ReferenceGoogle Ads disapproval
Destination not accessible
Google Ads disapproves ads whose landing page cannot be reached in the locations you target, or returns an error such as 404 or 403 to AdsBot. Check the page from the targeted country, check its HTTP status and robots.txt, and ask your developer to allow AdsBot-Google. Edit the ad and save once the page loads.
At a glance
- Where it shows
- The Status column on the Ads & assets page, as Disapproved.
- What stops
- The ad stops serving until the destination is reachable and reviewed.
- How serious
- Low on its own. Repeated violations can lead to suspension.
What it means
The policy requires an ad to work in the places it targets. A site that shows a message such as not accessible in your location, or a permission error, fails the people the ad is for, even if the page loads from the office.
The same policy covers the crawler. A landing page that returns a 404 or 403 to AdsBot, or is blocked by robots.txt or the server, is flagged as not accessible, even when it opens for visitors.
What actually triggers it
A geo-block in a targeted country
The site refuses visitors from a country the ad targets, and shows a message saying the site is not accessible there.
A 404 or 403 returned to AdsBot
The page opens for people but returns an error to the crawler. Google lists both codes as causes.
A server rule that refuses AdsBot
A firewall or server setting that blocks AdsBot-Google, including a robots.txt entry for it.
Ads on a removed campaign
Not on Google's help page
In one real account, a handful of ads in removed campaigns carried this status. Google's data holds it apart from the not-working status.
Fix it in this order
- Open the landing page from the targeted country, or ask someone there to load it. Note any access-limitation or permission message.
- Check the page's HTTP status, and check robots.txt for entries that name AdsBot-Google or AdsBot-Google-Mobile.
- In Google Search Console, use the URL Inspection tool to see what the crawler receives.
- Ask your web developer to allow AdsBot-Google and AdsBot-Google-Mobile at the server, then confirm the page loads from the targeted location.
- If the page now loads, hover over the ad in Campaigns, then Ads, select Edit and Save to resubmit it, and check the Ads & assets page.
When to appeal
Appeal only when the page loads consistently from the targeted location and AdsBot has full access. Google's page also suggests ruling out intermittent server problems before an appeal.
If the page still fails in one of the targeted places, an appeal will not clear it. Remove the ad or fix the server.
Often confused with
Not accessible is about location and access controls, including 404 and 403 errors. Not crawlable is about robots.txt and crawl limits. A 403 to the crawler belongs here; a robots.txt disallow belongs under not crawlable.
Not working is about pages that fail to load or do not resolve at all. Not accessible is about a page that loads but refuses a location or the crawler. The two are reported apart in Google's data, so check which one the status names.