AdCP, the Ad Context Protocol, is an open standard that lets AI agents discover, plan, buy, sell and measure advertising across channels using one shared set of tasks. It is published and governed by AgenticAdvertising.org, an industry body whose members include Yahoo, PubMatic, Scope3 and Samba TV. AdCP is not an IAB Tech Lab standard, and it covers far more than deal negotiation: it spans the campaign from the first brief to delivery reporting.

TL;DR. AdCP gives buyer agents and seller agents a common language, so an agent built by one company can transact with an agent built by another without a custom integration. It standardises inventory discovery, account set-up, creative distribution, media buy execution, data activation, governance checks and reporting, and runs over two transports, MCP and A2A. Version 3.2 is the current general release. AdCP does not by default cover payments, legal agreements, settlement, disputes or makegoods, which remain separate integrations unless a specific AdCP contract is in place.

What is the AdCP standard?

AdCP is an open protocol for agentic advertising. Its documentation describes the goal as becoming the coordination protocol for advertising across every channel, including direct deals, sponsorships, broadcast and out-of-home, not only programmatic exchange. The rationale is that most global ad spend flows outside programmatic auctions, and each channel currently has its own buying methods, terminology and reporting.

AdCP is published by AgenticAdvertising.org, which also certifies practitioners and governs how the protocol evolves. The organisation lists more than 154 member companies. It reports that the first agent-to-agent media buy using AdCP was executed on 16 October 2025, with inventory from LG Ads and agents handling creative, targeting and approval under human oversight.

What does AdCP cover across a media buy?

AdCP defines a set of tasks that agents call at each stage of a campaign. According to the AdCP documentation:

Discovery: get_products sends one brief to every connected seller and returns the inventory on offer. In 3.2, new integrations use list_products or request_proposals instead; get_products remains supported throughout 3.x.
Accounts: a standard request sets up the commercial relationship between a buyer and a seller.
Creative: build_creative and sync_creatives produce and distribute assets to every seller.
Execution: create_media_buy and update_media_buy place and change buys across sellers in one call. In 3.2, create_media_buy is kept for compatibility, and new integrations buy with buy_products or accept_proposal.
Data: sync_audiences, get_signals and activate_signal bring in first-party audiences and third-party targeting data.
Governance: check_governance validates budget limits, brand safety and targeting compliance before execution, and get_plan_audit_logs returns the decision history.
Reporting: get_media_buy_delivery aggregates delivery from every seller, and log_event records conversions.

Publishers declare which agents may sell their inventory in an adagents.json file hosted on their own domain, read the same way a browser reads robots.txt. A registry run by AgenticAdvertising.org lets buyer agents search for seller agents by channel or capability.

How does AdCP handle agent identity and human approval?

AdCP builds identity and approval into the protocol rather than leaving them to each platform. The documentation describes buyer agents signing requests with HTTP Message Signatures (RFC 9421), sellers verifying those signatures against keys the buyer publishes, and idempotency keys that stop a retried request from creating a second buy. Signing is optional in 3.2: each seller declares which operations require it, and the documentation sets out plans to make it mandatory for operations that commit spend in version 4.0.

Human approval sits in the governance layer. When a proposed buy exceeds an agent's authority, for example a budget above an auto-approval threshold, the governance agent escalates to a person, who can add conditions before approving. Approvals travel as signed tokens so no agent in the chain can forge a sign-off. AgenticAdvertising.org calls the principle behind this "Embedded Human Judgment": people stay in the loop on decisions with real consequences.

Is AdCP an agent-to-agent protocol?

AdCP is a task protocol, and agent-to-agent communication is one of the ways it runs. The same tasks and schemas work over MCP, used when an AI assistant calls tools, and over A2A, the agent-to-agent protocol, used when agents collaborate directly. A buyer agent and a seller agent can therefore agree and execute a media buy entirely between themselves, with humans approving at the thresholds the governance layer sets.

What does AdCP not cover?

The AdCP documentation is direct about its limits. One architecture does not mean every channel or commercial function has equal depth today, and payments, legal agreements, settlement, disputes, credits and makegoods remain account or platform integrations unless the relevant AdCP contract is explicitly present.

That boundary matters for buyers. AdCP standardises how a deal is discovered, executed and reported. It does not by itself give both parties a single agreed record of the commercial terms to settle a dispute against. That job falls to the marketplace or the contract between the parties.

How does AdCP compare with AAMP and OpenRTB?

OpenRTB standardised the auction: how a bid request and a bid response are formatted, so any DSP can bid into any SSP. It describes a single impression-level transaction.

AdCP standardises the campaign: discovery, buying, creative, data, governance and reporting, across programmatic and non-programmatic channels.

AAMP, the Agentic Advertising Management Protocols, is IAB Tech Lab's separate set of agentic specifications, announced in early 2026. Its current release includes the OpenProposal specification, buyer and seller agent SDKs and an agent orchestration layer. AdCP and AAMP come from different bodies, and whether they converge, coexist or compete is still open.

Why does AdCP matter for buyers and publishers?

For buyers, a buyer agent that speaks AdCP can reach any seller agent that speaks it, without a separate integration for each platform. The documentation's own example is an agency buying across CTV, display, audio, social, retail media and digital out-of-home through one workflow rather than one tool per channel.

For publishers, a seller agent that speaks AdCP can receive briefs from any compliant buyer agent, and adagents.json gives the publisher control over which agents are authorised to sell its inventory.

For both, the protocol does not remove the need to agree, record and verify the commercial terms. Marketplaces that focus on that layer sit alongside AdCP rather than replacing it. Alkimi, an agentic advertising marketplace, is one: buy-side and sell-side agents agree terms on a shared DealSheet that both parties hold, with humans keeping approval rights at the deal level.

Frequently asked questions

What does AdCP stand for?

AdCP stands for Ad Context Protocol. It is published by AgenticAdvertising.org.

Is AdCP an IAB Tech Lab standard?

No. AdCP is published and governed by AgenticAdvertising.org. IAB Tech Lab's agentic specifications are published separately as AAMP.

What is the current version of AdCP?

AdCP 3.2 is the current general release, according to the AdCP documentation as of October 2026.

Does AdCP replace OpenRTB?

No. OpenRTB standardises impression-level auction bidding. AdCP standardises campaign-level tasks across programmatic and non-programmatic channels, and the two can coexist.

Does AdCP handle disputes and settlement?

Not by default. The AdCP documentation states that payments, legal agreements, settlement, disputes, credits and makegoods remain account or platform integrations unless a specific AdCP contract covers them.

Which transports does AdCP use?

MCP, for AI assistants calling tools, and A2A, for direct agent-to-agent collaboration. The tasks and schemas are the same on both.

Correction: an earlier version of this page described AdCP as an IAB Tech Lab standard called the Agent Communication Protocol and said it defined the DealSheet record format. AdCP is the Ad Context Protocol, published by AgenticAdvertising.org, and the DealSheet is Alkimi's deal record, not part of the AdCP specification.