Notes
Meta's AI Labeling Policy Explained: When the 'AI Info' Tag Appears Next to Sponsored
Published
Meta treats AI-generated photorealistic people differently from AI-generated everything else. If your ad has a synthetic human in it, the disclosure is prominent by design.
Two tiers of label, and only one of them is visible
Meta's approach to generative-AI transparency in ads distinguishes between minor AI assistance and AI-generated photorealistic humans. Per Meta's own announcement, ads containing photorealistic AI-generated people carry an "AI info" indicator displayed alongside the Sponsored tag — not hidden in the post's overflow menu where most metadata lives.
That placement matters more than the existence of the label. A disclosure behind a menu is functionally invisible; a disclosure next to Sponsored is part of the creative. You should assume every viewer sees it and write the ad accordingly.
What triggers it
The trigger is a photorealistic person who was generated rather than filmed. Stylised or obviously illustrated characters sit in a different bucket, as do AI-assisted edits to real footage — colour, background, upscaling — which is the category most brands are already using without thinking of it as AI.
Meta also detects generation from industry-standard provenance signals embedded by the tools themselves, so this is not purely self-declared. Meta's own help centre documentation covers the mechanics.
Why this is fine, and how to make it fine
The instinct is to treat the label as a penalty on performance. In practice it's a constraint on *format*, not on results: what suffers is the ad that depended on the viewer believing a real customer was speaking. An ad that reads as an ad, with a presenter, loses nothing by being labelled as produced with AI.
Which is the argument for building the creative around a spokesperson from the start rather than around a fake customer — the label stops being a problem the moment the ad wasn't pretending. Why that model is the safer one, and why our terms commit to it.
Operational notes
- Assume the label appears. Don't build a concept that only works if it doesn't.
- Don't attempt to strip provenance metadata. It's detectable, it's a policy violation, and the downside is your ad account.
- Keep the AI disclosure consistent between the ad and any organic version of the same asset.
- Policies here move. Re-check before a big launch rather than trusting a blog post — including this one.
This isn't legal advice. It's an operator's account of rules we work under every day. If you're making a call with real money or real exposure behind it, get it reviewed by someone qualified.
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