Google Ads budget pacing template for Sheets

A free CSV for Google Sheets with every pacing formula shown: daily budget (budget / 30.4), expected to date, variance, month-end projection and catch-up.

1 October 2026

Download the free budget pacing template and import it into Google Sheets. Type four numbers per row: monthly budget, days in the month, the last full day your spend covers, and spend to date. Five formulas then give the daily budget (budget / 30.4), expected spend, variance, projected month end and the daily budget that lands the month on target.

What is in the budget pacing template

The CSV has a header row, three example rows and eleven columns. Each row is one client on one platform. You type columns A to F. Columns G to K are formulas you paste in once.

A. Client and B. Platform (Google Ads or Meta).
C. Monthly budget: the amount agreed for this platform this month.
D. Days in month: 28, 29, 30 or 31.
E. Day of month: the last full day your spend covers. On the 16th you pull spend for the 1st to the 15th, so you enter 15.
F. Spend to date: spend from the 1st through that day.
G. Daily budget: the monthly budget divided by 30.4.
H. Expected to date: what an on-pace account would have spent by day E.
I. Variance %: how far actual spend sits from expected.
J. Projected month end: where the month lands if the rate so far holds.
K. Daily budget needed: the daily amount that spends exactly what is left.

The example rows hold plain numbers, not formulas, so the file imports cleanly.

Why the daily budget divides by 30.4

30.4 is 365 divided by 12, the average length of a month. Google Ads uses it for its own monthly spending limit. From Google Ads Help, checked 3 September 2026:

Your daily spending limit (two times your average daily budget for most campaigns) on any particular day.

Your monthly spending limit (30.4 times your average daily budget for most campaigns) in any particular month.

Set a Google daily budget at monthly budget / 30.4 and Google's monthly limit equals your monthly budget. The template paces against that same daily figure, and so does Adswave.

The Google Sheets formulas, column by column

Paste these into row 2, then fill them down.

G  Daily budget         =C2/30.4
H  Expected to date     =G2*E2
I  Variance %           =IF(H2=0, "", (F2-H2)/H2*100)
J  Projected month end  =IF(E2=0, "", F2/E2*D2)
K  Daily budget needed  =IF(D2<=E2, "", MAX(0, C2-F2)/(D2-E2))

A positive variance means overspend. A negative one means underspend.

The projection multiplies by the real days in the month, because it answers where this month will land. The free budget pacing calculator multiplies by 30.4 instead, so its projection runs about 2% lower in a 31-day month.

Column K divides what is left by the days left, today included. It gives the same figure as the mid-month budget adjustment calculator. MAX stops it going negative once the budget is spent.

A filled example in euros

The first example row is a dental client on Google Ads in October, a 31-day month. The budget is €3,000. Spend from the 1st to the 15th is €1,650.

daily budget         = 3,000 / 30.4                          =    98.68
expected to date     = 3,000 / 30.4 * 15                     = 1,480.26
variance %           = (1,650 - 1,480.26) / 1,480.26 * 100   =   +11.5
projected month end  = 1,650 / 15 * 31                       = 3,410.00
daily budget needed  = (3,000 - 1,650) / (31 - 15)           =    84.38

The account is 11.5% ahead of pace and on course for €3,410, which is €410 over. A daily budget of €84.38 for the last 16 days lands the month on €3,000 if spend follows it. Google's daily limit is twice the average daily budget for most campaigns, so one day can run to €168.75. Treat €84.38 as an average, not a ceiling.

The other two rows, and the total they make with the first, show what a summary hides.

Example Dental on Meta. €1,500 budget, €640 spent. That is 13.5% behind pace and heading for €1,322.67. The catch-up figure is €53.75 a day.
Example Dental in total, Google and Meta added together. €4,500 budget, €2,290 spent, €2,220.39 expected. The total reads +3.1% and hides two platforms that need opposite fixes.
Example Furniture on Google Ads. €5,000 budget, €2,410 spent. The variance reads -2.3%, yet the projection of €4,980.67 is only 0.4% short. An evenly paced account reads about -1.9% in a 31-day month, so most of that gap is the calendar.

How to import the CSV into Google Sheets

Download budget-pacing-template.csv.
In a blank Google Sheets spreadsheet, choose File, Import, Upload and select the file.
Insert it as a new sheet and leave the separator on automatic detection.
Paste the five formulas into G2 to K2 and fill them down to row 4. The example numbers should not change beyond rounding. That is your check.
Overwrite the example rows with your clients, one row per client per platform.

The same file opens in Excel, and the formulas work there unchanged.

