The election for the 20th German Parliament is the first federal election in which Facebook/Meta provides public data related to advertising concerning the election through its ad library. For the first time, it is possible to monitor which parties are investing resources to widely promote their political content—and which of these ads reach the most people.

Based on scientific analysis, Thomas A. Herrig explores extremely important questions for democracy and political opinion formation, such as: Should parties design their online election advertising according to the platform companies' guidelines? What are their strategies for advertising on social media? Can smaller initiatives or parties achieve significant digital reach even with small budgets? And: What additional information can be derived from the extensive data offered by the ad library;

Concluding with practical recommendations for political advertising.