With Open Bidding Direct Pay, the participating sell-side platform, or SSP, pays the publisher under their agreement. Google runs the auction and invoices the publisher separately for its contracted percentage-of-media fee and any applicable ad-serving charges. Your Google Ad Manager report, exchange statement, and bank deposit can all show different numbers for the same impressions.
Google’s current Direct Pay guide says all Direct Pay bids have entered the auction net of its media fee since November 10. It says Ad Manager still shows gross bid prices with the media fee displayed separately until a reporting update planned for early 2027. That means the higher bid on your screen can be worth less in the auction, and the amount the exchange owes you can be higher than what you keep after paying Google.
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Who pays you and which fees to look for
Direct Pay is a beta for Ad Manager 360 and participating exchanges. The publisher requests it for an existing Open Bidding partner, and the partner has to accept. Google’s payment guide for standard Open Bidding describes a different arrangement. Google handles that payout and pays the publisher after taking its revenue share. If you have different arrangements with different exchanges, separate those amounts at month-end.
For Direct Pay, start with the legal entity and payment terms on the exchange agreement. The exchange owes you the media amount under that agreement. Its own fees, deductions, or adjustments depend on that agreement and may already be reflected in the exchange’s statement. Separately, Google puts its contracted media percentage on the monthly Ad Manager invoice alongside applicable ad-serving fees. Find the quoted rate under Costs in the Direct Pay feature settings, then match it to the invoice. Google’s public guide points publishers to their own terms for the rate.
Save the date the partner accepted the switch. A month can contain Google-paid and exchange-paid activity for that partner if the relationship changed midmonth. The switch can also affect how the exchange identifies your inventory. If the partner gives you new seller details, audit your ads.txt seller accounts against the new relationship.
Work through a $4,000 month
Suppose Ad Manager shows 1 million Direct Pay impressions and $4,000 in gross media for one exchange. Use an illustrative 5% Google media fee, $30 in applicable ad-serving charges, and an exchange statement that confirms the full $4,000 is payable. The Google invoice is $230 for these impressions. Your net after those Google charges is $3,770, or $3.77 per thousand served impressions. The percentages and charges below are examples. Use your contract, invoice and statement for your own numbers.
Suppose the exchange deposits $3,950. Before taking the $50 out of revenue, match the deposit to its remittance advice. If the advice shows a confirmed adjustment, your remaining amount after the Google charges is $3,720. If the statement still shows $4,000 due and there is no adjustment or other explanation, keep the $50 open and ask the exchange to account for it.
| Record | Amount | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Ad Manager gross media and exchange statement | $4,000 | Gross in the report and the amount due from the exchange in this example. |
| Google media fee | $200 | Illustrative 5% × $4,000, billed by Google. |
| Google ad-serving charges | $30 | Illustrative charges for the same impressions. |
| Net after Google charges | $3,770 | $4,000 less the $230 Google invoice amount for this activity. |
| Exchange bank deposit | $3,950 | Match the $50 difference to the remittance before classifying it. |
Reconcile the report, statement, invoice and deposit
In Ad Manager, break out the Demand channel and isolate Open Bidding Direct. Export by service month and exchange where the report supports it. Match the partner, account, time zone, currency and impression scope across files. Use the exchange statement to establish the amount due, the Google invoice to establish what you owe Google, and the bank deposit and remittance to establish what you collected.
Track what the exchange owes and what you owe Google on separate lines. A fee shown in reporting and billed on the invoice represents the same cost once you’ve matched it. Avoid subtracting it twice. If the exchange pays the following month, reconcile that deposit against the month the impressions ran. Compare outstanding payments with the exchange’s actual due date.
For a decision about inventory, compare receipts after equivalent costs against the same denominator. The revenue per thousand calculator works with either served impressions or eligible requests when you supply the matching count. Use eligible requests across a comparable set of placements if the change could affect how many requests earn anything.
Read gross bids carefully during the reporting transition
Using the same illustrative 5% rate, a $4.00 gross bid per thousand enters at $3.80 after the media fee. A standard Open Bidding bid at $3.90 net is worth more on that basis, even if its headline price looks smaller. This compares bid values before any other difference in auction treatment or settlement. Google’s auction model describes how expected billable delivery can also affect bid selection.
Google’s November 2 release notes describe the move to net bidding. The current Direct Pay guide’s top notice gives November 10 for all bids, while its setup section still gives November 1 as the completion date. Keep that discrepancy in mind if you are analyzing the first ten days of November. For the reporting transition, save a sample export now and check whether the same field is gross or net after Google updates the report before reusing your reconciliation formula.