APP: Black Friday Update - E-Commerce Advertising Progress Shows Meaningful Improvement

In our AppLovin 3Q25 Preview, we noted that following AppLovin’s October launch of Self-Service and e-commerce campaigns, e-commerce advertising budget growth was initially slower than expected. At the time, we identified several key points:

• AppLovin maintained a high rejection rate for Self-Service invitation codes, with many advertisers receiving approval only two weeks before Black Friday.

• Even after invitation code approval, creative review rejection rates remained elevated.

• Advertisers struggled to adapt to AppLovin’s 30-second video format, lacking established workflows for producing longer-form ad creatives.

• Performance varied meaningfully by vertical—snacks and consumer electronics performed well, while apparel, a major category, underperformed expectations.

Black Friday represented a critical inflection point for AppLovin—an opportunity to address these issues and accelerate advertiser onboarding. We conducted interviews with four advertising industry experts and found that the aforementioned challenges have shown marked improvement, with Black Friday spend ramping meaningfully.

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