10 Best Advertising Platforms to Run Ads in 2025

It is challenging to choose from the best advertising platforms. You need a lot of things to consider before jumping into a partnership. To name a few:

• advanced ad technology,
• intuitive dashboards,
• innovative optimization tools,
• easy testing,
• in-depth analytics,
• tools to look after your budgets.

And let’s face it, we want the support team that actually cares.

With less guesswork, you have less legwork and better return on ad spend (ROAS).

Let’s dig into the best advert platforms, name the best practices for advertising platforms and provide you with take-and-apply tips and hacks.

Best advertising platforms

Google Ads and Meta platforms like Facebook and Instagram are most popular platforms and are looked at as top choices due to their reach and targeting capability. LinkedIn for B2B, YouTube, and other social media platforms like TikTok, reaching a younger audience, and Amazon for e-commerce businesses follow next. 

On the other hand, niche ad networks can give you a more flexible advertising strategy. In the challenging setups, they can provide more freedom for advertising, super-precise targeting, and stricter budget control.

What are advertising platforms?

Digital advertising platforms are technology-driven systems that let businesses and advertisers buy ad space across diverse online environments. These internet advertising platforms (aka advert platforms) serve as a hub for executing effective marketing strategies within social media, mobile apps, websites, and even television. Best ad platforms streamline the entire advertising process.

Why choosing the right advertising platform matters for business growth?

Choosing the best online advertising platforms is pivotal because the right platforms provide advertisers with every tool for success. This includes:

1. Software with seamless integration to help meet KPIs and high ROI.
2. Performance tracking and reporting tools to monitor key metrics.
3. Ad campaign management for setup, launch, and tweaks, scheduling, and bidding.
4. Ad spend management to never overspend.
5. Innovative ad formats, including ready-crafted creatives, templates for designing, texts, images, videos, and advanced formats to tackle the famous users’ ad fatigue.
6. Granular audience targeting to reach the segments more effectively, paying attention to device type, behaviors, browsers, geo, and more.
7. Quick testing options with smaller spend before scaling up.
8. Different pricing models, like cost per click (CPC), cost per impression (CPM), or cost per acquisition (CPA).

Still, the question is “Which platform is best for ads and why?”

Let’s unfold it in the next paragraphs!

Top 10+ advertising platforms in 2025

We put together online advertising platforms list with a deeper look at 10+ advertising platforms online that can be useful in your digital marketing, including social media platforms and search engine platforms.

Ready? Let’s do it! 😊

1. Facebook Ads by Meta

Platform URL: https://www.facebook.com/pages/create/?ref_type=registration_form

Best for: Most businesses and brands.

Global reach: 3 billion monthly active user base.

Massive audience specifics:

• largest group – aged 25-34,
• males – 18.4%,
• females – 12.7% (globally by Statista).

Ad formats: Image ads, videos, collection ads, carousel ads.

Ad spend:

• $5 a day for clicks or video views is recommended,
• $1 – impressions,
• ~$40 – events like installs. (By SnowballCreations).

Key features:

• Facebook Ads Manager (Facebook, Instagram),
• Ecommerce store,
• Meta Business Suite,
• Business Manager.

Free online learning: Facebook advertising course

Overview: Facebook ads is omnipresent and one of the best-known paid ads platforms, providing a wide array of targeting options, personalized ad creatives, tunable performance metrics, and A/B testing.

Note: Facebook Ads Manager (Meta Ad Manager) accommodates ad campaign launches for Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger as well. You need to have a business account to jumpstart advertising, as your personal account won’t count.

Niche-expert Tip on working with Facebook traffic and ad network

“I began promoting a dating offer across multiple GEOs, initially focusing on Facebook browser traffic provided by Adsterra. I launched the campaign in a single geo, targeting Android users. After seeing consistent conversions, I gradually scaled to include additional geos”.

You can read the full story in the case study Dating Traffic Insight Features with 474.42% ROI.

2. Instagram Ads by Meta

Url: https://www.instagram.com/

Best for: Businesses and brands.

Global reach: 2 billion monthly active users (by Statista).

Vast audience:

• 31.7% – 18-24 year old,
• 30.6% – 25-34 years old.

Ad formats: Image ads, reels, videos, carousel, visual content, stories, and shopping features.

Ad spend: $5, picking a duration over 6 days is recommended, to see more results, you need to invest over $300 (by LyfeMarketing).

Key features:

• Facebook Ads Manager
• Boost Post for creating ads from Instagram

Helping material: About Instagram ads at Help Center

Overview: Instagram Ads allow for targeting and defining an ideal audience through demographics, interests, geo, tweaking your KPI objectives, ad spend, and duration.

