Bold Way Media — Display advertising creative

Bold Way Media — Display advertising creative | boldwaymedia.com

The core display set is six units: the 300×250 medium rectangle, 728×90 leaderboard, 160×600 wide skyscraper, 300×600 half-page, 970×250 billboard and 320×50 mobile leaderboard. Each fills a different slot on the page, and each ships under its own weight, format and viewability rules. This page lays out all of those numbers in one place.

boldwaymedia.comAll dimensions are width × height, in pixels.Weight caps are network ceilings, not targets — lighter is always safer.

Standard display ad sizes and their slots

The six standard display ad sizes and the slot each one fills
Banner name	Size (width × height)	Screen	Where it usually sits
Medium rectangle	300 × 250 px	Desktop and mobile	Inside article text or at the end of a paragraph
Leaderboard	728 × 90 px	Desktop	Across the top of the page, above the content
Wide skyscraper	160 × 600 px	Desktop	The side rail, beside the content column
Half-page	300 × 600 px	Desktop	The side rail, as a tall premium slot
Billboard	970 × 250 px	Desktop	Full width across the top of the page
Mobile leaderboard	320 × 50 px	Mobile	Top or bottom strip of a phone screen

The six standard display ad sizes and the slot each one fills

The six standard display ad sizes

Six units make up the core set, and each fills a specific slot on a desktop or mobile page.

The 300×250 medium rectangle is the workhorse: it sits inside article text and feeds and runs on both desktop and mobile, so most campaigns build it first as the master creative.

Desktop adds the wide units — the 728×90 leaderboard across the top of the page and the 970×250 billboard at full width — while the side rail carries the 160×600 wide skyscraper or the taller 300×600 half-page.

Phones use the 320×50 mobile leaderboard, a thin strip pinned to the top or bottom of the screen. The size-by-size slot map is on the Standard Display Ad Sizes page (/display-ad-sizes).

In-article or feed slot: 300×250 medium rectangle

Top of a desktop page: 728×90 leaderboard or 970×250 billboard

Desktop side rail: 160×600 wide skyscraper or 300×600 half-page

Phone screen strip: 320×50 mobile leaderboard

Three working rules

Weight, format and load-time limits

A creative that misses its weight or load budget is rejected before it ever reaches a page.

Most networks cap a static image banner at about 150 KB; HTML5 units get roughly 1-5 MB because they carry animation and code along with the image assets.

Weight is only half the budget — the creative must also finish loading in under 2 seconds on a typical phone connection, so a heavy HTML5 unit can pass the size check and still fail in the field.

High-DPI screens change the file, not the slot: creatives ship at 2×, so a 300×250 banner is delivered as a 600×500 pixel file and scaled down by the page.

Static image: about 150 KB maximum
HTML5: roughly 1-5 MB depending on the network
Load time: under 2 seconds on a typical phone connection
Export scale: 2× for high-DPI screens

The viewability rule

An impression counts as viewable when 50% of its pixels stay on screen for at least 1 continuous second — 2 seconds for video.

The MRC standard is a threshold, not an estimate: a creative that flashes past in a scroll, or sits below the fold and is never reached, logs a served impression but not a viewable one.

Video gets a longer window — 50% of the player in view for 2 continuous seconds. Because viewability is a property of the placement as much as the file, the same banner can score very differently in two slots on the same page.

Reading the report: CTR and conversion windows

Display click-through rates sit around 0.05-0.1%, and conversions are credited inside fixed windows after a click or a view.

Reported display CTR runs around 0.05-0.1%, while search ads commonly run 1-3%; both swing widely by sector and placement, so read them as ranges, never as targets.

Attribution is windowed: the defaults are 30 days after a click and 1 day after an impression, and conversions arriving later are not counted in most reports. Metric definitions with thresholds and benchmark ranges are on the CTR, Viewability and Conversion Windows page (/campaign-metrics).

Questions that come up in every campaign

Which size should I build first if I can only build one?

Build the 300×250 medium rectangle. It is the most widely accepted unit, runs on desktop and mobile, and forces the layout to work at a small size before you resize up to the rest of the set.

Why does my banner look soft or blurry on a new laptop or phone?

Because it was exported at 1×. High-DPI screens need creatives delivered at 2×, so a 300×250 banner should ship as a 600×500 pixel file and let the page scale it down.

My impressions are high but the viewability rate is low — is the creative broken?

Usually not. Viewability measures the placement: an impression only counts when 50% of the pixels stay on screen for 1 continuous second, so slots below the fold or in fast-scroll positions drag the rate down regardless of the file.

A sale came in a week after someone saw the banner — why isn't it in the report?

Because the default view-through window is 1 day. Conversions are credited within 30 days of a click but only 1 day of an impression, so a view-based conversion landing later is not counted in most reports.