PPC Platforms in 2026: Which 3 Are Worth Your Budget

The least useful PPC advice on the internet is a list of twenty-odd platforms that all supposedly work for your business. (They don’t. Most of them will quietly eat your budget while you’re distracted.)

Where to start, by business type

If you are	Start here	Then test	Do not bother yet
Local services (plumber, dentist, law firm)	Local Services Ads, then Google Search	Bing, Meta retargeting	TikTok, Pinterest, LinkedIn
Ecommerce, considered purchase	Google Shopping	Meta, Amazon	LinkedIn, X
Ecommerce, impulse or visual	Meta	TikTok, Pinterest	LinkedIn, Bing
B2B software or services	Google Search	LinkedIn, Bing	Broad Display, Performance Max until Search is dialled in
Lead generation, high ticket	Google Search	Meta retargeting, LinkedIn	Display, Taboola
App install	Google App campaigns	Meta, TikTok	Bing, LinkedIn
Publisher monetizing content	None of these, you are selling ad space, not buying it	Taboola or Outbrain as supply partners	Every buying platform on this page

The “do not bother yet” column is the one that saves money. Those platforms are not bad, they are just wrong for that business until the obvious demand is already captured and you have budget left over to go looking for more.

What are PPC platforms?

A PPC platform is where you build and run pay-per-click ads: Google Ads, Meta Ads Manager, Amazon Ads and so on. You are charged when someone clicks, at a price set by a live auction each time your keyword or audience comes up.

That definition is the easy part. The useful distinction is what each platform is actually for. Google and Amazon put your ad in front of someone who is already looking. Meta, TikTok and Pinterest put it in front of someone who was not. Both work, they just need different offers, different creative and very different patience about how long a conversion takes.

The Top PPC Platforms For Paid Advertising

Now we’re going to look at the top PPC platforms out there on the market right now for paid advertising, broken down into various categories including:

• Search - platforms driven by search engines like Google and Bing, where you capture demand that already exists.
• Social and video - platforms like Meta, TikTok, Pinterest and YouTube, where you create demand that does not.
• The long tail - native, display, programmatic and audio, covered in a paragraph each at the end because for most advertisers they are a later experiment rather than a starting point.

Search PPC Advertising Platforms

These platforms primarily focus on placing ads in search engine results or other websites based on specific keywords entered by the user.

The most obvious one is Google, but we should also consider other platforms like Amazon as well.

1) Google Ads

Google Ads (previously Google AdWords) is the largest PPC platform in the World by some distance, and in our opinion it’s the best.

It is the default search engine on the overwhelming majority of devices sold, and on top of that, their display advertising network runs banner & video adverts across a mammoth swathe of the internet as well.

This is why most advertisers prefer to start with Google Ads as their number 1 platform, because the sheer scope and scale of Google means that paid advertisers can reach pretty much their entire audience.

• Ad Formats - Text, Video, Image, Email. They also have Performance Max which uses AI to cover all 4 of these!
• Strengths - The biggest and most intelligent advertising platform in the World for a reason. Their ad technology is pretty incredible.
• Weaknesses - Arguably not the best PPC advertising platform if your goal is to generate new demand, with other platforms like Instagram and TikTok providing a more engaging experience. Additionally, some of the Google reps can be annoying .
• Pricing - Google Ads cost around $3.67 per click on average , but varies massively depending on industry and ad type.

2) Microsoft Ads (Bing)

Bing is the World’s second largest search engine, and you can advertise directly there via Microsoft ads.

Bing actually accounts for over 10% of the global desktop market.

It’s growing fast as well since 2021, as it attempts to slowly dethrone Google.

The biggest thing for advertisers is that Bing users are older and wealthier than Google users.

• Ad Formats: The primary use case is going to be text-ads on their search engine.
• Strengths: Access to an extremely wealthy userbase, and cheaper ad costs compared to Google.
• Weaknesses: Smaller market share compared to Google.
• Pricing: Generally lower CPCs compared to Google Ads, averaging around $1.54 per click.

3) Amazon Ads

Amazon accounts for 47% of all Ecommerce spend in the USA . Simply put, almost everyone is using Amazon to search for products.

If you’re an Ecommerce brand and your products are not on Amazon, you’re probably missing out on a ton of revenue.

Amazon actually makes the third biggest ad revenue of all PPC platforms, behind Google and Meta.

