Google Ads Now Lets You Cap Display and Partner Spend, and Is Removing the Old Display Setup in February
The short version
Google started rolling out two optional budget controls on October 15: mark a channel High or Low priority, and cap a Low-priority channel at a percentage of the campaign's average daily budget. The cap is best-effort, not a guarantee, and prioritization does little on tCPA or tROAS campaigns that are not limited by budget. The part that is not optional lands in February 2027, when Google removes the current Display setup on Search campaigns. If you want to keep today's behavior, Google's own answer is Display at Low priority with a 50% allocation.
What Google announced
In an October 14 post on the Google Ads & Commerce blog, Tal Akabas, Director of Product Management, introduced two controls. Channel prioritization sorts channels into High and Low priority, and High-priority channels are funded first. Budget allocation sets a daily percentage cap on channels you have already marked Low. Google framed them as "more control than all-or-nothing opt-outs."
The channels differ by campaign type. Search covers Google Search, Search partners and the Display Network. Shopping covers Search and Search partners. Performance Max covers Google channels as a group, Search partners and Display. Demand Gen covers Google channels and Display. Per the post, availability begins October 15 and rolls out progressively over the coming months, in the Google Ads interface and Search Ads 360, with Google Ads API and Editor support listed as "coming soon." Search Engine Roundtable notes an alpha of the controls was visible in August.
The line that matters is further down the post. Starting in February 2027, Search campaigns with the Display Network turned on lose their current spend allocation setup, which may shift how spend is distributed across channels. Advertisers who want to keep the current configuration can set Display to Low priority with a 50% allocation.
What it actually means
Read this as a spend-ordering layer, not a bidding change. Google still decides how to spend inside each tier. What you gain is an order of funding and a ceiling on the channels you trust least. That is useful, and it is the same problem the Partners Alpha test was reaching for, now with a setting attached.
The details decide whether it does anything for you. The cap is a share of the campaign's average daily budget, not of actual spend: 5% of a $1,000 average budget targets about $50 a day on that channel. It resets daily, and unspent or overspent amounts do not carry over. Setting a Low channel to 0% stops spending there. Google calls the limit best-effort and says the allocation is not a guarantee, so spend can occasionally exceed it. If a campaign already spends more on a Low channel than your new percentage, expect that channel to shrink after you apply it.
Prioritization is weaker than it sounds on the accounts most of us run. Google says that on Target CPA, Target ROAS or Target CPC campaigns that are not limited by budget, prioritization generally does not change how spend is distributed. That is the same mechanic that makes the bid target adjustment matter mostly for budget-limited campaigns. Budget allocation percentages still apply either way, which makes the cap the more reliable of the two controls.
The control transfer here is a reversal with a trapdoor. Control comes back to the advertiser in a narrow form: ordering and ceilings. But the default moves against you on a date. In February, the current Display setup goes away on Search, and the setting that preserves it is one you have to choose. Doing nothing is a decision, and it has a deadline.
Two things are not settled. Google's Help documentation, as read by PPC Land, says budget allocation is not supported for Demand Gen, while the blog post does not mention the exclusion and Search Engine Roundtable describes Demand Gen as coming later. Treat Demand Gen budget allocation as unconfirmed in your account until you see the control. And PPC Land reports that Display also stops serving on Search campaigns that use Target Impression Share; that detail did not appear in the sources I could read from Google, so verify it before you act on it.
A cap that Google calls best-effort is a request, not a ceiling. Plan for the February default, not for the toggle.
Signal or noise: high, with a narrow audience
High if you run Search campaigns with the Display Network on, because the February change reaches you whether or not you touch anything, and if you run Performance Max or Shopping accounts where Search partners or Display take spend you cannot account for. Low if every campaign is on Target CPA or Target ROAS without a budget limit and no Search campaign has Display on. Google's incentive is worth naming: the controls make it easier to stay on every channel at a lower dose than to leave, and the February migration moves the default under accounts that do not respond.
The Monday-morning playbook
- Find the exposure. In every Search campaign, check whether the Display Network is on, then segment by Network over the last 30 days and note the share of cost going to Display and to Search partners. Do the same with the channel and network breakdowns on Performance Max and Shopping. Flag anything above single digits that you cannot explain.
- Confirm the controls have reached the account. The rollout is progressive, so check the campaign's budget settings before you promise a client anything. The settings cannot be applied from a manager account; they are set in the client account or at campaign level. API and Editor support is not available yet, so do not plan a script.
- Pick one of three outcomes per campaign. (a) Keep today's Display behavior: Display at Low priority, 50% allocation. (b) Tighten: lower the percentage, or set 0% to stop spend on a channel you do not want. (c) Do nothing and accept what the February migration does.
- Check what kind of campaign it is. If it is Target CPA or Target ROAS and not limited by budget, expect prioritization to do little and use the allocation percentage if you want a real effect.
- Calendar two dates. A pre-Black Friday review (November 27) of any campaign you changed, and a February 2027 check of every Search campaign that still has Display on.
- Write down the starting point. Record each campaign's Display and partner share before you change anything, so you can tell what the cap did and what the February migration did.
The bottom line
Pull the Display and partner share of spend this week, decide per campaign whether to preserve, tighten or accept the change, and put February on the calendar. Do not read a percentage as a hard stop. The controls are real and worth using on accounts with leakage, and the date is the reason to look now rather than in January.
Frequently asked
What happens to Display Expansion on Google Ads Search campaigns in February 2027?
Google says that starting in February 2027 it will remove the current spend allocation setup for Search campaigns with the Google Display Network turned on, which may shift how spend is distributed. To keep the current configuration, Google suggests setting the Display Network to Low priority with a 50% budget allocation. The exact day in February has not been published.
Is the Google Ads budget allocation limit a hard cap?
No. Google describes the limit as best-effort: it aims to keep spend on a Low-priority channel within the percentage you set, but says the allocation is not a guarantee and spend can occasionally exceed it. The percentage is applied to the campaign's average daily budget, not to actual spend, and it resets each day.
Does channel prioritization work on Target CPA and Target ROAS campaigns?
Only in limited cases. Google says that on Target CPA, Target ROAS or Target CPC campaigns that are not limited by budget, prioritization generally does not change how spend is distributed. Budget allocation percentages still apply, so a cap on a Low-priority channel works whether or not the campaign is budget-limited.
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