Facebook’s 20% Rule Erroneously Reported as Dead

In March, Facebook eliminated its rule that prohibited brand Pages from putting any text on its cover photos. The new rule allowed brands and businesses to use up to 20% of cover photo space for text.

Last week several blogs reported Facebook “quietly” eliminated this rule. Unfortunately for all the designers of the world that the despised this seemingly arbitrary restriction, the 20% rule appears to still be very much alive. Facebook did remove the specific prohibition from its Page Guidelines when it comes to Cover Photos.

20 Percent Rule Gone

(Image courtesy of tabsite)

However, there has been no broader confirmation or announcement from Facebook. In fact, their “Text in Images” help section still notes that “images in your ads, sponsored stories and cover photo for your Page can include text that meets our general Advertising Guidelines, but may not include more than 20% text in the image.”

Text on Facebook photos rule

Our guess is that Facebook removed the rule from the terms, but kept it in the policy section because they have no way to monitor it as they do with the ads via the grid tool.

20 percent Facebook Grid Rule

Since ads are still subject to the 20% rule, it’s important for brands to always follow the rule in case they want to promote a post after it’s published.



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