This is because their platform is so incredibly popular and competitive that brands can actually buy advertising space directly on Amazon’s website.

• Ad Formats: Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Display and Stores.
• Strengths: Direct access to Amazon’s huge user base and platform, which is known to have extremely strong conversion rates.
• Weaknesses: The platform is highly competitive especially in popular product categories, which can drive up costs. Additionally, you’re kind of locked into the Amazon ecosystem.
• Pricing: You only get charged when someone clicks on your add (PPC style) but CPCs can vary widely based on the product category and competition. CPCs can range from $0.80 - $1.50

4) Apple Search Ads

Apple Search Ads is the advertising platform that gives app developers the opportunity to boost and promote their apps directly in the app store search results.

This platform is ONLY suitable for boosting your Apple app, and doesn’t have any other use cases.

But their annual ad revenue from this is around $7 billion, so it’s an incredibly popular investment for many advertisers and entities that have an application for download.

• Ad Formats: Text & images are pulled direct from your app store listing, so you don’t need to upload any creative assets.
• Strengths: It’s really great for targeting high-intent users. For example if someone was to search for “Spotify” but you have an amazing music app alternative, then your app could in fact appear above Spotify in the App store!
• Weaknesses: It’s totally limited to the iOS ecosystem, so if you don’t own an app, this is a non-starter.
• Pricing: Cost-per-tap (CPT) model, where you pay only when a user taps on your ad. The average CPT can vary, but it often ranges from $0.50 to $3.00 depending on the competition.

Social and Video PPC Advertising Platforms

There’s a huge number of social media sites out there, and collectively that eat up a huge amount of people’s time.

Let’s see which platforms are the best for paid advertising.

5) Meta Ads (Facebook & Instagram)

Meta Ads use the joint power of both Facebook and Instagram, allowing advertisers to reach audiences on both platforms at the same time.

Our favorite feature of their advertising platform is that Meta will automatically deploy your ads to either Instagram or Facebook depending on where their algorithm is seeing the best results - So you don’t need to manually allocate advertising budget to each platform individually.

We all know that Facebook and Instagram offers a very visual and compelling experience that allows advertisers to really get creative.

• Ad Formats: Image, Video, Carousel, Slideshow, Stories etc.
• Strengths: Unmatched audience reach with incredible targeting options, and an advanced algorithm that will largely take care of that targeting for you using AI. Meta is also an incredible platform for PPC remarketing .
• Weaknesses: Ad performance can be impacted by lack of cookies tracking, and also ad fatigue means that advertisers need to constantly refresh their creatives to remain relevant.
• Pricing: Average CPC for Meta ranges from $0.50 to $2.00 depending on industry.

6) LinkedIn Ads

LinkedIn Ads is a very unique opportunity because it’s focuses 100% on the professional social network of LinkedIn, and there’s really no serious alternative.

It’s particularly great for recruiters, B2B companies and services, because it’s really where professionals look to either improve their own career OR seek to improve their company’s fortunes.

Additionally, you can leverage their InMail which is pretty awesome for some personal targeting.

• Ad Formats: Sponsored Content, Sponsored InMail (very cool feature), Text Ads, Dynamic Ads, Video Ads.
• Strengths: Pretty exceptional targeting because you can literally target based on industry, company size, job title etc. It’s also a very ‘serious’ platform where people expect to conduct business on.
• Weaknesses: It’s notorious for having a high CPC compared to other platforms.
• Pricing: Typically much higher than other platforms, with CPCs ranging from $5 to $8. But the ROI can still be incredible!

7) X (Twitter) Ads

X (formerly known as Twitter) is still one of the most used, but also most controversial social media platforms out there.

Since Elon Musk acquired the company, he has tried to improve advertising performance and stamp out issues with bots that were impacting the platform.

We’re still not 100% confident that the platform is a great choice for advertisers.

But, because of the sheer volume of people that use the platform, it’s one that large brands should at least consider and test .

• Ad Formats: Promoted Tweets, Promoted Accounts, Video Ads.
• Strengths: X is ideal for quick, impactful messages and has strong viral marketing potential.
• Weaknesses: Messages can quickly get lost or drowned out compared to other platforms, and there’s still an issue with traffic quality from advertising reported by users.
• Pricing: We’ve seen reports that you need to start with a minimum $15k budget to get going on X, and ad reps will push you to spend at least $500 per day.

