. And the blog post says the controls "apply to shared budgets", while the Help page limits that to shared budgets whose campaigns are all the same type. The Help page is the more detailed of the two, and its version is the safer one to plan around.

The February 2027 change to Display Expansion on Search

This part of the announcement is not optional. According to Google Ads Help, starting in February 2027 every Search campaign with Display Expansion enabled will migrate automatically to channel prioritization and budget allocation. The current spend allocation setup goes away, and Google warns that advertisers "may see a shift in channel spending" between Google Search, Search partners and the Google Display Network.

Google's stated way to keep today's behavior is to set the Google Display Network to Low priority with a 50% daily budget allocation, and that 50% is also best-effort. Two more details from the Help page:

• Once the change takes effect, the Display Network will no longer serve on Search campaigns that use the Target Impression Share bid strategy.
• If you set channel priorities on a Search campaign before February 2027, the new settings apply at once and replace the Display Expansion budget behavior for that campaign. Until then, campaigns that have not set priorities keep the current behavior.

Google has not given an exact day in February, and has not said how a migrated campaign with no settings will be tiered by default beyond the general rule that all channels start as High priority.

What advertisers should check in their accounts

This is our reading of the Help page, not a list Google published.

1. Find every Search campaign with the Display Network on. These are the campaigns the February 2027 migration touches. Decide whether each one should keep Display at all, then set it explicitly: Low priority with 50% to copy today's behavior, a lower percentage to tighten it, or 0% to stop Display spend.
2. Check Target Impression Share campaigns. If any brand or competitor campaign uses Target Impression Share and gets Display traffic now, that traffic stops after the change.
3. Sort campaigns by budget status. For Target CPA or Target ROAS campaigns that are not budget-limited, tiers alone will not move spend. Only a percentage cap will.
4. Review shared budgets and total budgets. Mixed-type shared budgets and non-Demand Gen campaigns on total budgets will not pick up the settings.
5. Plan the admin time. With no manager-account setting and no Editor or API support at launch, multi-account setups mean opening each account. The account-level default in Account settings, under the "Channel Prioritization" card, saves repeating it per campaign.
6. Test Search partners again with a cap. Google pitches the cap as a way for advertisers who opted out of Search partners or the Display Network to test them "with more confidence and clearer limits". A small percentage on Low priority gives a bounded test that is easy to read in channel reports.

One more practical point: Google says a new account-level default applies to every eligible campaign of that type. If a campaign currently spends more on a Low priority channel than the new percentage allows, Google says you may see a shift in spend on that channel after the setting is applied. Change one campaign type at a time and watch the totals for a few days before moving on.

What this means for Thai marketers

Google describes the rollout as global and does not single out any country, so Thai advertisers should expect the same progressive rollout and the same February 2027 date. For agencies and in-house teams handling many Thai accounts, the missing manager-account control is the practical cost. Each account needs its own review before February.

The cap also gives a cleaner way to answer an old question in Thai accounts: is Search partner or Display traffic worth anything for this business? Instead of turning a channel fully on and watching cost per lead move, an advertiser can hold it to a small daily share and compare. If you want help auditing channel settings across your accounts, our Google Ads management team can review them before the February deadline, and retailers running Shopping can pair this with an ecommerce marketing review of feed and budget structure.

FAQ

Do I have to change anything because of channel prioritization?

Only if you run Search campaigns with the Google Display Network turned on, because those campaigns migrate automatically in February 2027. Everything else is optional, and Google Ads Help says all channels default to High priority, so nothing changes until you act.

How do I keep my current Display Expansion behavior after February 2027?

Google says to set the Google Display Network to Low priority with a 50% daily budget allocation. That allocation is best-effort, and Display will stop serving on Search campaigns that use Target Impression Share.

Is the percentage cap a hard limit?

No, Google calls it best-effort and says daily spend on the channel may occasionally exceed it. It is a percentage of the campaign's average daily budget, it resets daily, and nothing carries over between days.

Can I set channel prioritization from my MCC account?

No, Google Ads Help says it cannot be set from a manager account. Set it in each client account or at campaign level, using the Google Ads interface or Search Ads 360, as API and Editor support is listed as "coming soon".

Is this available in Thailand yet?

Google has not given country-by-country dates. It describes a global, progressive rollout starting 15 October 2026 over the coming months, so the setting may appear in Thai accounts at different times by campaign type.

Channel prioritization gives Google Ads a middle setting between on and off for Search partners and the Display Network, and February 2027 is the date that forces a decision on every Search campaign with Display enabled. If you would rather have an outside check on how your accounts are set up, talk to Relevant Audience about Google Ads.