Global brands entering the Middle East often ask whether their ads should be in Arabic or English. In most Gulf markets the answer is both. In markets such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Arabic usually comes first. In every market, the audience and your test results should make the final decision. This guide explains how to choose between Arabic or English ads in the Middle East by country and audience. It also shows how Google Ads and Meta handle ad language, and how to test the two.
Ad Language by Country
The population mix is the first thing to check, because it decides how many people each language can reach:
| Market | Audience | Starting point |
|---|---|---|
| UAE | About 89% of residents are expatriates | English and Arabic. English reaches most expatriates, and Arabic reaches Emiratis and Arab expatriates. |
| Saudi Arabia | Saudi nationals were 58.4% of the population in the 2022 census | Arabic first, with English for expatriates and some B2B audiences |
| Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman | Large expatriate populations | Arabic and English |
| Egypt | A mainly Arabic-speaking population | Arabic first, with English for some B2B and premium audiences |
| Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia | Arabic and French widely used | Arabic and French |
Audience Signals That Matter More Than the Country
- Nationality and first language. Nationals and Arab expatriates usually respond best to Arabic, and most Western and Asian expatriates to English.
- B2B or B2C. Many business and technology buyers research in English, while mass consumer audiences more often search in Arabic.
- Search behaviour. Check your Arabic keyword research: if people search for your product in Arabic, your ads and pages should be in Arabic.
- Who decides. When parents or the wider family take part in the decision, Arabic content often matters more, as our guide to Arab family decision-making explains.
How Google Ads Matches Ad Language
Since September 2026, Google Ads no longer uses the campaign-level language setting for Search campaigns, or for Search ads in Performance Max. Google now matches ads to people based on the languages it understands each person knows, and it gives priority to ads in the same language as the search term. For searches without a clear language, such as brand names, it gives priority to the person's preferred language. The language settings still apply to other Performance Max channels, such as YouTube and Display.
In practice, write separate Arabic and English ads and keywords, and keep them in separate ad groups so you can compare them. Send each ad to a landing page in the same language. Our guide to Google Ads in the Middle East covers the rest of the setup.
How Meta Ads Handles Ad Language
In Meta Ads Manager, language targeting is part of the audience settings of each ad set, and it uses the language people choose for their account, not their location. Meta also offers multi-language ads: you add text in several languages to one ad, and each person sees the version in their language. Our guide to Meta advertising in MENA explains the rest of the setup.
Ad Language on LinkedIn, Snapchat and TikTok
The same approach works on other platforms: separate ad groups by language, matching landing pages and a fair test. On LinkedIn, campaign language targeting is based on the language of members' profiles, and many business professionals in the Gulf use LinkedIn in English. On Snapchat and TikTok, test Arabic and English creative side by side, with captions in the same language as the voice-over. Our guide to TikTok Ads in the Middle East covers the setup.
The Landing Page Must Match the Ad
An Arabic ad that leads to an English page loses many of the clicks it paid for. Every Arabic ad needs an Arabic landing page with a right-to-left layout and an Arabic form, and every English ad an English page. Our guides to bilingual websites and conversion rate optimization for Arabic websites explain how to build them.
How to Test Arabic and English Ads
- Run Arabic and English in separate ad groups or ad sets, with the same offer.
- Send each one to a landing page in the same language.
- Compare cost per conversion and conversion rate. Click-through rate (CTR) alone can point to the wrong winner.
- Run the test until each language has enough conversions to compare fairly.
- Check lead quality in your CRM, because one language may bring more leads but weaker ones.
- Repeat the test in each country, because results in the UAE do not predict results in Saudi Arabia.
Write Arabic Ads, Do Not Translate Them
A translated English ad rarely performs as well as an ad written in Arabic for the market. Write Arabic headlines and descriptions from Arabic keyword research, in the right tone for the country, as our guide to Arabic copywriting explains. If you use AI to draft them, follow a native review process, as our guide to using AI for Arabic content describes.
Conclusion
Choose the ad language by country and by audience, run Arabic and English side by side, and let conversion data decide the budget split. GOTOMENA writes and tests Arabic and English ads on Google and Meta through our Arabic Google Ads and PPC services. To plan your campaigns, contact our team.