Note: You need to create a pro account for business and connect your Instagram account to your Facebook Page.

3. Adsterra display ad platform

Platform url: https://adsterra.com/advertisers/

Overview: Adsterra is a robust online advertising network for brands, agencies, and media buyers, unlocking high-quality CPM, CPC, and CPA traffic. Unlike social media platforms, it partners directly with 36K+ direct publishers with millions of unique visitors.

Global reach through: 35B+ ad impressions monthly, 1.6B conversions per year.

Key features:

• Proprietary ad format Social Bar, designed specifically  by Adsterra’s developers to fight the users banner blindness (ad fatigue),
• Precise pricing tools, like Smart CPM, Custom Bid, CPA Goal,
• API for advertisers,
• 3-level security system to prevent any fraud traffic,
• Advanced targeting with 20+ settings,
• Unique Partner Care Program, and many more.

Ad types: Popunder, Social Bar, Native Banner, In-Page Push, Interstitial, etc.

Min budget: $5

Best for:

• Advertisers, marketers, and brands who want to start digital advertising immediately.
• Who wants more money-saving tools.
• Who looks for innovative, non-intrusive ad formats with up to 30X higher CTRs.
• Who wants a rapid start at advertising in verticals like VPN & Utilities, Mobile Apps, Ecommerce, Social & Dating, iGaming & Sports, Subscriptions, Browser Extensions, Sweepstakes, and more.

Free training course: Affiliate Marketing Crash Course

Niche-expert Tip on working with advertising platforms

“Adsterra’s ad formats In-Page Push and Social Bar, set it apart from other platforms by consistently delivering higher CTRs. These unique layouts also enhance the impact of your creative content, making it more engaging and appealing to a wide audience”.

You can read the full story in the case study High ROI of 360% from Adsterra’s Traffic on Play Regal Offer.

4. LinkedIn Ads

Url: https://business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions/ads

Best for: B2B businesses, marketers, and recruiters.

Global reach: 1 billion members.

Age specifics:

• 50.6% of users aged 25-34,
• 3.8% aged over 55,
• 24.5% aged 18-24 (by Statista).

Ad formats: Message ads, sponsored content, dynamic ads, and text ads.

Minimum daily amount: $10 to start on LinkedIn.

Key features:

• LinkedIn Campaign Manager

Free online learning: LinkedIn Ads Training Course

Overview: Unlike other ad platforms, the LinkedIn Ads platform is a powerful tool for B2B marketing, enabling advertisers to engage potential customers and target professionals based on job titles, industries, and more. LinkedIn Campaign Manager facilitates the whole advertising process with multiple targeting categories, analytics, ad budgeting, and scheduling.

Note: The career-focused character of the advert platform suggests careful choice of your offers for promotion.

5. TikTok Ads

Url:: https://ads.tiktok.com/business/en#6ZaQrxi4daN4Q2WlDYCbfq

Best for: E-commerce brands, targeting younger demographics, engaged and diverse audiences.

Global reach: 1.59 billion monthly active users.

Different demographics:

• 66% are 18-34 years old,
• 35.3% – 25-34 years old,
• 17.6% – over 45 years old (by Data Reportal).

Diverse ad formats: In-feed video ads, spark ads, pulse suite, playable ads, carousel ads, non-feed placement.

Minimum budget: Daily ad spend and lifetime budgets must exceed $50, with ad group exceeding $20.

Key features:

• Ad Manager

Free online learning: Onboarding 5-video course on TikTok Ads

Overview: TikTok’s short-form video content makes it one of the best platforms for digital advertising to reach the right demographic users through creative content. 

Note: There are audience insights based on the third-party surveys among TikTok users aged 18+ to help you in decision-making.

6. Amazon Ads

Platform url:: https://advertising.amazon.com/get-started

Best for: Small businesses, medium-sized ecommerce businesses, enterprises, agencies.

Global reach: Over 130 million customers only in the US.

Demographics:

• Average age 36-43 years old,
• 45% in the 35-49 range (by Trivium).

Ad formats: Video, display, audio, out-of-home ads, device ads, sponsored ads, sponsored search results.

Minimum daily budget: $10 to use performance-based rules, with schedule-based rules to increase by percentage and precision for holidays.

Key features:

• Persona Builder and Amazon Audiences for insights and planning,
• Advertising tool suite,
• Self-service and managed-service options.

Free online learning: Amazon Academy for advertising

Overview: The Amazon Ads platform is a digital advertising solution that allows sellers and vendors to reach customers across Amazon’s ecosystem for visibility, traffic, customer loyalty, and sales.

