After notifying advertisers about the upcoming change last week, Google has now officially confirmed on the Google Ads Developer Blog that Local Inventory Ads (LIA) will be enabled by default for all Shopping campaigns beginning August 31st.
Why we care. Advertisers using Shopping campaigns will no longer be able to disable Local Inventory Ads through the Google Ads API. If your workflows or campaign structure rely on keeping local inventory separate from online inventory, you’ll need to update both your code and campaign configuration before the change takes effect.
What’s changing. Starting Aug. 31, Google will automatically enable the “Local products” setting for every Shopping campaign.
Previously, advertisers had to explicitly set the enable_local field to true in a campaign’s ShoppingSetting to serve products from their Local Inventory Ads feed.
After the update:
- Shopping campaigns will always have Local Inventory Ads enabled.
- The
Campaign.ShoppingSetting.enable_localfield will be ignored. - Google will automatically treat the setting as
true, regardless of the value submitted.
The change aligns Shopping campaigns with Performance Max for Retail, where Local Inventory Ads are already enabled by default.
What developers need to do. Developers using Google Ads API v25.1 or later should stop attempting to set enable_local to false.
Doing so will return:
ContextError.OPERATION_NOT_PERMITTED_FOR_CONTEXT
For API versions earlier than v25.1, existing code will continue to work, but any attempts to disable Local Inventory Ads will simply be ignored, with Google treating the value as true.
How to prevent local products from serving. Advertisers that previously disabled Local Inventory Ads for specific Shopping campaigns now have two alternatives:
- Create a listing scope using
CampaignCriterionServicewithproduct_channelset to ONLINE. - Use the Inventory filter in the Google Ads campaign settings to exclude local inventory and separate budgets between online and local products.
In other words, Google is shifting inventory control away from a simple campaign setting and toward inventory filtering.
Not changing. The update applies only to Shopping campaigns.
The enable_local field will continue to function normally for other supported campaign types, including:
- Performance Max
- Demand Gen
Bottom line. Beginning Aug. 31, Local Inventory Ads will automatically be enabled for every Shopping campaign. Advertisers that currently rely on disabling local inventory should update their API integrations and inventory filtering strategy before the rollout.
