Google to change budget pacing for campaigns using ad scheduling
Google’s new pacing update could increase monthly spend for ad-scheduled campaigns by pushing budgets harder within allowed run times.
Google is rolling out a major update to how average daily budgets pace in campaigns using ad scheduling — and it could materially change monthly spend.
What’s happening. Google Ads will proactively pace budgets to spend up to the full 30.4x monthly limit — even if your campaigns run only on specific days through ad scheduling. This will start March 1, according to an email from Google Ads:
How it works:
- The 2x daily overspend rule stays in place.
- The 30.4x average daily budget monthly cap remains unchanged.
- Campaigns will not run outside scheduled hours.
- But Google will now attempt to hit the full monthly ceiling within the allowed schedule.
Example. A campaign set to weekends only, with a $100 daily budget, previously spent about $800 per month (roughly eight weekend days). Under the new pacing logic, it could spend up to $1,600 per month — hitting $200 (2x daily budget) on each scheduled day.
Why we care. If you run limited schedules — like weekends only — you’ve likely spent less because Google paced against active days. Now Google will push to hit the full 30.4x monthly limit within your scheduled window, which could sharply increase spend and cause you to overshoot your monthly target unless you lower daily budgets.
What Google says. The goal is to better align pacing behavior with advertisers’ expectations around monthly spend limits, according to Google Ads Liaison Ginny Marvin. Spend will still be driven by campaign objectives, such as conversions or conversion value, and no campaign will exceed the existing billing caps.
Marvin also clarified that only advertisers who received notifications about this update will be affected and the change will be slowly rolled out.
Between the lines. This is less about raising limits — and more about how aggressively Google uses existing ones. For advertisers relying on ad scheduling to naturally suppress spend, this could lead to unexpected increases unless daily budgets are recalibrated.
What to do now:
- Review campaigns using ad scheduling.
- Recalculate daily budgets based on true monthly goals.
- Lower daily budgets to maintain previous monthly spend levels.
First spotted. Jordan Fry, CEO at RevAmp agency, shared the email he received from Google on LinkedIn.
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