Note: Amazon Ads are designed for ecommerce business advertising.

7. Pinterest Ads

Platform url:: https://www.pinterest.com/business/create/

Best for: Advertisers, ecommerce brands, and businesses aiming at fashion, beauty products, wellness, and home décor niches.

Global reach: 570 million monthly active Pinterest users.

Specifics: 42% are Gen Z users. For US users:

• 46% – ages 18-24,
• 40% – ages 25-34,
• 39% – ages 35-44 (by Pinterest Business).

Diverse ad formats: Carousel, collections, idea, image ads, premiere spotlight, quiz, showcase, video pins.

Minimum spend: $5 per day, $2 per day for ad group.

Key features:

• Pinterest Conversions API for valuable insights across multiple channels.
• Targeting, measuring tools for brand visibility, engagement, and conversions.

Online learning: Pinterest Academy for advertising

Overview: Pinterest Ads are promoted pins that appear in home users feeds, search results, and related pins. Pay attention to the platform specifics to run ads effectively, meaning to let users find new ideas, inspiration and focus on visual discovery and visual storytelling.

Note: Please remember to register a Pinterest business account and have an active advertiser profile. With Pinterest ads, you have tools to control spend, set your own bids or rely on automatic bidding tools.

8. Google Ads (previously AdWords)

Platform url: https://business.google.com/in/google-ads/

Best for: Companies and individuals willing to place ads on Google search pages and YouTube videos locally and globally.

Global reach: About 90% of web visitors worldwide, a large user base of 4.77 billion.

Ad types: Google shopping ads, text ads, search and display ads, and video ads, retargeting.

Budget: Google Ads costs vary, with the expected average spent $100-$10,000+ per month.

Key features: Performance Max

Free online learning: Google Ads Academy

Overview: Google Ads is a self-serve platform with pay per click (CPC) or for every thousand impressions (CPM). The platform accommodates placing your ads in search results, other websites and mobile apps in Google Ads ecosystem, and ideal for reaching the desired audience effectively – potential customers that are actively searching for your products or services. 

Note: It works on an auction system, where advertisers bid on keywords and Google determines ad placement based on factors like bid, quality score, and ad relevance.

9. YouTube Ads

Url: https://www.youtube.com/intl/ALL_sg/ads/

Best for: Businesses and individuals.

Global reach: YouTube ads reach a 2.53 billion user base (by DataReportal).

Ad types: YouTube offers video skippable ads and non-skippable ads, bumper ads, shorts ads, mid-roll ad settings, etc.

Budget: $10 to $50 daily for a business.

Overview: As the leading video platform within the Google’s advertising system, YouTube Ads allows businesses and brands to promote video or display ads across the Google Video Partner Network with a more engaging experience.

Note: YouTube ads are managed through Google Ads within Google Ads ecosystem.

10. Twitter Ads (now X)

Platform URL: https://business.x.com/en/advertising

Best for: Businesses and solopreneurs.

Global reach: 429 million X users worldwide in 2024.

Engaged audience:

• 18-24 years – 32.1%,
• 25-34 years – 35.7%,
• 35-49 years – 21.1% (by Statista).

Ad types:

• Promoted tweets (regular posts that advertisers pay to amplify),
• Vertical video ads (full-screen, sound-on ads),
• Collection ads (a way to browse, tell stories, and shop), etc.

Budget: With no minimum required spend for X Ads, you rely on the auction system and bidding.

Key features: Twitter Ads Manager platform (campaign creation, targeting settings, performance metrics).

Free online learning: X Ads Academy.

Overview: Twitter Ads platform offers a self-serve advertising system that allows businesses and brands to increase engagement and drive conversions using targeted ads across the X platform.

Note: You can get hold of the built-in AI content generator to optimize ad creation process with Twitter.

11. Bing Ads (Microsoft advertising platform)

Platform url: https://ads.microsoft.com/

Best for: Businesses and advertisers

Global reach: Over 1.8 billion unique visitors.

Audience: 71% – aged over 35 (by Market.US).

Ad types: Text ads, display ads, and video ads.

Budget: $5–$10 a day is recommended to start. At least $500 a month to gather useful data (by Aimers).

Features:

• Microsoft Clarity to analyze your users’ behavior on a website.
• Bing Webmaster tools to obtain your site’s performance data and free SEO.

Online learning: Microsoft Advertising Learning Lab and free consultation is available.

Overview: Bing Ads is a search advertising platform that helps advertisers to create and manage ad campaigns and drive performance across the entire Microsoft Advertising Network. With Bing Ads, your ads also pop up on Yahoo and AOL.

