How to Use the TikTok Ad Library and Creative Center in 2026

The TikTok Ad Library (TikTok calls it the Commercial Content Library) is a free search tool at library.tiktok.com/ads. Pick a country, type a brand name and you get every ad it ran there in the last year, with first and last shown dates, a reach range and targeting. It only covers Europe, the UK, Turkey and Switzerland, so for top ads elsewhere you use the TikTok Creative Center.

This guide walks through both tools step by step, using Gymshark as the example. Every step was walked and screenshotted on October 30, 2026, without logging in to anything.

What you need before you start

Nothing but a browser. The TikTok Ad Library doesn't need a TikTok account, and TikTok's FAQ says so directly. The Creative Center shows a few top ads to logged-out visitors and asks you to sign up for the rest.

Two things are worth knowing up front:

• Coverage. TikTok says the library archives ads that ran anywhere in the European Economic Area, the UK, Turkey and Switzerland, for one year after they were last shown. EEA ads also get extra transparency data.
• Freshness. New ads appear within 24 hours of a campaign starting, and all dates are in UTC.

How to use the TikTok Ad Library: step by step

Step 1: Open the library and pick a country

Go to library.tiktok.com/ads. You'll land on Find ads on TikTok with three fields: Ad target country, Last shown date and Advertiser name or keyword.

Click Ad target country and choose a country. You can't search without one, and the field shows Select an ad target country in red until you do. You can pick more than one, which helps when a brand runs the same ads across several European markets.

TikTok Ad Library home page with the Ad target country field highlighted above an empty country dropdown

Step 2: Search for an advertiser

Type the brand name into Advertiser name or keyword and click Search. Last shown date defaults to the last 30 days, so widen it if you want older ads.

We searched "gymshark" in the United Kingdom and got Total ads: 2,179. Each card shows the account name, First shown, Last shown and Unique users seen.

TikTok Ad Library search results for gymshark in the United Kingdom showing 2,179 total ads and ad cards with first shown, last shown and unique users seen

Notice the first two cards are creator accounts, not GYMSHARK LTD. TikTok's search is fuzzy: it matches the advertiser name, the "paid by" name, the ad title and the caption, and returns up to 5,000 results. Creators running paid posts that mention Gymshark show up too.

Step 3: Narrow results with Filters

Click Filters. You get five dropdowns: Ad type, Ad status, Age, Gender and Unique reach. Ad status defaults to Active.

Change Ad status if you want paused ads as well, or set Unique reach to cut out tiny tests. Click Search to apply.

TikTok Ad Library Filters panel with Ad type, Ad status set to Active, Age, Gender and Unique reach dropdowns

Step 4: Sort by unique users seen

Click the sort menu, which reads Last shown date: Newest to oldest by default. Pick Unique users seen: High to low.

The other options are Last shown date: Oldest to newest, Publication date: Newest to oldest, Publication date: Oldest to newest and Unique users seen: Low to high. Reach is the closest thing to a performance signal the library gives you, so high to low puts the ads a brand pushed hardest at the top.

TikTok Ad Library sort menu open with Unique users seen: High to low highlighted

Step 5: Open an ad to see its details

Click any ad card. The Ad details page opens with an Ad summary, a Targeting summary and the advertiser panel on the right.

For one Gymshark ad we opened, the page showed First shown 09/30/2026, Last shown 10/28/2026 and Unique users seen 1K-10K. Targeting was the United Kingdom, ages 18-24 and 25-34, male. The right panel listed the External website linked (a men's "must-have" collection page on uk.gymshark.com) and the Ad Category, Apparel & Accessories.

TikTok Ad Library ad details page for a Gymshark ad showing first shown, last shown, unique users seen, targeting summary and the external website linked

That landing page link is one of the most useful fields. It tells you which product or collection the ad is selling and where the traffic goes. Click See all ads under the advertiser name to jump back to everything that account is running.

How to find top ads in the TikTok Creative Center

The Ad Library tells you what a brand ran. The Creative Center's Top Ads Dashboard shows you high-performing auction ads across a category, including in the United States.

Step 6: Open the Top Ads Dashboard

Go to the TikTok Creative Center and open Inspiration, then the Top Ads Dashboard tab. Close the pop-up if one appears.

The region defaults to your location (ours was Australia). The Region list includes the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, France, Japan and about 20 more. The other filters are Industry, Objective, a date range (Last 30 days by default), Ad Language, Ad Format and Likes.

TikTok Creative Center Top Ads Dashboard with region, industry, objective, date, ad language, ad format and likes filters

Step 7: Filter by objective

Click Objective and pick what the ads were optimized for: Traffic, App Installs, Conversions, Video Views, Reach, Lead Generation or Product sales.

If you sell online, Conversions and Product sales are the ones to study. Then set Industry to your category so you're not scrolling past games and finance apps.

TikTok Creative Center Objective dropdown open showing Traffic, App Installs, Conversions, Video Views, Reach, Lead Generation and Product sales

Step 8: Sort by CTR and read each card

Next to Sort by, click CTR. The other options are For You, Reach and Others.