How to keep the sheet current

By hand. In Google Ads, set the date range from the 1st to yesterday and copy each account's cost into column F. Do the same with amount spent in Meta Ads Manager. Then set column E to yesterday's date.

If you paste spend every morning, two formulas can fill the dates:

D  Days in month   =DAY(EOMONTH(TODAY(), 0))
E  Day of month    =DAY(TODAY())-1

Use the second only if your spend really runs through yesterday. A day number ahead of the spend makes every row read low.

With a connector. Any tool that writes spend into a sheet on a schedule will do, such as a Sheets add-on or a script you maintain. Let it write to its own tab, called Raw here, with client, platform and cost in columns A to C. Then point column F at it:

F  Spend to date   =SUMIFS(Raw!C:C, Raw!A:A, A2, Raw!B:B, B2)

Column E still has to match the last day the connector pulled.

Where the template stops

The sheet does the arithmetic well. These are its limits.

One platform per row. A client on Google and Meta needs two rows, plus a third for the total. Fill that row's C and F with SUMIFS over the other two.
Manual refresh. The sheet knows only what you last pasted. Reconcile invoices against each platform's billing, never against this sheet.
No alerts. Conditional formatting can colour column I. A colour only helps when someone opens the sheet.
The 30.4-day month skews the variance. An evenly paced account reads about -1.9% in a 31-day month and about +8.6% in a 28-day February. Swap 30.4 for D2 in column G to follow the calendar. The sheet then stops matching Google's monthly limit and Adswave.
Partial days. Keep today out of column F. A partial day of spend against a full day of expected spend reads as underspend.
One currency per row. The sheet does not convert currencies.

How Adswave does the same across clients

Adswave runs the same daily figure, monthly budget / 30.4, for every client at once. It fetches spend from Google Ads and Meta itself and caches it for five minutes, so nobody pastes anything.

The Budget Pacing view shows one card per client. Each card compares expected and actual spend over rolling windows of 2, 14, 30, 90, 180 and 365 days ending today, plus a custom range. Google and Meta sit side by side next to the client total. The variance is green within 2%, amber up to 5% and red beyond 5%, over or under.

You enter budgets per linked ad account, in the Client dialog under Admin, Clients. Adswave adds them up per client and carries each amount forward to later months until you change it.

Two differences from the sheet matter. The app shows no projected month end and no month-to-date figure, because its windows roll. Keep this sheet or the calculator for those. And today counts as a full day while its spend is still partial, so every window leans toward underspend until the day ends.

The part a sheet cannot do is tell you. A pacing alert rule compares spend over the last 1, 7, 14 or 30 complete days, ending yesterday, with the monthly budget / 30.4 times those days. You pick a threshold from 5% to 50% in eight steps, and a direction: over, under or either. Rules are evaluated hourly in production and fire at most once per target in 24 hours. Emails go to owners and admins with alert emails on. Members see alerts in the app.

Budget pacing and alerts are on every plan, from Basic at €19.99 a month for up to 5 clients. Adswave is read-only. It tells you a client is ahead of pace, and you change the budget in Google Ads or Meta yourself.

Questions people ask

How do I calculate a daily budget from a monthly budget in Google Ads?

Divide the monthly budget by 30.4. A €3,000 month gives €98.68 a day. Google's monthly spending limit is 30.4 times the average daily budget for most campaigns, so that figure caps the month at €3,000. A single day can still reach twice the daily budget, €197.37.

Should I divide by 30, 30.4 or the days in the month?

30.4 matches Google's monthly limit and Adswave. The real days in the month match an even calendar split. The two differ by about 2% in a 31-day month and about 8.6% in February. Dividing by 30 matches neither. Pick one and use it for every client.

What is a good budget pacing percentage?

No platform sets one. Adswave colours a variance within 2% green, up to 5% amber and beyond 5% red. Read the percentage with the day of the month. On a €3,000 budget, 10% on day 3 is about €30. On day 25 it is about €247.

Can Google Sheets update Google Ads spend automatically?

Not from this template alone, because it is a static file. A connector or a script that writes spend into the sheet on a schedule keeps it current, and the formulas recalculate each time.

Does the template work for Meta ads?

Yes. The arithmetic does not depend on the platform, so give Meta its own row. The 30.4 comes from Google's documentation. On a Meta row it is a convention that keeps both platforms on the same scale.

Start a 7-day free trial, no card required, and see every client's pacing without pasting a number.

Google budget limits quoted from Google Ads Help, answer 6385083, checked 3 September 2026. Adswave product figures checked on 1 October 2026.