Note: Bing Ads is usually underestimated in favor of Google Ads, but it can offer fewer competing keywords, while targeting a higher-earning, blue-collar American audience. Bing users spend 35% more than Google users (by REQ).

12. Apple search ads (Apple Search Ads previously )

Platform url: https://ads.apple.com/app-store

Global reach: Over 650 million people visiting the App Store weekly.

Best for: App developers, marketers, and webmaster.

Ad types: Text, display, video, native/sponsored content ads, carousel banner, outstream video ads.

Minimum budget: $5k-$10k per app per month. Cost per tap (CPT) for Apple Search Ads ranges $1.06-$1.59 (by SplitMetrics).

Free learning course: Apple Ads Certification

Overview: Apple Ads is an advertising platform designed to help app developers and marketers promote their iOS apps directly within the App Store.

Note: Remember to recalculate your monthly spend after adjusting your daily ad spend.

13. Snapchat Ads

Platform url:: https://forbusiness.snapchat.com/

Best for: Businesses and advertisers.

Global reach: 850 million monthly active users.

Audience: 75% – 13-34 year-olds with a $5 trillion buying capabilities.

Various ad formats: Image, video ads, commercials, dynamic ads, spotlight, story ads, collection, snap ads, AR lenses with an interactive AR experience

Features:

• Snapchat Ads Manager,
• Auto-bidding,
• Snap Auction.

Minimum spend: $5 per day, $20-50 is recommended.

Free online learning: Introductory lessons

Overview: Snapchat Ads makes it a suitable advert platform for businesses to reach younger audiences and actively engage users with short attention spans. Advertisers can benefit from delivering immersive, full-screen video ads, and interactive ad experiences to users.

Note: You can additionally apply Snap Pixel tool for performance, engagement, and user behavior tracking like page visits, cart additions and purchases for your site.

Comparing the top advertising platforms

How to choose the best advertising platform for your business or offer

Considering the following factors, you can choose the best advertising platform and help maximize effectiveness and ROI of your ad campaigns.

1. Set goals

Determine what you want to achieve with your advertising campaign, e.g., brand awareness, website traffic, sales or to generate leads, so that you can choose the platform that matches your objectives the best.

2. Specify target audience

Different platforms have varying user demographics. Research your audience’s specifics, interests, online behavior, and where they spend their time and apply to your advertising approach.

3. Check your platform usage capabilities

Different platforms for advertising offer different tools and opportunities. Make sure your platform has all you need with straightforward mechanics and an easy learning curve.

Adsterra ad network offers a versatile and independent advertising strategy, providing flexibility, precise targeting, and advanced tools for funding and ad campaign management.

Best practices for effective advertising on the platform

Now, we’ll take you down the advertising best practices on Adsterra platform by advertisers, from choosing an offer to tweaking an ad campaign. If you have any questions, go through quick signup and chat with the Partner Care Team for little spoken advertising boosters.

1. Get an offer

You need an offer to advertise — a link where you send traffic to. To try out, you can select a test offer with the most straightforward conversion flow, that is an install, download, or even click. If you’re unsure where to start, review the Offers Wishlist in Adsterra’s account.

2. Use a Traffic Chart

We don’t like guesswork, just like you. Traffic Chart lets you make data-driven decisions by observing how many ad impressions you’ll receive for your geo, particular ad creatives, traffic type, device, and filtered by other 15+ parameters.

Niche-expert Tip by Thandeka’s Diary Blogger

Keep in mind that Adsterra provides a built-in free feature that lets you estimate traffic volume when advertising. This allows you to forecast potential reach and plan your ad spend with greater accuracy.

You can read the full story of the Mobile Carrier Subscriptions case study of Getting $346 Profit in 6 Days.

3. Apply postback tracking

Though this is optional, it’ll pay you off quickly! The online platform’s stats for ads will still deliver you ad placements, impressions, clicks, and more. With CPA campaigns, you can apply trackers not to miss a single action from users.

In Advertiser’s account, tap Tracking, then Conversion Tracking.

In your Adsterra’s account (The Section: Freebies and Bonuses), you’ll find PROMO CODES and discounts for the most essential tools for advertising. Go through a quick registration as an Advertiser and get a promo.

4. Take care of effective advertising on the platform

A. Tap Campaigns, then Create.

B. Jump to Required Settings, name your first test ad campaign.

C. Target with device and traffic type

Experiment with device time and mainstream and non-mainstream traffic. The more flexible you go, the more stats you have at hand. Mainstream plays out well with any ad campaign. Non-mainstream is a lucky find for niche audiences like Entertainment, iGaming, Dating, Sports, etc.

