What is the default Meta attribution setting for beauty?
Usually 7-day click, 1-day view and 1-day engagement, the same as for any store. If you sell health and beauty, the 1-day parts matter most. Quick buys after a scroll get credit. A save today and a purchase next week get none for the save.
By Joris van Huët, Founder & CEOUpdated 5 min read
Run the numbers for your store: the free view-through attribution calculator.
If you sell health and beauty, Meta's default is usually the same as everyone's: 7-day click, 1-day view and 1-day engagement. What differs is how your buyers meet it. Quick buys after a scroll land inside the 1-day view window. A serum saved today and bought next week gets no credit for the save.
If you sell health and beauty
If you sell skincare, make-up, hair care or vitamins, your ads are probably short videos, swatches and before-and-after shots. People watch them, save them and send them to friends. Some buy within the hour. Others compare shades and ingredient lists for a week, then buy when the bottle at home runs out.
Meta's default treats those habits unevenly. A link click earns the ad 7 days of credit, and a plain view earns 1 day. A save, a share or a 5-second video play counts only under engage-through, for 1 day, if the ad set includes it. Meta's Results page puts that engagement window in the default. Its developer reference leaves it out, so check what your own ad sets run.
What one store's export can show you
One store's anonymised GA4 export, 1 January 2024 to 21 August 2026. It holds shares of revenue only: no ad spend, no order counts. Nothing in it says what the store sells, so read it as a worked example, not a picture of beauty.
| What the export shows | Share of revenue | Source cell |
|---|---|---|
| Organic Video, in last click, first click and touched views | 0.0% | Channels sheet, Organic Video row |
| Direct, in last click, first click and touched views | 57.7% | Channels sheet, Direct row |
| Journeys with 4 to 9 touches (16.9 days to buy) | 5.4% | Journeys sheet, 4-9 touches row |
On the Channels sheet, Organic Video holds 0.0% of revenue in every view. That does not mean nobody watched a video. GA4 records visits to the site, not views in a feed, so a tutorial watched inside an app leaves no trace until someone clicks through.
Direct holds 57.7% of revenue on the Channels sheet, in all three views. A shopper who saved your serum ad and came back later by typing your address lands in this row. GA4 gives Direct the sale, and Meta can claim it as well if an ad view fell within the day before.
On the Journeys sheet, journeys of 4 to 9 touches hold 5.4% of revenue and take 16.9 days to buy. That is the comparison shopper: many visits, more than two weeks. If a Meta ad opened a journey like that, the 7-day click window shut long before the purchase.
The export holds no spend and no Meta figures, so it cannot say whether that store ran Meta ads or posted videos at all. It is one store, not a benchmark for beauty.
What changes for a health and beauty store?
- Saves are your slow signal, and Meta gives them a day. Since March 2026, a save counts as engage-through, not as a click. A shopper who saves a cleanser on Sunday and buys it on Friday gives the ad nothing for the save.
- Views flatter replenishment. If your audiences include past buyers, a 1-day view can credit a reorder that was due anyway. Judge those ad sets against Shopify sales, not against Meta's results.
- Video counts sooner than it used to. Meta cut an engaged video view from 10 seconds to 5 in March 2026. Tutorials and demos clear that bar easily, so engage-through may fill up faster than before.
- Dropping views is a real option. Meta's setup page lets you set View-through to None. With click-through and engage-through only, Results counts link clicks plus active engagement, not every scroll past.
What to do this week
- Compare views with engagement on your top video ad set. In Ads Manager, open Columns: Performance, select Compare attribution settings, then pick the View-through and 1-day Engagement options. Pass: engagement purchases are a real share of the total. Fail: nearly everything rests on views, so the ad may be taking credit for buyers already on their way.
- Check how long your shoppers compare. In GA4, click Advertising, then Key event attribution paths under Key events, and sort by Days to key event. Pass: most revenue closes within a week. Fail: much of it takes longer, so Meta's windows miss your comparison shoppers.
- Trial one click-and-engage ad set. Build a new ad set, open Show more options, then Standard attribution selections, and set View-through to None with Engage-through on. Pass: after two weeks, Shopify's Total sales over time report holds while Meta reports fewer results. Fail: sales dip too, so the views were finding real buyers.
Check the homework. Your GA4 Attribution paths export already holds the evidence. Causality Engine reads that one file and shows what each channel caused next to what last-click gave it, in 1 to 2 minutes, for €99 once (excluding VAT), refundable within 30 days. Check the homework
Sources, 1 October 2026: About attribution models and attribution settings (Meta Business Help Center); Set up engage-through in Meta Ads Manager (Meta Business Help Center); Results (Meta Business Help Center); Ad Account Insights reference (Meta for Developers); Simplifying Ad Measurement for a Social-First World (Meta); Key events attribution paths report (Google Analytics Help); Sales reports (Shopify Help Center); Default channel group (Google Analytics Help).
Related answers
Frequently asked questions
Should a beauty brand turn off view-through on Meta?
Only after a test. View-through can credit impulse buys your ads prompted and reorders they did not. Try one new ad set with click-through and engage-through only, then judge it on Shopify sales rather than on Meta's results.Does Meta's default work for impulse beauty buys?
Mostly, yes. A buyer who sees a lipstick ad and buys within a day sits inside the default's view and engagement windows. It struggles with the opposite case: shoppers who save a serum or watch a tutorial, then compare for a week.Why does GA4 show so little from my beauty videos?
Because GA4 records visits to your site, not views in a feed. A tutorial watched in an app, followed by a typed-in visit, shows up as Direct. Meta can still credit that sale to the view if it fell within 1 day.
Go deeper: Incrementality testing, explained.
Sixty-second versions of these ideas: Causality Engine on YouTube Shorts.
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Terms in this article
- Ad SpendAd Spend is the total amount invested in advertising campaigns. It is measured against Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) to evaluate campaign effectiveness.
- AnalyticsAnalytics is the systematic computational analysis of data. It reveals customer behavior and measures campaign performance.
- AttributionAttribution identifies user actions that contribute to a desired outcome and assigns value to each. It reveals which marketing touchpoints drive conversions.
- Attribution ModelAn Attribution Model defines how credit for conversions is assigned to marketing touchpoints. It dictates how marketing channels receive credit for sales.
- CausalityCausality is the relationship where one event directly causes another, essential for identifying specific actions that drive desired outcomes in marketing.
- Google AnalyticsGoogle Analytics is a web analytics service that tracks and reports website traffic.
- IncrementalityIncrementality measures the true causal impact of a marketing campaign. It quantifies the additional conversions or revenue directly from that activity.
- Incrementality TestingIncrementality Testing measures the additional impact of a marketing campaign. It compares exposed and control groups to determine causal effect.