> ## 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.

# Creatives

> A visual grid of ad creatives ranked by a chosen metric — see thumbnails alongside performance.

The **Creatives** widget displays a grid of ad creative thumbnails ranked by a chosen metric. Each card shows the creative's media (image, video, or preview), the ad name, and the metric values selected. It's the natural choice for creative performance reviews.

## When to use a Creatives widget

* **Creative performance reviews** — top-performing and bottom-performing ads by any metric.
* **Executive dashboards** where the creative itself is part of the story, not just the numbers.
* **Naming or theme audits** across a large batch of active creatives.

## Configure a Creatives widget

### Mandatory fields

<Steps>
  <Step title="Pick a data source">
    In the **Data sources** section, select marketing (ad) data sources. The Creatives widget only works with marketing sources — non-ad data sources (analytics, e-commerce, CRM) don't provide ad creative data.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Set the Ranked by metric">
    Click **Edit** on the Ranked by 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 order of creatives so top or bottom performers surface first — for example, Spend, Impressions, or CTR. New custom metrics can be created directly from the picker panel without leaving the chart widget.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Set the Grouped by">
    Click **Edit** on the Grouped by field to open the picker panel. Pick up to **20 breakdowns** to make available in the widget's dropdown, reorder them if needed, and set the active one shown by default. The active breakdown renders as what each card represents — for example, **Ad** (one card per ad) or **Creative Image** (one card per unique creative image). New custom breakdowns can be created directly from the picker panel without leaving the chart widget.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Pick metrics">
    Add the metrics shown on each card alongside the media. Default metrics are Spend, Impressions, Clicks, CPM, CPC, and CTR.
  </Step>
</Steps>

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).
* **Number of creatives** — how many creatives to show. Options: **1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50** (default 10).
* **Hide metric value** — hide creatives 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 Creatives widget expose:

* **Sort direction** — switch between descending (top-N) and ascending (bottom-N) order.
* **Ranked by** — swap the ranking metric inline.
* **Grouped by** — swap between Ad and Creative Image 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 each card shows

* **Rank number** at the top-left.
* **Channel icon** identifying which platform the ad ran on.
* **Media** — the actual creative content. Adriel supports multiple media types:
  * **Static image** — displayed at card size.
  * **Carousel** — for ads with multiple images, the card shows arrows to cycle through each image in the carousel.
  * **Video** — the card shows the video thumbnail. Click the card to open the preview and play the video.
  * **YouTube** — embedded via YouTube; plays inline.
  * **HTML5 creative**.
  * **Audio**.
  * **Google Search Preview** for expanded text ads like Responsive Search Ads.
* **Ad name** below the media.
* **Metric values** for every metric added in the settings panel.

Cards are laid out in a grid; the widget adapts the number of cards per row to the widget's width on the dashboard.

## Card interactions

* **Click a card** to open a larger preview of the creative, including full-size video playback for video ads.
* **Pagination arrows** in the widget header cycle through pages of creatives.

## Comparison mode

**Creatives widgets do not render comparison values.** Even when the Compare toggle is on, the widget draws only the primary window.

## Widget styling

Global widget style settings — font, border, background, and color themes — apply to every widget through the [Dashboard style settings](/dashboards/building/dashboard-style-settings#global-widget-settings). On top of those, Creatives widgets have style options unique to this widget type:

* **Slide card border** — border color (HEX) and weight applied to each creative card.
* **Text styling** — HEX color used for the text on each creative card (ad name and metric values).
* **Chart controls colors** — the Chart controls block exposes color pickers for **Background**, **Border**, **Category**, **Value text**, and **Arrow icon**. Note: the Widget icon color available on other widgets is not present on Creatives.

## Troubleshooting

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="The widget is empty ('No data available')">
    Confirm marketing data sources are selected with active creatives in the current date range. Non-ad sources don't produce creative widgets. See [Data not loading](/troubleshooting/data-not-loading).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Media isn't displaying for some cards">
    Some creative formats can't be embedded (for example, certain platform-specific dynamic ad formats). The card still shows the ad name and metric values, just without the visual.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Wrong creatives are surfacing">
    Confirm the Ranked by metric is set correctly, and adjust the sort direction to show either top or bottom performers. Also check widget filters — an aggressive filter may exclude the creatives expected.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Related

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Word cloud" href="/widgets/widget-library/chart-widgets/word-cloud">
    Surface high-performing terms across ad names or copy.
  </Card>

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

  <Card title="Ads Table" href="/widgets/widget-library/table-widgets/ads-table">
    Row-by-row breakdown of the same metrics without visual thumbnails.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>