D. Select an advertising format

This is paramount! With new state-of-the-art technologies in advertising these days, you can boost your CTRs up to 30 times higher ONLY using the right ad format for your ad campaign.

What can you test? Here it is:

• Social Bar
• Popunder
• Native Banners
• In-Page Push
• Interstitial

You can launch a campaign very quickly with Popunders, which doesn’t require creatives and brings 11.9 billion monthly impressions in a direct way. Popunder is 100% thumbs-up for many niches like iGaming, Sport, eCommerce, etc., and it’s one of the best practices to start effective advertising.

The most natural notification-like ad unit Social Bar has over 20 most-converting template creatives and is perfect for Dating, VPNs, Downloadable, and many other niches. You can also try In-Page Push, a display ad with multiple variations for showcasing your offer in the most engaging way. It’s perfect for any niche and runs perfectly on desktop or mobile devices.

E. Select pricing model

Next comes the pricing type — you have CPM, CPA, or CPC model at your service, depending on the ad unit you picked before. When you run offers with fast conversions, the advice is to pick the CPA pricing to only pay for actions completed.

F. Apply Smart CPM pricing

You can use Smart CPM to participate in real-time auctions. You only pay slightly higher than the next highest bidder and buy traffic at the lowest possible cost.

5. Tune your ad spend

Set your total budget. Be safe that you’ll never overspend with Budget settings in the Cappings and Limits section.

With CPA campaigns, we advise to enter a test budget. Why is that? Since all test CPA ads are charged on a CPM basis., this way you’ll embrace more traffic, ensure the offer is interesting to your target users, and no doubt, you’ll save money. Check our latest updates on the recommended test budgets.

For a CPA campaign, the minimum and maximum test amounts are $10 and $500.

6. Review and launch advertising campaign

Congrats! You’re ready to go! Click SUBMIT and go through Preview for detailed check, then tap CREATE CAMPAIGN. After verification, schedule it for a specific day, start immediately, or shoot it manually anytime later.

There are many more targeting options and best practices that can help you slice traffic and target audience. You can always turn to our team with any concerns, doubts, or motivation!

Best emerging trends in advertising platforms

Now let’s look into emerging trends in digital advertising platforms that are reshaping the digital landscape for advertisers and companies:

AI and machine learning integration

Popular platforms currently use AI to automate ad targeting, optimize bidding, improve ROI and reducing manual efforts. Machine Learning (ML) analyzes datasets to predict consumer behavior and enhance ad performance.

Interactive and immersive ads

Augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), interactive quizzes, polls are evolving gamified ad experiences. Highly visual, immersive advertising campaigns are getting very popular, especially among Gen Z and younger audiences.

Advertising despite banner blindness (ad fatigue)

Some platforms now offer ads that can revolutionize your advertising strategy in the niche. Be ready to ask your advertising preferred platform for innovations to engage users without ad fatigue with your unique value proposition.

Advanced ad formats with higher CTR

Pop ads are often blocked on iOS devices, so you can opt for alternatives, like In-Page Push that comfortably pass ad blockers. At the same time, formats like Social Bar and its variations give you up to 30x higher CTRs at the start.

Data privacy and authentic content

As data privacy regulations progress, advertisers are focusing on transparent, first-party data collection, contextual advertising, and compelling content that echoes with users’ values.

Voice and social search optimization

Users’ discovery habits are constantly evolving with the use of smart speakers and voice assistants. Many platforms are incorporating audio ads to tap into new, less cluttered multiple channels.

Cross-channel (omnichannel) integration

Cross-channel marketing involves creating a comprehensive customer journey across multiple platforms and devices.

Influencer and user-generated content

Brands leverage micro-influencers and user-generated content to foster authenticity and connect with audiences on a human level.

Restraints

The advertising landscape remains highly dynamic, with regulatory environments and major platform policies in flux, e.g., Meta, Google, and Apple. Today’s emerging trends and best practices may require adaptation on the go. On the other hand, niche display networks, like Adsterra, are a game changer, as you can have more flexibility to move faster with less traction in digital advertising.

Conclusion

When selecting the best digital advertising platforms to promote your offer or brand, test first and benefit from the support team for your maximum results. The platform solution you put your eyes on must be natural to use without any bottlenecks, giving you enough freedom to pilot your ad campaigns with no friction.

It may seem challenging to master the tools your platform suggests to drive results further, but the little effort and time eventually bring growth and success. With tips and guides at hand from your advert platform, move gradually and steadily to the best results.

Best advertising platforms FAQ