Back in December, Facebook introduced auto-playing video ads. These ads automatically play in the News Feed on both the desktop and mobile versions. The most annoying part is that these ads start playing without you clicking on the play button. If by mistake you click on the play button, then these ads will go full screen mode with sound.
When the social networking giant introduced this video ads, there was no way to stop them, and if you wanted to ignore the ad, all you could do was keep scrolling (because that’s what we mostly do on Facebook). Fast forward to today, and Facebook has now introduced a new setting to disable auto-playing video ads on the desktop version, and for those on mobile, they can now limit the advertisement to play only on WiFi and not on data connections.
Before we start, note that you need to perform this setting separately on the desktop, and on the mobile app. This is because your preferences are not carried over between different platforms.
How to disable video ads on Facebook
To disable video ads on the desktop version of Facebook, click on the drop-down menu in the top right corner and then go to Settings.
From the Settings page, click on Videos from the left sidebar.
Next to the Auto-Play Videos setting, click on the drop-down button and then select Off.
For Android users
If you’re on Android platform, then as mentioned already, you can’t completely disable video ads, but you can stop those annoying ads when you’re not connected to WiFi.
Launch the Facebook app on your Android device and open the left sidebar, and tap on App Settings.
In this page, you’ll find an option for “Auto-play videos on Wi-Fi only.” Tap on this option to enable it. Unfortunately, unlike the desktop version, that’s all you can do now.
For iOS users
Just like Android version, all you can do is to disable ads when you’re not on WiFi.
Go to the iOS Settings page and then select Facebook.
Under the Video section, switch the “Auto-play on WiFi only” option to on.
So that’s how you can prevent Facebook’s new video ads. Try it out.
