Third-party ad tag technical specs

Third-party ad tags should only be used for creative rendering on Apple News. Any uses beyond the display of advertising, such as the the creation and/or operation of an ad network is strictly prohibited and is subject to review by Apple and may be removed at its sole discretion.

Pre-roll video and outstream video ads can use their third-party VAST tags which can be served on iOS 14.0 and later.

Google Campaign Manager supports banner ads listed above, but doesn’t support interstitial ads, and requires iOS 14.0 and later. See Google Campaign Manager technical specs.

Google Ad Manager Programmatic Guaranteed supports third-party tags for large, MREC, IAB 300 x 250, IAB 320 x 50, IAB 320 x 320, IAB 300 x 600, IAB 728 x 90, IAB 970 x 250 ad formats.

Third-party served ads should adapt to changes in point size for portrait and landscape orientations. With the exception of MREC, all Apple ad formats require one ad tag for portrait and landscape orientations on each device.

In order to prevent non-user initiated navigation, all tap methods should be associated with a tap in a timely manner. Delays in tap method calls may cause the ad destination to be blocked. Therefore, all tap action methods including MRAID.open(), MRAID.expand(), and MRAID createCalendarEvent() should be called upon immediately on tap.

Note that fourth-party tracking tags are not supported.

MRAID implementation

Apple News Advertising SDK implements a subset of MRAID 1.0 as a standard MRAID that can be called by the ad. All tags must be MRAID compliant. See supported methods and events below.

Supported methods

• addEventListener
• close
• expand(twopartonly)
• getExpandProperties
• getPlacementType
• getState
• getVersion
• isViewable
• open
• removeEventListener
• setExpandProperties
• _addToCalendar(AppleAPI)

Supported events

• error
• ready
• stateChange
• viewableChange

Allow Listing

Ads requested by Apple News will be routed through an Apple-hosted proxy server for privacy purposes. This means that all ads served on Apple News will come from Apple IP addresses, therefore we need to make sure that the traffic isn’t identified as bots/DDOS by your servers. The ideal way for this to be solved would be for you to Allow List all IP addresses beginning with 17 (for example, 17.*.*.*), which are all owned by Apple.

Additional development details

Ads are loaded in a fairly standard web view (WKWebView). But there are important details that should be taken in to consideration when using third-party ad tags for ads on Apple News.

• Google Campaign Manager tags require internal redirects when booking campaigns on Google Ad Manager using standard creative workflows (no templates).
• Google Campaign Manager tags require Javascript tags when booking campaigns on Workbench, or on Google Ad Manager when using templates. The following Google Campaign Manager tag types are supported: JavaScript(withdata-dcm-rendering- mode=’script’) LegacyJavaScript
• All paths to resources that the ads load must be absolute (complete) URLs, not relative paths. Note that Google Campaign Manager can support both absolute and relative paths.
• Use of iFrames isn’t supported. When ads are loaded in Apple News, they can’t create or use iFrames at any time; the ad will fail loading. The MRAID object is only accessible via the document’s mainframe. Note that Google Campaign Manager can support the use of iFrames.
• SSL serving is required. All ads must be SSL compliant.
• Taps are supported using MRAID.open method or anchor tags <ahref>. Use of Window.open will cause the clicks to fail.
• A maximum of 100 requests per impression is allowed. This includes all pixels, JS, image, etc. Any requests beyond the allowed limit will be ignored.

Supported in-banner features

• HTML5 JS/CSS Animation

• Tap: Activates a control or selects an item
• Flick: Scrolls or pans quickly
• Drag: Move an element from side to side or drag an element across the display banner’s interaction space

Unsupported features

To optimize user experience and ensure security and privacy, the following device features are blocked by Apple News Ad SDK.

• Accelerometer
• Gyroscope
• In-banner forms
• Tap to SMS/Call/Email
• Camera access
• Video/audio
• Device location

Supported vendors

• Bonsai
• Celtra
• Dianomi
• Google Campaign Manager
• Polar
• ResponsiveAds
• RevContent
• Keystone
• Innovid

Note that only Celtra and Google Campaign Manager ad tags are supported when using standard creative workflows for Apple News campaigns. See specific support plans below:

Third-party ad tag (display) checklist

• Absolute URLs only
  
  

Google Campaign Manager tags can support absolute or relative paths.
• URLs must use HTTPS protocol
• Apple IPs (17.*) Allow Listed or not blocked
• No iFrames


  
  Google Campaign Manager tags can support the use of iFrames.
• SSL compliant
• All clicks using MRAID.open() or <ahref> 


Google Campaign Manager tags are flagged as invalid for the following reasons:

• Invalid impression/click URL format includes invalid characters (such as [ ] < > “ # % { } \ ^ ~ \\ ` or unicode characters such as \u2018, \u2019, \u201c, \u201d)
• Invalid article ID, article header, or advertiser name for native templates
• Invalid or missing creative ID, size, type, or body for template-less ads
• Invalid DCM tracker or VAST tag
• Known blocked creatives (deny-listed)
• Network issues in accessing the tag

Note that use of Window.open will cause the clicks to fail.

• No fourth-party tracking

• < 100 requests per impression

• All ads are to spec in portrait and landscape mode
• Expandable ads (No custom close, Two-part expand only)