How to Check Facebook Ad Relevance Score
Trying to find your Facebook Ad Relevance Score? You won’t, because it’s gone. A few years ago, Facebook replaced the single 1-to-10 score with three more specific and actionable metrics. This article breaks down what those new metrics are, where to find them in your Ads Manager, and how to use them to make your ads better and more profitable.
What Happened to Facebook's Relevance Score?
For years, the Ad Relevance Score was a go-to metric for advertisers. It gave you a simple number from 1 to 10 that told you how well your ad was resonating with your target audience. A score of 8 was great, a score of 2 meant you had problems.
The problem was its simplicity. While a low score told you an ad was underperforming, it didn’t tell you why. Was it the image? The ad copy? The targeting? The landing page experience? The single score was a symptom, not a diagnosis. To get to the root of the problem, you had to guess, which wasn't very efficient.
In 2019, Facebook retired the single score and introduced a suite of "Ad Relevance Diagnostics" to give advertisers more clarity. Instead of one vague score, you now get three specific rankings that tell a much more complete story about your ad's performance.
The Ad Relevance Diagnostics: Breaking Down the New Metrics
The new system evaluates your ad against others competing for the same audience. Each diagnostic gives you a ranking: Below Average, Average, or Above Average. Understanding what each one measures is the key to improving your campaigns.
1. Quality Ranking
What it measures: The Quality Ranking assesses the perceived quality of your ad. It's based on user feedback and whether people are interacting with your ad or hiding it. It also takes into account "low-quality attributes" like clickbait, engagement bait, or sensationalized language.
Think of this as Facebook's judgment of your ad's overall character. Are you providing a good user experience or just trying to game the algorithm with cheap tricks?
Above Average: Your ad offers a positive user experience and is well-received.
Average: Your ad is standard, no major issues, but nothing exceptional either.
Below Average (Bottom 35% of ads): Users are likely hiding your ad, reporting it, or otherwise providing negative feedback. Your ad creative might contain clickbait, excessive text, or low-resolution imagery. This rank can seriously limit your ad's reach.
How to Improve Your Quality Ranking:
Use High-Resolution Creative: Stop using blurry, pixelated photos or videos. Invest in clean, crisp, and professional-looking assets.
Avoid Clickbait Headlines: Headlines like "You Won’t Believe What Happens Next!" will get your ad penalized. Be direct and clear about your value proposition.
Follow Ad Policies: Read and understand Facebook's Advertising Policies. Making prohibited claims or using deceptive imagery will get you flagged.
Check for Engagement Bait: Don’t explicitly ask for likes, comments, or shares (e.g., "Like this post if you love coffee!"). Instead, create content that naturally encourages engagement.
2. Engagement Rate Ranking
What it measures: This metric compares your ad's expected engagement rate to the ads you're competing against. Engagement includes clicks, likes, comments, shares, and other interactions.
A high engagement rate signals to Facebook that your ad is relevant and interesting. As a result, Facebook is more likely to show it to more people at a lower cost.
Above Average: Your ad is sparking conversations and capturing attention effectively.
Average: Your ad is performing on par with other ads targeting the same audience.
Below Average (Bottom 35% of ads): Your ad isn't grabbing attention. People are scrolling right past it. This often points to dull creative or uninspired ad copy.
How to Improve Your Engagement Rate Ranking:
Stop the Scroll with Strong Visuals: Use short, attention-grabbing videos, vibrant carousel ads, or striking images that stand out in a busy feed.
Write Compelling Copy: Open with a strong hook that speaks directly to your audience's pain points or desires. Ask questions to spark curiosity.
Test Your Calls to Action (CTAs): Beyond the standard "Shop Now," try CTAs that feel more native to the conversation, like "Learn More" or "Send Message." Ensure it's the right CTA for the goal you're trying to achieve.
3. Conversion Rate Ranking
What it measures: This diagnostic compares your ad's expected conversion rate based on its optimization goal. If your goal is "Purchases," it measures how well your ad is driving purchases compared to other ads also optimized for purchases targeting the same audience.