Each card shows the objective, the industry, Likes, a CTR percentile (for example "Top 4%") and a Budget level of Low, Medium or High. See analytics sits under each ad.

TikTok Creative Center top ads cards showing likes, CTR percentile and budget level with a See analytics button

Logged out, we got 4 ads before the page said "Log in to access all Top Ads and more." Clicking See analytics didn't open a detail view for us without an account. TikTok also notes that the dashboard only includes ads that advertisers have authorized, so it isn't every top ad.

Tips for getting more out of the TikTok Ad Library

• Pick the brand's biggest European market. Results only cover the countries you select, so start where the brand sells most. "gymshark" in the United Kingdom returned 2,179 results in 30 days.
• Use quotation marks for exact names. TikTok's FAQ says searches without quotes are fuzzy, matching each word on its own. Quotes help when a brand name is a common word.
• Check the creator ads too. Fuzzy search pulls in creators running paid posts about the brand. That's a quick way to see who a brand works with.
• Read the targeting tables. Age and gender ticks show who the ad was aimed at. TikTok says EEA ads shown from June 2026 also break reach down by age and gender.
• Follow the landing page. The External website linked field shows which collection or offer each ad pushes.
• Look at Other commercial content. This tab covers branded content from paid creators and brands' own promotional posts, searchable by creator country.

Common problems and fixes

"Select an ad target country" won't go away. You have to pick at least one country before searching. US-only brands may return nothing, because the library doesn't cover the United States.

Results are full of other accounts. That's fuzzy search. Sort by Unique users seen: High to low and look for the brand's own account name on each card, or click See all ads on one of its ads.

Access blocked. TikTok says it sometimes blocks an IP it suspects of spam or misuse, and suggests trying again in 24 hours.

An ad has no video. TikTok shows details for disapproved ads, like targeting, but can't show the creative itself for regulatory reasons.

What the TikTok Ad Library won't tell you

Both tools are genuinely useful, and both are free. But they stop short of the question most marketers actually have: which ads are working?

• No US coverage in the library. It only archives ads that ran in the EEA, the UK, Turkey and Switzerland. A brand that only advertises in the US is invisible.
• Reach comes in wide bands. "1K-10K" or "0-1K" is all you get on the cards. You can't rank a brand's ads precisely.
• No spend and no performance. The library has no spend, clicks or conversions. The Creative Center has a CTR percentile, but only for authorized top ads.
• No way to save or track. You can't build boards, follow a brand or get told when it launches something new. You search from scratch every time.
• Creatives aren't grouped. The same video run in 10 ad sets shows up as 10 ads, so 2,179 results can mean far fewer actual ideas.
• The Creative Center is gated. Logged out, you see a handful of ads before it asks you to sign up.

A faster way: research competitor ads with Adspo

Adspo covers Meta ads, not TikTok. But most brands that scale on TikTok run the same videos on Facebook and Instagram, so Adspo is where you see which of those creatives a brand keeps paying to run, worldwide and not just in Europe.

Adspo groups every ad into unique creatives and ranks them by impressions within the brand's own account. As of October 30, 2026, Adspo has 39,940 Gymshark ads on file, grouped into 2,510 unique creatives, 774 of them video, with 326 new creatives in the last 30 days. That's the deduplication the TikTok library doesn't do.

Gymshark's brand page in the Adspo app showing creatives, ads, creative velocity, media mix, target countries and landing pages

Here are Gymshark's active creatives sorted by longest running. The oldest one has been live for 650 days and the top 10 are all past 500, which is the clearest signal there is that an ad works.

Gymshark's active creatives in the Adspo app sorted by longest running, each card showing its runtime in days

How Adspo answers each limit above:

• Every market, not just Europe. Adspo covers Meta ads from 10,000+ verified brands, with target countries on every creative.
• A ranking, not a band. Creatives are ranked by impressions within each brand's account, so you see what it's scaling.
• Deduplicated creatives. Each unique creative shows once, with its full runtime, the number of ads it runs in, its transcript and its landing page.
• Boards and tracking. Save ads to boards, follow any brand and get alerted when it launches new creatives.
• One price. $29/month, or $19/month billed yearly, with a 7-day free trial.

If Meta is your main channel, see how Adspo compares with Meta's own tool on our Meta Ad Library alternative page.

Related guides

• How to use the Facebook Ad Library: the same walkthrough for Meta's library, which covers every active ad worldwide.
• Facebook Ad Library search tips: 11 ways to find the ads that matter faster.
• PiPiAds alternatives: paid tools for TikTok ad research, compared on price and coverage.
• The best ad spy tools: the wider roundup across Meta and TikTok.

Wrapping it up

Use the TikTok Ad Library to see everything a brand ran in Europe, the UK, Turkey or Switzerland, sorted by reach, with targeting and landing pages. Use the Creative Center's Top Ads Dashboard to browse high-CTR ads by region, industry and objective.

When you need to know which creatives a brand is actually scaling, and you want to save and track them, try Adspo free for 7 days.