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Shared budget

A shared budget is one average daily budget that several Google Ads campaigns spend from together.

How it works

An ordinary budget belongs to one campaign. A shared budget is a single amount for several campaigns, with no split between them: what one campaign does not spend, another can take. Reports show each campaign’s spend afterwards, but you cannot give any campaign a fixed share.

Performance Max cannot use a shared budget. Performance Max runs in 141 of 146 stores in our data and takes a median 95.7% of their ad budget (GetProfit data, June 2025 – June 2026). So in most stores a shared budget can cover only the other campaigns. When it helps and when it gets in the way is covered in shared budgets in Google Ads.

Where you see it

In Google Ads, shared budgets sit in the account’s Shared Library; a budget of a single campaign appears only in that campaign’s settings.

Example

Example store, not client data.

The tableware shop runs two campaigns from one shared budget of 500 a day: Standard Shopping and a Search campaign on searches for the shop’s name. On a day with plenty of cheap Shopping clicks, Shopping can take 450 of it and leave Search 50. On another day, the split can go the other way. The 500 a day is set for the pair, not for each campaign.

Not to be confused with

  • Portfolio bid strategy — one bidding goal for several campaigns. It shares the goal, a shared budget shares the money, and each works without the other.
  • Campaign total budget — one amount for a single campaign’s whole run, from start date to end date. It cannot be shared.

Right and wrong readings

  • Wrong: “A shared budget gives each campaign an equal part.” Right: there is one amount and no split, so in the example Shopping can take 450 of the 500 on one day.
  • Wrong: “A shared budget can hold Performance Max back in favour of Shopping.” Right: Performance Max cannot join a shared budget, so it always runs on a budget of its own.

Sources