How to Pause a Google Ads Campaign

Pausing a Google Ads campaign is easy and reversible. However, there are some things you should know before you pause a campaign, such as how it affects your performance, billing, and quality score.

💡 For more, read: common Google Ads mistakes.

IMPORTANT: Enabling a Google Ads campaign once it has been paused does not guarantee that your ads will perform as before. The algorithm has lost its recent history data and your ads might face different competition, demand, or customer behavior as well.

Why Pause a Google Ads Campaign?

Pausing a Google Ads campaign means that your ads will stop showing to potential customers, but your campaign settings and data will remain intact. You can resume your campaign anytime you want, and your ads will start running again.

Pausing a Google Ads campaign can be useful for several scenarios, such as:

Test different versions of your ads or landing pages, and you want to compare the results before resuming your campaign.
Save your budget for a specific period, such as a holiday season, a special promotion, or a peak in competition.
You want to temporarily stop your campaign due to external factors, such as inventory issues, website problems, or market changes.

You can pause your entire campaign or individual ad groups within your campaign in a few ways. Here is the simple way to pause a campaign:

Sign in to your Google Ads account.
Click on the Campaigns tab on the left menu.
Find the campaign that you want to pause.
Click on the green switch next to the campaign name and select “Pause”.
The switch will turn gray and show “Paused”.

That’s it! You have successfully paused your Google Ads campaign. You can resume your campaign at any time by clicking on the toggle switch again and confirming the action.

Note: This process of pausing and enabling again campaigns, can also be done for ad groups, keywords, and audiences. You just need to navigate to that level in the Google Ads interface.

…when you resume a paused campaign your campaign might not start running if you’ve also paused the campaign’s ad groups, keywords, or ads. In that case, you’ll need to individually resume the paused ad groups, keywords, or ads…
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Benefits and Drawbacks of Pausing a Campaign in Google Ads

Pausing a Google Ads campaign can have some benefits and drawbacks for your advertising performance. Here are some of them:

Benefits of Pausing Google Ads Campaigns

Cost Control: Pausing a campaign allows you to temporarily stop spending on advertising, which can be beneficial if you need to manage your budget during slow periods or special circumstances.
Strategy Adjustment: This provides an opportunity to reevaluate your campaign’s performance and make necessary adjustments, such as refining keywords, ad copy, or targeting.
Seasonal Flexibility: Pausing allows you to tailor your advertising to seasonal fluctuations in demand, ensuring your ads are active when they’ll have the most impact.
Preventing Wasted Spend: If there are technical issues on your website or with your products/services, pausing can prevent you from paying for clicks that might not lead to conversions.
A/B Testing: Pausing a campaign temporarily can facilitate A/B testing, allowing you to compare different ad variations, landing pages, or strategies to optimize your campaign’s performance

Drawbacks of Pausing Google Ads Campaigns

Loss of Visibility: Pausing your campaign means your ads won’t be displayed, potentially resulting in reduced online visibility and lost opportunities to attract potential customers.
Disruption in Momentum: Continuously pausing and resuming a campaign can disrupt its momentum and affect ad ranking and quality score.
Competitor Gains: While your ads are paused, competitors may capture your audience and market share, making it harder to regain your position when you restart the campaign.
Delayed Results: Pausing a campaign can lead to a delay in achieving your advertising goals, such as generating leads, sales, or brand awareness.
Ad Rank Impact: Pausing can influence your ad’s Quality Score, which may affect your ad rank and CPC when you reactivate the campaign.

Tips for Pausing a Google Ads Campaign

Pausing a campaign is not something you should do randomly or frequently. It should be part of your overall advertising strategy and based on data and analysis.

Here are some tips on how to pause a campaign effectively:

Plan ahead and set clear goals for your campaign when pausing it. Know when and why you want to pause it, and for how long.
Experiment with different options and scenarios before pausing a campaign. Use features such as drafts and experiments, ad variations, responsive search ads, and Google Ads optimization score to test different versions of your campaign without affecting your live ads.
Pausing a Google Ads campaign does not stop your billing cycle. You will still be charged for any clicks or impressions that occurred before you paused your campaign.
It might take some time before your ads start showing again when a paused campaign is re-activated. Depending on your campaign settings and budget, it might take up to 24 hours for your ads to be approved and activated.