Microsoft Monetize - Creative CTV guidelines and specifications

To serve on Microsoft Advertising publisher's CTV inventory, your creatives must meet the guidelines and specification requirements, as well as Microsoft Advertising creative standards and any other guidelines that may apply. While uploading your creatives, you can see whether your creatives meet the specified CTV requirements or not under the View CTV Eligibility section. If not, you can click More Details, to see which requirements need to be adjusted in order to serve on Microsoft Advertising’s premium publisher’s CTV inventory. The CTV specification validations and approval indicators will be present throughout the Line item and Creative workflows in various tooltips and issues columns, as well.

For more information, see Creative Guidelines and Specifications and Creative Standards.

Important

The CTV guidelines and specification requirements referenced here may change at any time depending upon the publisher's needs.

Hosted creative CTV guidelines and specifications

Buyers upload one media file and Microsoft Advertising works on its transcoding. Therefore, the following requirements are for an individual media file which the buyer needs to upload.

Hulu

File Type Bitrate Resolution Duration
The file must be formatted as one of the following:
- MP4
- MOV
The bitrate must be between 15,000 Kbps and 30,000 Kbps. The resolution must be one of the following:
- 960 x 720
- 1280 x 720
- 1440 x 1080
- 1920 x 1080
The duration must be one of the following:
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds

Roku

File Type Bitrate Resolution Duration Aspect Ratio
The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The bit rate must at least be 2,100 kbps There is no specific resolution The duration must be between 6 and 60 seconds. The aspect ratio must be 16:9.

ESPN

File Type Bitrate Resolution Duration
The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The bitrate must at least be 2,000 kbps The resolution must be of the following:
- 1280 x 720
- 1920 x 1080
The duration must be one of the following:
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds

NBCU

File Type Bitrate Resolution Duration
The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The bitrate must be between 15,000 Kbps and 30,000 Kbps. The resolution must be of the following:
- 1920 x 1080
The duration must be one of the following:
- 6 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
- 45 seconds
- 60 seconds

Netflix

Note

Netflix does not allow QR codes in their creatives.

Creative Specification Details
Audio Bitrate for AAC An audio bitrate of 192 Kbps or higher must be used.
Audio Channels 2 channel stereo must be used.
Audio Codec PCM is the preferred audio codec. However, AAC-LC is accepted.
Audio Sample Bit Depth for PCM The audio sample bit depth must be one of the following:
- 16 bit
- 24 bit
Audio Sample Rate The audio sample rate must be 48kHz.
Duration (in seconds) The duration must be one of the following:
- 10 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 20 seconds (Spain market only)
- 30 seconds
- 60 seconds
Duration Conformance The video and audio durations must be identical with a tolerance of 500 ms.
File Type The file must be formatted as one of the following:
- MP4
- MOV
Resolution The resolution must be one of the following:
- 1280 x 720
- 1920 x 1080
Track Conformance The file must contain one video and one audio track.
Video Bitrate for H.264 - For 720p: The video bitrate for H.264 must be greater than 8,000 Kbps
- For 1080p: The video bitrate for H.264 must be greater than 12,000 Kbps
Video Bitrate for MOV - For 720p: The video bitrate for MOV must be greater than 42,000 Kbps
- For 1080p: The video bitrate for MOV must be greater than 80,000 Kbps
Video Chroma Subsampling 4:2:2 (ProRes) is the preferred chroma subsampling. However, 4:2:0 (H.264) is accepted.
Video Codec Apple ProRes is the preferred video codec. However, H.264 is accepted.
Video Frame Rate The video frame rate must be one of the following:
- 23.976
- 24
- 25
- 29.97
- 30
Video Frame Rate Mode The video frame rate mode must be constant.
Video Profile for H.264 The video profile for H.264 must be one of the following:
- Baseline
- Main
- High
Video Profile for MOV The video profile for MOV must be one of the following:
- Apple ProRes 422 (HQ)
- Apple ProRes 422
- Apple ProRes 422 (LT)
Video Scan Type The video scan type must be progressive.

Third-party creative CTV guidelines and specifications

Note

Each rendition represents a required media file for the publisher. Failure to include one of them will prevent the line from serving.

Hulu

File Type Bitrate Resolution Duration Rendition
The file must be formatted as one of the following:
- MP4
- MOV
The bitrate must be between 15,000 Kbps and 30,000 Kbps The resolution must be one of the following:
- 960 x 720
- 1280 x 720
- 1440 x 1080
- 1920 x 1080
The duration must be one of the following:
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
A minimum of one file is required

Roku

Rendition File Type Aspect Ratio Resolution Bitrate Duration
High The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The aspect ratio must be 16:9 There is no specific resolution The bitrate must be between 1,200 Kbps and 2,100 Kbps The duration must be between 6 and 60 seconds.
Low The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The aspect ratio must be 16:9 There is no specific resolution The bitrate must be between 360 Kbps and 500 Kbps The duration must be between 6 and 60 seconds.
Med The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The aspect ratio must be 16:9 There is no specific resolution The bitrate must be between 700 Kbps and 1200 Kbps The duration must be between 6 and 60 seconds.

ESPN

Rendition File Type Resolution Bitrate Duration
High The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 1280 x 720
- 1920 x 1080
The bitrate must be between 2,000 Kbps and 5,000 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
Low The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 640 x 360
- 1280 x 720
- 1920 x 1080
The bitrate must be less than 1,500 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds

NBCU

Rendition File Type Resolution Bitrate Duration
High The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 720 x 480
- 1280 x 720
- 1920 x 1080
The bitrate must be between 3,250 Kbps and 5,000 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 6 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
- 45 seconds
- 60 seconds
Low The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 640 x 360
- 416 x 234
The bitrate must be between 340 Kbps and 460 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 6 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
- 45 seconds
- 60 seconds
Med The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 640 x 480
- 960 x 540
The bitrate must be between 1,000 Kbps and 1,500 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 6 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
- 45 seconds
- 60 seconds
Mezzanine The file must be formatted as:
- MP4
The resolution must be of the following:
- 1920 x 1080
The bitrate must be between 15,000 Kbps and 30,000 Kbps The duration must be one of the following:
- 6 seconds
- 15 seconds
- 30 seconds
- 45 seconds
- 60 seconds

Warning

All four files are required to serve on NBCU's inventory. If you exceed this number of files, NBCU will reject your creative.

Creative Guidelines and Specifications