Google will stop serving political ads in the EU, including on YouTube

Google will stop serving political advertisements in the European Union. The decision, in The Keyword blog, is in response to an upcoming new rule for the bloc that “introduces significant new operational challenges and legal uncertainties for political advertisers and platforms.” The company says the Regulation on Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising has an overly broad definition for political advertising and raised concerns that technical guidance around the policy may not be given until close to October 2025, when the rules will take effect.

In addition to no longer serving that ad content ahead of next October, Google said that paid political advertisements will also not be allowed on YouTube in the EU. The company said that similar regulations have already led it to stop serving political ads in , France and Brazil.

Google’s advertising and ad tech have been subjected to scrutiny by the European government in recent years. The company faced (but ultimately ) fines for “abusive” advertising practices in 2019, and last year was hit with . And Google has also engaged in other eyebrow-raising behavior in the bloc. Just yesterday, the company began what it called a “small, time-limited test” to from EU-based news publishers in search, Google News and the Discover feed.