Meta attribution settings: what each window counts

Meta attribution settings, which many still call the Facebook attribution window, are the rules, chosen per ad set, that decide which conversions Ads Manager credits to your ads. For website leads you can combine 1-day or 7-day click-through, 1-day engage-through and 1-day view-through. Meta’s default is 7-day click, 1-day view and 1-day engagement. Change the setting and the reported CPL moves while spend stays the same.

This describes Meta as of November 2026. Click-through changed meaning in March 2026, so older guides, and your own older reports, use the same name for a different count.

What Meta attribution settings count

Meta’s help center lists the standard attribution settings for website and in-store conversions, and its definition of the Results metric gives the default. Translated into lead gen:

Meta adds a caveat worth reading twice: some accounts may still run the previous versions of click-through and engage-through while the update rolls out.

These windows belong to the standard attribution model. The ad set setup also offers incremental attribution, which Meta describes as optimising delivery for, and reporting on, conversions that its models predict were caused by the ad. That’s a different count, closer to the idea of incrementality, and Meta warns against comparing results across ad sets on different models in the campaign table.

What changed in March 2026

On March 3, 2026 Meta announced that click-through attribution for website and in-store conversions would count link clicks only. Until then a like, a share or a save counted as a click too. Conversions after those interactions moved into engaged-view attribution, which Meta renamed engage-through. The same announcement cut the engaged view of a video ad from 10 seconds to 5. The rollout started later that month and reached accounts at different times, and Meta stated that billing would not change.

What that means for a lead gen account:

• Under the new definition click-through can only shrink. What leaves it shows up as engage-through.
• A click-through CPL from February 2026 and one from April 2026 rest on two definitions. Mark the date in client reports before you compare them; reporting Facebook ads to clients covers how.
• Click-through now sits closer to what your landing page can see, because a like never sent anyone to it. Meta’s stated aim was better alignment with third-party tools such as Google Analytics.

What Meta has removed

Long windows are gone as ad set settings: the maximum is now 7 days for click-through and 1 day for views and engagement. Two leftovers deserve a note.

• 28-day click survives as a column in Compare attribution settings, for reporting only.
• 7-day view and 28-day view are gone everywhere. Meta’s developer blog announced that from January 12, 2026 the Ads Insights API stops returning them, while 1-day click, 7-day click, 28-day click, 1-day engaged view and 1-day view stay available, consistent with Ads Manager. If a dashboard connector was built on the old view windows, check it.

How to change the attribution setting on Facebook ads

Meta’s setup steps for engage-through walk through the ad set screen:

1. In Ads Manager, click + Create and choose Leads, Sales or Engagement as the objective.
2. At ad set level, in the Conversion section, choose Website as the conversion location.
3. Click Show more options.
4. Hover over Standard attribution selections and click Edit.
5. Set Click-through to 1 day or 7 days, Engage-through to 1 day and View-through to None or 1 day.
6. Finish the ad and publish.

Meta notes that the steps can look different if your account doesn’t have the updated engage-through yet.

Before you change anything, know what the setting does. Meta’s help article on attribution says the model you pick informs ad delivery as well as how conversions are credited, and that standard attribution optimises delivery for the windows you select. Tightening the setting to make Ads Manager agree with your CRM also changes what the algorithm optimises for. If all you want is a different view of the same delivery, use the comparison columns.

How to compare Meta attribution settings without changing delivery

Meta’s Compare attribution settings view works whatever setting the campaign optimises for:

1. Open the Columns: Performance dropdown and keep Performance selected.
2. Scroll down and choose Compare attribution settings.
3. Tick the windows you want: 1-day view, 1-day click, 7-day click, 28-day click. Engage-through appears as 1-day Engagement.
4. Choose the conversion count: All conversions or First conversion.
5. Click Apply. The customised table can then be exported.

Two details matter for lead gen. First conversion shows only the first measurable conversion after a click or view, which is nearer to a CRM that merges repeat submissions from the same person. And a campaign that hasn’t been live for 28 days only has partial data in the 28-day click column.

How the setting changes your reported CPL

CPL is spend divided by leads. Your budget and the auction set the spend; the attribution setting sets the denominator.

Example: an ad set spends €1,500 in a week. Here is what each setting would report:

Same €1,500, and a CPL anywhere between €16.67 and €30.00. Every Meta row is correct under its own rule. In this example 22 of the default’s 90 leads are credited to an impression alone, and the only row that counts forms you actually received is the last one, which lands near the click-through rows. Decide budget on that number, the real CPL, and keep Meta’s as a diagnostic column.

Meta’s attribution setting changes how many leads it reports; the forms you received stay the same. DropCPL computes CPL per creative and per landing page from the leads your landing pages collected, against spend synced per ad from the Meta Ads API. Start free →

Why your first-party lead count disagrees with Meta

Your landing page and your CRM count forms that arrived. Meta counts conversions its attribution credits to an ad. The two diverge for reasons you can name:

• No link click. View-through and engage-through credit a lead to an ad that didn’t send that person to your landing page. The lead came another way, through search, an email or a typed URL, and your tracking credits that route while Meta credits its ad. The view-through attribution entry covers the mechanics.
• Windows. 7-day click credits a lead to a click up to a week old. Your tracking credits the click it can tie to the form, within the window you set; see attribution window.
• Modelling. Meta’s Results definition says that where results can’t be measured directly, because data is partial or missing, statistical modelling may be used for some of them. Your CRM has no modelled rows.
• Counting. All conversions includes repeat submissions that your CRM may merge into one contact.
• Duplicates. A Lead event sent from both browser and server without a shared event_id can be counted twice. That one is a setup error you can fix, so rule it out first with the Pixel and CAPI deduplication guide.

The full argument for picking one number is in real CPL vs platform CPL.

Which attribution setting should you use for lead gen?

Leave the ad set on the setting you want Meta to optimise for, and stop trying to make Ads Manager match your CRM. Then read results in this order:

1. Report the first-party CPL: leads received, against spend per ad.
2. Put Meta’s 7-day click next to it, from the comparison columns. Since March 2026 it’s the Meta count that comes closest to what a landing page can observe.
3. Keep view-through and engagement as diagnostic columns. If a creative’s results are mostly view-through, check your own numbers before you scale it.