Specifications for Guardian Commercial online ad formats. This includes all standard and expandable ad formats and all new ad formats along with delivery information and contact details. Should you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact our Ad Operations team at:

guardian.adops@guardian.co.uk

This Publication carries on-line advertising only. For information on our print sections please see our other pages on Specle.

Please take some time to read the following guidelines for different creative applications for use on the Guardian network. We are constantly working with agencies and clients and will keep you informed of developments and extensions to these guidelines.


The Guardian along with many other publishers has committed to comply with the IAB’s Self-Regulatory Framework in relation to OBA Advertising.

In order to comply we will require all 3rd party hosted adverts to include the Adchoices Ad Marker as per the IAB’s technical guidelines

http://www.iabeurope.eu/media/86423/technical_specifications_for_iab_eu_oba_fw_v1.pdf

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Non-expandable creative

Maximum File Size for all of below is 40k

MPU: 300 wide x 250 high (pixels)
Skyscraper: 120 wide x 600 high (pixels)
Leaderboard: 728 wide x 90 high (pixels)
Super Skyscraper: 160 wide x 600 high (pixels)
Half-page: 300 wide x 600 high (pixels)
Superheader: 900 wide x 250 high (pixels)

Delivery Formats

GU hosted GIF: Send GIF file and clickthrough URL
GU hosted Flash: Send swf file using ClickTag clicktracking method, backup gif and clickthrough url. Please See ‘Flash and Rich Media Instructions’ section on this page for further information on supplying Flash Creatives.
Third Party Hosted: We accept only iFRAME tags and internal redirects. Please include detailed implementation instructions.

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Expandable creative

Initial File Size for all of below is 40k

MPU: 900 wide x 500 high max (pixels)
Skyscraper: 350 wide x 600 high max (pixels)
Leaderboard: 728 wide x 900 high max (pixels)
Super Skyscraper: 390 wide x 600 high max (pixels)
Half-Page: 900 wide x 600 high max(pixels)

Please see our gallery for future formats and rising stars
http://advertising.guardian.co.uk/gallery/#list/

Notes on expandable creative

We serve ads through an iFrame so require you to provide code to allow the ad to expand.

We fully support expandable creative from the following third parties (other third party ad code will require technical time): Mediamind (Eyeblaster), DART Motif, Flashtalking, Atlas, RM, Mediaplex.

All expandable creative requires editorial approval

Creative must contract on roll-off

Please See ‘Flash and Rich Media Instructions’ section on this page for further information on supplying Flash Creatives.

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Page Skin

Width 1600 Length 1200
• No Click To remove
• No Animation of Skins allowed
• Low Frequency
• If Third party served, must be rich media
• Agency need to supply the third party with a GIF or JPG – 1600×1200 creative – middle (980 pixels) must be blank
• Third party to provide tag that we traffic as an intrusive ad
• Max weight of creative the third party allows is 300k for Eyeblaster, and 400k for Flashtalking.
• For non scrolling Page skin, please contact the 3rd party – In this instance we recommend Skin should be 1600×900
• If your concerned the skin won’t display on laptop screens – please be aware that this should be addressed at the creative build stage

Alternatively, we can host the Skin (150kb max) – contact us for details

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Mobile

Standard Mobile Banner

• Banner size: 320×50 or 300×50 preferred
• Format: gif or jpeg
• Max file size: 18kb

Expandable Mobile Banner

• Maximum expansion size: 300×300
• All expandable units must be 3rd party hosted

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General Notes

White Creative: All white and light-coloured creative must have a dark one-pixel border.
Click into new window: All ads must click into a new browser window.
Browser compliance: We target all rich media ads to all versions of IE and Firefox unless otherwise instructed. We target gif ads to all browsers unless otherwise instructed.
Rich Media: For Flash, Expandable creative, please See ‘Flash and Rich Media Instructions’ section on this page for further information.Testing: All solutions are subject to final senior editorial approval (rich media campaigns are subject to testing).
Flash Versions: We accept all versions of Macromedia/Adobe Flash up to version 10.
Technical Contact: For all rich media campaigns we need the name of a technical contact at your end.
Lead Time: Please allow 2 days lead time for gifs and 5 days for all other creative.
Sound: All sound must be user click activated.
Misleading Ads: We will not carry any form of advertising that is deemed to be misleading or confusing to our users.
More information: For information on ad types not covered here please contact us directly via the navigation bar on the left of this page.
CPU: We may measure CPU, and reject or remove ads that drive the CPU too high (i.e. negatively affect the speed of the page load or certain page functionality) Please See ‘Flash and Rich Media Instructions’ section on this page for further information on supplying Flash Creatives.

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Guidelines on Photosensitive effects

(affecting people with complaints such as epilepsy and migraine)

General flash threshold
A sequence of flashes or rapidly changing image sequences where both the following occur:
1. The combined area of flashes occurring concurrently (but not necessarily contiguously) occupies more than one quarter of any 335 × 268 pixel rectangle anywhere on the displayed screen area when the content is viewed at 1024 by 768 pixels and…
2. There are more than three flashes within any one-second period.
Note: For the general flash threshold, a flash is defined as a pair of opposing changes in brightness of 10% or more of full scale white brightness, where brightness is calculated as .2126*R + .7152*G + .0722B using linearised R, G, and B values. Linearised-X = (X/FS)^2.2 where FS is full scale (usually 255 today). An “opposing change” is an increase followed by a decrease, or a decrease followed by an increase.
Red flash threshold
A transition to or from a saturated red where the following occurs: The combined area of flashes occurring concurrently occupies more than one quarter of any 335 × 268 pixel rectangle anywhere on the displayed screen area when the content is viewed at 1024 by 768 pixels and there are more than three flashes within any one-second period.

Contacts:

All creative should be supplied to our Ad Operations team at guardian.adops@guardian.co.uk
Any technical queries should be emailed to your Ad Operations Executive
Requests for reports should be made to: guardian.adops@guardian.co.uk

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For all Flash and Rich media details;
http://specle.net/uk/guardian-news-media/guardian-flash-and-rich-media-instructions