Playable ads, built from the same brief as the video.

What a playable ad is

A playable ad is an interactive ad that lets someone try a small slice of a game before installing it. Technically it is a self-contained HTML5 file that runs inside another app's ad slot and ends by sending the player to the app store. Unity puts it plainly: "Playable ads let players try a short interactive version of your game before they install it."

A playable runs in one of two ways. As a standalone ad, it is the whole ad. As an interactive end card, it plays after a video and picks up where the video stopped. Unity's guidance treats the two differently: a standalone playable is for players with "No prior knowledge of the game", so it has to teach the mechanic, while a playable end card should "Skip the setup, and start at the moment the video promised." The second case has its own page: end cards.

Why playables matter for game user acquisition

A video tells the player what the game is. A playable lets them check.

AppLovin's advertiser guidance says "Playable ads should showcase the key features of your app. This attracts high-value, more engaged users." The same page recommends "a mix of video, playable, and static assets to broaden reach and improve performance", and notes that "the majority of AppLovin’s inventory is video-based." So a playable sits next to the video in a campaign, not in place of it.

TikTok's help centre claims playables let users "experience your app's value upfront, helping to boost install quality and reduce churn." Moloco, writing on its own blog, reports that one of its top US gaming advertisers "saw a 49% lift in IPM and a 25% improvement in ROAS with playables." That is one advertiser on one network, as reported by the network, and we would read it that way.

Our view: the reason to make playables is not that they are interactive. It is that the player who installs after trying the game has already met the thing they will spend time on, so the install is less of a guess on both sides.

How a playable works, technically

A playable is a single HTML document with every image, sound and script packed inside it. AppLovin and TikTok prohibit it from calling out to a server. It talks to the app it runs in through an ad API, and on most networks that API is MRAID. The IAB Tech Lab describes MRAID as "the common API (Application Programming Interface) for mobile rich media ads that will run in mobile apps", which lets one creative run "within applications using any MRAID-compliant SDK."

That is the theory. In practice each network names its own package, size cap and click call:

Network	Package	Size cap	How the store click is made	First-tap and audio rules
AppLovin	One HTML file, resources embedded in base64 or base122	5 MB	MRAID v2.0, mraid.open()	No redirect on the first tap; audio muted until first interaction
Unity Ads	One inline, responsive, minified HTML file (playable end card spec)	Under 5 MB	MRAID 3.0	No automatic redirect and no first-touch redirect
Meta	HTML file or zip	Zip under 5 MB; single HTML or index.html 2 MB	FbPlayableAd.onCTAClick()	No JavaScript redirect to an external link
Google App campaigns	.ZIP, up to 512 files	5 MB	ExitApi.exit() via exitapi.js, or the MRAID equivalent	Sound not enabled before the user interacts
TikTok (and Pangle)	.zip with index.html and config.json	Under 5 MB after compression	TikTok's js-sdk, window.openAppStore(); not mraid.js format	No JS redirects, no HTTP requests

Two practical consequences. First, one build rarely ships everywhere untouched: the game logic can be shared, but the wrapper that makes the click work is per network. Second, a 5 MB cap with everything inlined is tight, which is why Unity's file size advice starts with sprite sheets, lower art resolution and compressed audio before minifying.

Where they run also differs. Meta lists Facebook Stories and Newsfeed, Audience Network Interstitial and Rewarded, and Instagram Feed and Stories through Placement Asset Customization, and says "Playable ads are only available with the App Installs objective." On TikTok a playable "appears as a video creative in a user's For You feed" and a call to action invites the user to play after a few seconds; TikTok says playables are only available in its upgraded Smart+ experience. Google notes that HTML5/Playable ads are not eligible for App campaigns for pre-registration or for engagement.

What good looks like

Most of what makes a playable work is restraint. Our longer argument is in Playables: the shortest possible version wins. The short version, with the platform guidance that backs it:

Open on the action. Unity: "Open your playable on a state the player can act on right away" and "Avoid logos, studio splashes, and cinematic intros." It adds that players need to understand the mechanic "within the first 3 to 5 s because the Unity close button can appear after only 5 s."

One mechanic, one hint. Pick the moment in the game that is most fun to touch and build only that. Our Pull the Pin and Hexasort playables for Wildlife's Paradise Paws are two different mechanics for the same game, which is the kind of question a playable test should answer.

Let the loop set the length. Unity gives typical lengths of 20 to 40 seconds for simple, repetitive hyper-casual mechanics and more than two minutes for puzzle, merge and mid-core. A mid-core game like Empires & Puzzles carries a longer loop; see Titan Attack.

Keep the download button visible. Unity: "A persistent download button during gameplay reliably earns more clicks than waiting for the end screen."

Vary one thing at a time. Treasure Frenzy and its Egg Variant for Monster Legends are the same playable with one element changed, so the result says something about that element.

Be honest. TikTok: "Don't mislead users with gameplay that is inconsistent with your app or disguise download prompts." Unity's most frequent rejection reasons include "Deceptive redirects, such as gameplay elements that open the app store."

The step by step build for AppLovin is in How do I make a playable ad that improves install rate on AppLovin?.

How Flixr makes playables

We make playables in house, from the same brief as the video ads, the end card and the landing page, so the playable keeps the promise the video made. We run and read paid media on AppLovin, Meta and TikTok and put a creative lead inside the client's ad account. Playables launch into your campaigns on AppLovin first.

An engagement starts with read-only access to your results and ad accounts. The first month is spent reading 90 days of your ads one by one, then a gap analysis of what works and who you do not reach yet, then the first three hypotheses go live. After that the loop runs every week: brief, make, launch, read, log. Flixr Studio, our own tool, tracks every ad running in a category on AppLovin, Meta and TikTok, so a playable brief can start from what rivals keep running.

How to measure a playable

Judge it on installs and payers in your MMP, read inside your own ad accounts, not on how long someone played. Engagement inside the playable tells you where it leaks; it does not tell you whether it paid.

The headline rate is IPM, which Unity defines as "the number of app installs per thousand ad impressions." Compare a playable against the video in the same campaign, not against last quarter.

For diagnosis, AppLovin offers in-HTML analytics events. DISPLAYED is required; others include CHALLENGE_STARTED, ENDCARD_SHOWN and CTA_CLICKED. "Only predefined events work: AppLovin does not track custom events," and AppLovin says not to add analytics to short HTMLs "with fewer than three interactions to complete" or that "redirect in less than five seconds from the first interaction."

Other networks count differently. On Google App campaigns an engagement is counted "when a user interacts for the first time with or clicks on" the ad, playables are billed per engagement, and conversions count when a user installs "within 30 days of an Engagement." TikTok reports playable performance at the creative and ad group levels. So line up the definitions before you compare networks. The full picture, including placement and brands, is in Playable ads: the complete guide.