Google Updates Ad Scheduling Budget Pacing: What it Means for Advertisers

If you run ads in Google, you may (or may not) have gotten an email recently about updates to budget pacing.

The changes, which begin rolling out gradually on March 1, adjust how daily budgets pace for campaigns using ad scheduling. So what does this mean for your campaigns? And when will it roll out to your account? Let’s break it down.

The Google Ads Announcement

According to the email Google Ads sent out, shared by Jordan Fry on LinkedIn, the platform will "gradually begin rolling out a change to Google Ads average daily budget pacing for advertisers using ad scheduling."

Google Ads Liaison Ginny Marvin clarified that the email was sent only to the first wave of advertisers, as the update is being rolled out gradually, and accounts will be notified before the change takes effect.

On paper, not much will change when this rolls out to your account. The email says:

• Your monthly spend cap is still 30.4x your average daily budget (Google calls this your monthly spending limit)
• Your campaign will never spend more than 2x its daily budget on a single day (Google calls this your daily spending limit)
• Ads still won’t run outside of your scheduled hours
• Spend is still driven by your campaign goal

On social media, Ginny Marvin told advertisers the changes aim to “better align budget pacing functionality.”

So what’s the big deal?

The big deal is that Ad Scheduling isn’t your budget bodyguard anymore.

What Actually Changed

Previously, if you wanted to limit spending during certain hours or days, you could use an ad schedule to restrict when your ads showed up and spent money. When you set a daily budget, Google can spend up to 30.4x that amount in any given month. Nothing has changed there.

What’s changing now is Google will actively attempt to spend that 30.4x amount… even if your campaign uses ad scheduling.

So, if your daily budget is set to $100, Google sees that as permission to spend $3,040 in a month (again, this is not new) – even if you’re only running your ads part-time. Now, Google is saying it will actively try to spend $3,040 within a given month.

Why This Matters

A major reason advertisers set ad schedules is to control spend and how it paces. This update changes that dynamic.

The way Google Ads “daily” budgets work is confusing for many, and this email doesn’t do a great job explaining the change.

But one thing is clear: Google saying they will “proactively attempt to spend up to this limit regardless of a campaign's ad schedule” means that your campaigns will most likely spend more.

Let’s revisit our example of a campaign with a $100 daily budget. For this example, let’s pretend it’s a B2B account that uses ad scheduling to turn ads off on the weekends, and we’re trying to forecast how much the campaign will spend in March 2026. After this change rolls out, I would expect your campaign to spend closer to $3,040, even though the campaign will only be turned on for 22 days during March.

The Good News: The 2x Rule Still Applies

Despite this most recent change, Google says it’s still committed to its rule that it will never spend more than 2x your daily budget in a single day.

So, if your daily budget is $100, the most Google can spend on any given day is $200. You won’t wake up to a random 5x or 10x spike in daily spend. There is still a hard daily cap in place.

What Marketers Should Do About It

Whether you received the email yet or not, you should prepare to adjust if you're currently using ad scheduling in your accounts.

While Google can’t exceed 2x in a single day, this update means it can string together multiple high-spend days to reach that monthly 30.4x target – even if your ads only run during limited hours.

If you want to prevent unexpected spending spikes, here is what you can do about it:

1. Adjust Your Daily Budgets

If you have a strict monthly budget cap, divide your intended monthly spend by 30.4 and set that as your new daily budget. This aligns Google’s pacing logic with your actual monthly goal – not an inflated signal caused by part-time scheduling.

Keep in mind, if you make any budget changes during a month, your monthly spending limit will also change.

2. Use an Automated Rule or Script

You could also consider using an automated rule or script instead of ad scheduling.

So if you’re running a weekend-only (Fri-Sun) campaign, you would:

• Remove ad scheduling restrictions
• Create an automated rule or script to enable the campaign on Friday @ 12 a.m.
• Create an automated rule or script to pause the campaign on Monday @ 12 a.m., OR when the defined spend threshold is reached.

This creates a hard enable/pause control, rather than relying on ad scheduling and heavy pacing budgets.

Google reps have told our team in the past that pausing campaigns regularly is not great for machine learning and optimization. However, if your budgets are very tight, this is an option.

3. Use Campaign Total Budgets

Google now offers Campaign Total Budgets for Search and Shopping campaigns. This feature was previously only available for PMax campaigns.

The feature allows you to set a true spend cap that Google can’t exceed – ideal for short-term promotions or strict budget environments.

The downside of this option is that Google only allows campaign total budgets for campaigns running up to 90 days. You could, in theory, extend the end date after 90 days and reset the budget to keep the campaign running. However, this isn’t the most sustainable option.

Key Takeaways

Budget management is not performance optimization. In a perfect world, you’d have unlimited ad spend if performance targets were being hit. However, we live in the real world, where some businesses have very strict limits on ad spend. This change will make it even more difficult to control monthly spend.

Ad Scheduling still controls when ads run, it just doesn’t control how much you spend in the same way anymore.

If your daily budget doesn’t reflect what you are truly willing to spend, now is the time to fix that. After this update, Google will not take your budget at face value.

Need help adjusting to Google Ads updates? Get in touch with our team to optimize your accounts!