For the first time, real-time content from creators can be targeted as an ad spot via the paid amplification of a creator’s live broadcast, which was previously only available on Facebook and is now rolling out to Instagram. The tech company announced the rollout last week at the IAB’s inaugural Global Creator Week, as well as launching Meta’s consolidated Creator Marketing Hub globally.

Combined with Partnership Ads, Instagram Live Video Ads enables a brand to leverage its creator’s live stream with paid advertising and not just rely on organic reach. Meta labelled the format as one that would enable them to make “high-intent, real-time engagement” count on the funnel.

A one-stop solution for discovery and activation of resources.

Meta’s Creator Marketing Hub, which it first unveiled in June at Cannes Lions as an initiative to combine Creator Marketplace with the Partnership Ads Hub, is now accessible to creators worldwide and will feature more capabilities in the coming months throughout 2026. In addition, new features introduced are discovery filters for known and predicted affiliate content, content-level permissions with expiration dates, one-click ad creation from within the Hub and ad-readiness editing tools that can remove copyrighted music or stickers from a post for it to be eligible to run as a Partnership Ad. Brands will also no longer need to exit the Hub for partnership messaging; this will be integrated directly into the platform.

On the API side, Facebook creators are getting into the Creator Marketplace API, with the addition of a new Messaging API for creator outreach, and Meta is rolling out a new Content Discovery API with the same recommendations and filters as the ones you’ll find in Meta’s own tools. It’s also adding its business assistant feature from Meta AI to the Hub, allowing advertisers to use an AI assistant of their choice to manage their creator campaigns and permissions via the Meta Ads MCP connector.

Meta shared statistics from its own “Q4 2025 Modern Shopper Research” and the “2025 IAB Creator Economy Report,” revealing that creator recommendations drive 45% of consumer purchases and that spending on ads in the Creator Economy has surged 4X as compared to ad spend in the media sector.

Live Content as a Second Revenue Layer

The reorientation is an additional tool for creators to leverage when negotiating contracts with brands aside from the appearance fee. In a creator’s guide for creating their own partnerships, Meta says the company’s own data has shown that a creator’s audience spends as much on their brand as it does on their own content, so creators can “advocate for higher pay given the extended usage rights.” If this reasoning is applied to live video, the video stream itself can be a brand’s asset that it can pay to promote rather than just the finished video.

“Brands already taking advantage of Instagram Live for specific audiences are already showing interest in the new feature. From the perspective of engaging with our target consumers, the Gen Z and K-Beauty lovers, Instagram Live has emerged as one of the most impactful engagement platforms for us,” said Woosung Kim, Performance Marketing Manager at eBay Japan. “The range of upcoming features in Instagram Live Video Ads gives them the opportunity to explore even more dynamic and deep interactions, which they are excited about driving deeper,” they said.

With creator content becoming more important within the paid media mix overall, the announcement comes as no surprise. According to a recent report from CreatorIQ, creator content is now accounting for 44% of the average creator’s paid media creative, with 92% of the paid media leaders using creator content in campaigns, compared to about half a year or two ago. 

In that report, Meta’s own statistics indicate that creators’ content is 20% less expensive on cost per acquisition and 50% more likely to convert customers than non-creator brand content, thus creating the incentive to continue to push creator partnerships further down the paid-media funnel, and, now, live streaming.