8) TikTok Ads

TikTok truly is experiencing phenomenal growth as a platform, and marketers are starting to invest a ton into TikTok Ads.

To have any success on TikTok as a PPC platform, you need to create UGC (user generated content) because anything else simply won’t work.

We spoke to a leading TikTok ads agency who say that they prefer taking their client’s top performing organic posts and literally just using those as adverts.

• Ad Formats: In-feed video ads (primarily)
• Strengths: High engagement rates, particularly with younger demographics + rare ability to go viral.
• Weaknesses: Super fast-paced nature, and if your creative is weak you just won’t do well (although the same can be said for a lot of platforms),
• Pricing: You have to spend a minimum of $50 per day, and they use based on CPM (cost per thousand impressions) which will work out to something like $1-10 per CPM.

9) Reddit Ads

Reddit officially launched on the New York stock exchange in March 2024, so they’re certainly in a position now where they want to improve their paid advertising capabilities.

They now have more than 260 million active weekly users , which means that big advertisers can’t really ignore the platform anymore.

Most people struggle to get success with Reddit ads, but we do have a contact that gave us some very positive feedback:

“I have been having success with Reddit ads by targeting single subreddits per ad group, and using native-appearing ads that feel like natural posts. I only show them to USA traffic and mobile-only, and primarily to advertise app installs. It’s been working very well.”

• Ad Formats: Promoted Posts, Display Ads, Video Ads.
• Strengths: Ability to target audience by specific subreddits (categories) is pretty great.
• Weaknesses: Reddit users are pretty skeptical of advertisers.
• Pricing: Typically a cost per click between $0.20 - $1.20.

10) Snapchat Ads

Snapchat still has a surprisingly strong user base, with over 800 million active monthly users Worldwide .

We’ve seen strong evidence to suggest that it’s actually a great platform for targeting a very young user base e.g. between 15-20 years old.

It’s completely geared toward very short form video content (similar to TikTok) and of course instant photographs.

• Ad Formats: Snap Ads (video), Sponsored Lenses, Sponsored Geofilters, Story Ads.
• Strengths: Very strong engagement from Gen Z and younger users.
• Weaknesses: Temporary nature of Snapchat content means ads have super short lifespan.
• Pricing: CPM (cost per thousand impressions) on Snapchat can range from $2.95 to $10.00.

11) Pinterest Ads

Pinterest is primarily a platform where people come to for inspiration and discovery - And it’s absolutely vital that advertisers acknowledge that fact!

Very rarely is someone going to make a direct purchase from Pinterest, but it truly is an awesome place to get people acquainted with your brand.

Obviously with the nature of Pinterest, you’re only going to get good results with Ecommerce brands either in the fashion space or home decor primarily.

95% of brands fail with Pinterest ads because they just use the exact same strategy that worked on Facebook or Instagram.

• Ad Formats: Promoted Pins, Video Pins, Carousel Ads, Shopping Pins.
• Strengths: Fantastic platform for discovery because you can showcase products with beautiful images!
• Weaknesses: Super niche target audience, particularly Women. However generally quite an affluent user base.
• Pricing: It’s typically a PPC platform that focuses on charging advertisers per click, which range from $0.10 to $1.50 per click depending on the goals (engagement vs. traffic).

12) YouTube Ads

The obvious huge one here is YouTube, and whilst it’s technically part of Google ads (they’re owned by the same company) we’ve separated this one out because YouTube just feels like a totally different website.

YouTube ads work extremely well for a huge number of use cases.

Obviously, YouTube is 100% video based, and it’s actually cheaper than other platforms for the simple reason that most advertisers don’t have the budget or appetite to create video content for YouTube ads. So there is definitely an opportunity here!

• Ad Formats: Skippable and non-skippable video ads, bumper ads, overlay ads, display ads, sponsored cards.
• Strengths: Over 2 billion+ users and the power of Google’s incredible ad platform. You can also build way more trust with videos.
• Weaknesses: Producing high-quality video content can be more expensive, and a lot of users are pre-programmed to just skip video ads.
• Pricing: CPV (cost per view) can range from $0.010 to $0.030.

13) CTV Ads (StackAdapt)

CTV ads refers to ‘connected TV ads’ which is just a fancy way for saying advertising on TV streaming platforms.

