Google’s new “Ads Advisor” AI is put to the test

Google Ads coach Jyll Saskin Gales spent 24 hours testing Google’s new “agentic” Ads Advisor — an experimental AI assistant designed to help advertisers optimize campaigns. Her verdict: promising, but far from perfect.

Why we care. The Ads Advisor represents Google’s push toward agentic AI tools — systems that can act autonomously on users’ behalf. This review offers an early, real-world look at how Ads Advisor actually performs — beyond Google’s marketing claims.

As AI tools begin playing a bigger role in campaign management, understanding their accuracy, limitations, and decision-making is critical. This feedback helps advertisers know what tasks they can safely trust to the AI — and where human oversight is still essential to protect performance and budget.

The upsides:

• Not a Google shill: The AI often searches the open web before answering — even recommending against default Google settings, like unchecking “Display Network” and “Search Partners” for new Search campaigns.
• Holistic thinking: It considers factors beyond Google Ads, such as improving product titles for Shopping campaigns — though some of its implementation guidance was wrong.

The downsides:

• Outdated or incorrect info. The AI misdiagnosed campaign performance issues and referenced old interfaces like “Tools & Settings > Conversions.”
• Not truly agentic. Despite its name, the Ads Advisor can’t make changes directly in campaigns — only provide instructions, which sometimes miss the mark.

The bottom line. Gales compares the Ads Advisor to “an intern who just passed their Google Ads certification — eager, occasionally right, but often off-base.” She’s cautiously optimistic about its future potential but warns small business owners to tread carefully before taking its advice at face value.

What’s next. Gales plans to continue testing and will share a full breakdown in an upcoming YouTube video.