Meta Ads 2026: benchmarks by industry and what Andromeda changed
On Meta in 2026, the creative does the targeting. Since the Andromeda retrieval engine rolled out across Facebook and Instagram, the algorithm reads your ads to decide who sees them; stacking detailed audiences matters less and less. Here are the benchmarks to know and the account structure that works today.
Key takeaways
- Facebook ecommerce CTR: 1.94–2.92%; CPM: $6.96–$12.46; acquisition cost: $20–$39 (Lebesgue, March 2026).
- Andromeda, Meta’s ad retrieval engine, improved recall by 6% and ad quality by 8% according to Meta.
- Winning structure: few campaigns, few ad sets, lots of genuinely different creatives.
- The number-one lever is no longer the audience but creative diversity (angles, formats, hooks).
Facebook 2026 benchmarks by industry
Lebesgue’s March 2026 study across eleven ecommerce industries:
Facebook Ads: 2026 ecommerce benchmarks
How to read these numbers
A high CTR doesn’t guarantee a good acquisition cost: art and decor has the best CTR but one of the lowest conversion rates. Food and drink, on the other hand, converts well and posts the lowest CAC. Always compare your cost per result, not your CTR, to your industry’s.
Outside ecommerce, aggregators put the median CPC around $0.70 for traffic campaigns and $1.92 for lead generation.
Andromeda: what changed
Andromeda is the retrieval system that picks, out of millions of ads, the few thousand candidates for each person before the auction. Meta introduced it in late 2024: a far more powerful neural network that improves recall by 6% and ad quality by 8% on measured segments. It has been generalised since 2025.
In practice: the system understands what your creative shows and who it speaks to. A trail-running shoe ad will reach runners even without “trail” targeting. Creatives that are too similar are treated as one and share the same audience.
The account structure that works in 2026
Structuring Meta campaigns in 2026
Do
- One campaign per main objective (sales, leads, conversations)
- Broad targeting, Advantage+ on
- 10–20 active creatives per ad set, with different angles
- Mix short video, image, carousel and creator content
- Refresh creatives weekly
Drop
- Ten ad sets with ten interest audiences
- Five colour variants of the same image
- Killing a campaign after 48 hours
- Duplicating campaigns to “reset” learning
Where to find creatives that work
In your organic content. An Instagram post that gets lots of shares and saves has already proven its hook. That’s why we recommend combining organic and paid rather than opposing them. And if you’re torn between boosting a post and building a real campaign, read our boost vs Ads Manager comparison.
The underrated format: ads that open a conversation
Click-to-Message campaigns send users into an Instagram, Messenger or WhatsApp conversation rather than to a website. For services, local businesses or products that need advice, it’s often the best cost per customer. It’s all in our Click-to-DM ads guide.
Frequently asked questions
What is the average Facebook CPM in 2026?
Between $7 and $12.50 depending on the industry for ecommerce (Lebesgue, March 2026). Beauty and health is the most expensive, hardware and automotive the cheapest.
What is Meta Andromeda?
The engine that preselects candidate ads for each user before the auction. It analyses creative content, which makes creative diversity more important than audience targeting.
How many creatives per ad set?
Practitioners recommend 10–20 active creatives with genuinely different angles (hook, format, promise), rather than cosmetic variants.
Is interest targeting still useful?
Less and less. With Advantage+ and Andromeda, broad targeting lets the algorithm find the audience from the creative; interests become suggestions at best.
Can Perroly manage my Meta campaigns?
Meta ads management is in the works at Perroly. Today, Perroly automatically answers people who message you on Instagram or Facebook after clicking an ad, thanks to the “arrival from an ad” trigger.