> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.adriel.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Word cloud

> Surface the highest-performing terms across ad names or copy at a glance.

A **word cloud** breaks down the text across a set of ad creatives into individual words, then renders each word at a size proportional to its frequency across those creatives. Word color additionally encodes a per-word efficiency metric — brighter words are performing better, dimmer words worse.

Word clouds are useful for spotting themes across a large volume of creatives — for example, "which terms in ad copy correlate with the lowest cost per conversion?"

## When to use a word cloud

* **Spot dominant themes** across a large batch of creatives.
* **Identify which words correlate with strong efficiency** — for example, terms that drive low CPC or CPA.
* **Compare naming conventions** across campaigns.

## Configure a word cloud

### Mandatory fields

<Steps>
  <Step title="Pick a data source">
    In the **Data sources** section, select ad data sources with creative text (ad names, ad copy). Word clouds require creative text to build the term frequency — non-ad data sources don't provide this.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Pick a metric">
    Click **Edit** on the Metric field to open the picker panel. Pick up to **20 metrics** to make available in the widget's dropdown, reorder them if needed, and set the active one shown by default. The active metric renders as the color intensity of each word — for example, CPC, CPA, CPR, CPM, or CPV. Any numeric metric can be selected, but cost-per efficiency metrics such as **CPC**, **CPA**, **CPR**, **CPM**, and **CPV** produce the most meaningful results: a word associated with a lower average cost per outcome renders brighter, making high-performing terms easy to spot at a glance. Volume metrics like Impressions or Clicks can also be plotted, but their coloring doesn't imply efficiency.

    New custom metrics can be created directly from the picker panel without leaving the chart widget.
  </Step>
</Steps>

Word clouds don't have a Group by picker — the "groups" are the individual words extracted from creative text automatically. The word set is fixed to whatever the selected ad accounts have in their creatives.

Widget changes save automatically when the settings panel closes. Persist changes to the dashboard by clicking **Save dashboard**.

### Optional fields

* **Widget filter** — narrow the creatives feeding the widget. See [Filters](/dashboards/filters-and-dates/filters).
* **Hide metric value** — hide items whose **Ad Spend**, **Impressions**, or **Link Clicks** meet a threshold. Two blocks are available: a preset "Value = 0" checkbox per metric, and a custom threshold block with an operator (default `≤`) and value. Both can be combined.
* **Period** — override the dashboard's date range. See [Date ranges](/dashboards/filters-and-dates/date-ranges).
* **Chart controls** — toggle whether Chart controls render on this widget. On by default.

## Chart controls

Chart controls are toggled on or off per widget from the **Chart controls** switch in the widget settings panel. When off, Chart controls don't render on the widget; when on, the dropdowns configured below appear on the widget.

Some key settings can be updated directly from the widget header without opening the settings panel. The **Chart controls** on a word cloud expose:

* **Chart type** — a switcher on the left of the widget header to change to another chart type.
* **Colored by** — swap the metric that colors the words inline.

Changes made in the Chart controls **aren't saved automatically** — click **Save dashboard** to persist them. Chart controls are read-only when viewing a shared dashboard. In shared dashboards, Chart controls show only the items selected in each field, matching what the dashboard owner configured.

## What the visual encodes

* **Word size** — proportional to the word's frequency across the visible creative set. More frequent words are larger.
* **Word color** — proportional to the selected efficiency metric. For cost-per metrics (where lower is better), a brighter word is a lower value.

## Word limit

Word clouds render up to **50 words** by default — the top 50 by frequency across the visible creatives. Words with zero frequency or zero metric value are filtered out before the limit is applied. The word set is derived from creative text, so the specific words shown depend on the ad accounts and date range selected.

## Comparison mode

**Word clouds do not render comparison values.** Even when the Compare toggle is on, the word cloud draws only the primary window.

## Troubleshooting

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="The cloud is empty ('No data available')">
    Word clouds require ad data sources with creative text (ad names or copy). Confirm at least one ad account is selected, and that the date range covers periods with active creatives. See [Data not loading](/troubleshooting/data-not-loading).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Only common English words appear">
    Common words (the, and, of, for, and so on) may dominate the frequency count depending on the creative text. Narrow with a widget filter on Campaign or Ad name to focus on a subset of creatives that share meaningful naming conventions.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Non-ad data source is selected">
    Word clouds only work with ad data sources — they read creative text from ad accounts. Remove non-ad sources and add ad accounts.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Related

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Color clustering" href="/widgets/widget-library/chart-widgets/color-clustering">
    Group ad creatives by dominant color and compare performance.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Creative gallery" href="/widgets/widget-library/other-widgets/creatives">
    Visual grid of ad creatives sorted by a metric.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>