This is arguably the most important metric of the three, as it directly relates to your business objective. A low conversion rate ranking points to a problem that happens after the click.
Above Average: Your ad is effectively driving the action you're optimizing for.
Average: Your ad's post-click performance is typical for ads with your optimization goal and audience.
Below Average (Bottom 35% of ads): People are clicking but not converting. This almost always indicates a disconnect between your ad and your landing page, or a problem on the page itself.
How to Improve Your Conversion Rate Ranking:
Ensure Message Match: Does your landing page continue the conversation started in your ad? The headline, images, and offer should be consistent. If your ad promises a 50% discount on shoes, the landing page better show shoes with a 50% discount.
Optimize Landing Page Speed: Every second counts. Use tools like Google's PageSpeed Insights to check your load time. Slow pages kill conversions.
SImplify the Path to Conversion: Is your checkout process complicated? Do you ask for too much information in your lead form? Remove unnecessary steps and friction.
Strengthen Your Offer: Perhaps the ad is fine and the landing page works, but the offer itself isn't compelling enough to make someone act now.
How to Find Your Ad Relevance Diagnostics in Ads Manager
Finding these three metrics is simple once you know where to look. They're hidden by default, so you'll need to customize your columns.
Go to your Facebook Ads Manager.
Navigate to the campaign and ad set you want to review, and click on the Ads tab.
Look for the Columns dropdown menu above your ad performance metrics (it usually says "Performance").
Click it and select Customize Columns... from the bottom of the list.
A new window will open. In the search bar on the right, type in the name of each diagnostic:
Quality ranking
Engagement rate ranking
Conversion rate ranking
Check the box next to each one. You can drag and drop them on the far right list to rearrange their order in your report.
Click the Apply button in the bottom right corner.
Your ad reporting table will now include these three new columns. It's a good idea to click the "Columns" dropdown again and select "Save as preset" so you can easily access this view in the future.
Note: It takes some data for Facebook to generate these rankings, typically around 500 impressions. If you see "--" in the columns, it just means the ad hasn't been shown enough yet.
Using the Diagnostics to Troubleshoot Your Ads: Common Scenarios
The real power of these diagnostics comes from using them together to pinpoint specific problems. Here’s how to decipher the most common combinations.
Scenario 1: Consistently "Below Average" Across All Three
The Diagnosis: Your ad concept is a total mismatch for your audience. The creative is weak, the message isn't resonating, and the offer isn't relevant.
The Fix: Shut it down and start fresh. This isn't a case for small tweaks. Go back to your audience research. Are you targeting the right people? Re-evaluate your core value proposition and create a completely new ad.
Scenario 2: High Quality Ranking, High Engagement, but "Below Average" Conversion Rate
The Diagnosis: You’ve made a great ad! People love it, are engaging with it, and it provides a good user experience. However, an aspect of the post-click experience is failing.
The Fix: Focus entirely on your landing page. Check for message mismatch, slow load times, a confusing user flow, or a checkout process with too much friction. The problem isn’t the ad, it's what happens after the click.
Scenario 3: "Average" to "Below Average" Engagement, but "Above Average" Conversion Rate
The Diagnosis: Your offer is a winner! The people who manage to click are highly likely to convert. The problem is your ad isn't doing a good enough job of stopping the scroll and grabbing their attention in the first place.
The Fix: Improve your ad creative. Test radically different images, new video hooks in the first three seconds, and headlines that address your customer’s #1 pain point more directly. You have a great offer, now show it off.
Final Thoughts
Letting go of the old single Relevance Score might feel strange at first, but the shift to Quality, Engagement, and Conversion rate rankings provides a far more complete diagnostic tool. By analyzing these three metrics together, you can stop guessing and start making precise, data-driven decisions to fix your underperforming ads and scale your winners.
While locating these metrics inside Ads Manager is a great first step, making it a regular part of your workflow can still feel time-consuming. At Graphed, we help you simplify this process entirely. Instead of customizing columns and exporting CSVs, you can use plain English to instantly build a real-time dashboard that flags your winning and losing ads, combining Facebook Ads data with metrics from Google Analytics, Shopify, and more - all without any manual work.