So if you want to advertise on platforms like Hulu, Netflix, Disney+ and other smaller platforms, most advertisers will typically use a platform like Stackadapt in order to push ads out programmatically to various TV platforms.

• Ad Formats: Video ads that play before, during, or after streaming content.
• Strengths: High engagement and viewability rates, as ads are often unskippable. CTV advertising on StackAdapt allows for precise targeting based on viewer data.
• Weaknesses: Higher costs compared to standard digital ads due to the premium nature of the inventory. Also, measuring direct conversion from CTV ads can be difficult.
• Pricing: CTV advertising has a higher CPM (cost per thousand impressions) due to the premium experience and advanced targeting capabilities.

The long tail, in one paragraph each

These are real platforms and some of them move serious money, but for most advertisers they are a later experiment rather than a starting point. Each gets a line so you know what it is for and can stop wondering.

• Outbrain and Taboola are native advertising networks. Your ad appears as a recommended article under a news story. Cheap clicks, weak intent, and they mainly suit content-led funnels that can afford a long path to conversion.
• MediaVine is not an ad-buying platform at all. It is a publisher monetization network, so it belongs on this list only if you are the one selling ad space. If a “top PPC platforms” guide sells it to you as a buying platform, they have not run ads on it.
• Media.net is a contextual display network built around Yahoo and Bing search inventory. Same trade-off as native: volume is easy, intent is thin.
• The Trade Desk is a demand-side platform for programmatic buying across display, video and connected TV. Genuinely powerful, and genuinely not for you unless you have an agency or a media buyer running it and budget in the tens of thousands.
• Spotify Ads sells audio and podcast inventory. Good for brand recall in a specific demographic, poor for anything that needs a click, because nobody is looking at their phone while it plays.
• Quora Ads puts you next to questions people are actively asking, which sounds like search intent and mostly is not. Worth a small test for B2B and considered purchases, not a core channel.
• Nextdoor Ads reaches neighbourhood-level local audiences, which makes it a plausible second platform for home services once Google Search is already working.
• Twitch Ads is bought through Amazon’s ad stack rather than as a standalone self-serve platform, which makes it a fit for gaming and entertainment brands already buying Amazon inventory, and awkward for everyone else.

Summary

There’s a pretty overwhelming number of different PPC platforms that advertisers have available to them nowadays.

Your decisions should always begin with your own brand and product - If you’re a local services business then platforms like Google and Nextdoor are going to be optimal. Weighing whether a new platform is worth the spend? Our channel expansion planner helps you pressure-test the move before you commit budget.

But if you’re an Ecommerce brand then you’re almost certainly going to be wanting to advertise on Meta.

It’s also vital to remember that some platforms (like Pinterest) are particularly strong for generating demand, but perhaps not so good at converting customers on the spot.

We recommend running patient experiments across different platforms, choosing how you bid on each, and measuring results very carefully, so that you understand the impact each platform has had on your revenue and business outcomes.

Frequently asked questions

What are PPC platforms?

A PPC platform is where you build and run pay-per-click ads, and you are charged when someone clicks at a price set by a live auction. Three matter for most advertisers: Google Ads for capturing demand that already exists, Meta for creating demand that does not, and Amazon for capturing demand at the point of purchase. The other platforms covered here are situational, meaning they are right for specific business models rather than for everyone.

Which PPC platform is the best?

There is no single best platform, and the honest answer depends entirely on whether you are capturing existing demand or creating it. If people already search for what you sell, Google Ads is the first platform to master. If they do not know they need it yet, which is the case for most impulse and visual ecommerce, Meta is where you start instead. Amazon wins when the purchase decision happens on Amazon itself. Picking on audience size rather than on demand type is the most common and most expensive mistake.

Which platform is most commonly used for PPC advertising?

Google Ads, by a wide margin, because it reaches people at the moment they are actively searching for a product or service. Meta is the usual second platform for consumer brands, and Amazon is the usual second for ecommerce sellers whose customers buy there.

Is PPC still worth it?

Yes, with one caveat that has changed since 2024. AI Overviews now answer many informational searches directly, so the traffic that used to arrive from broad research queries has thinned. Commercial searches, the ones where someone is ready to buy, still route through ads and still convert. The practical effect is that PPC has become more valuable for bottom-of-funnel intent and less useful for buying top-of-funnel awareness through search. Ads are now being placed inside those AI Overviews too, which we cover separately.