On August 6, 2026, Meta changed three reporting breakdowns from default-on to opt-in only: device, hourly, and frequency. The API field names are impression_device, hourly_stats_aggregated_by_audience_time_zone, and frequency_value. Until you opt each account back in, queries for these breakdowns return an HTTP 200 response with an empty data array.
No error. No alert. No email from Meta.
What the silence looks like in practice
An HTTP error is something you debug. An HTTP 200 with empty data looks like a quiet week.
Your reporting rows still exist. Your exports still run. The numbers look fine — they're just missing the dimension that would tell you something is wrong. This is what makes the change hard to catch without a systematic check: there's no red flag, only an absence.
Third-party measurement platforms including AppsFlyer and DataSlayer have documented the issue and flagged their connectors as affected. If your team pulls reports directly from the Meta Graph API, the same silent 200 response applies. The common pattern from reports surfacing on ppc.land and in agency channels: teams assumed a data glitch, cleared cache, re-ran the pull, and got the same empty result — because the result is correct behavior for an account without the opt-in.
What you're blind to without these three breakdowns
The device breakdown (impression_device) tells you whether your spend is going to mobile, desktop, or connected TV. Without it, a campaign spending the majority of its budget on desktop — where your conversion rate is likely lower than mobile — looks identical to one hitting your best-converting device type.
The hourly breakdown (hourly_stats_aggregated_by_audience_time_zone) is how most day-parting decisions get validated. If you're running ad schedules to avoid low-intent hours, this is the only signal that confirms your schedule is actually doing what you set it up to do.
The frequency breakdown (frequency_value) is what you reach for when results are declining and creative fatigue is the suspected cause. It's also the primary way to audit whether your Advantage+ Shopping audience is being hit too many times before the algorithm refreshes.
Losing all three at once, without knowing, means budget and creative decisions are being made on incomplete data. The analysis feels valid because the API isn't throwing errors. It isn't.
How to get the data back
According to documentation from AppsFlyer and ppc.land, the opt-in lives in Ads Manager's breakdown settings under the reporting view. Look for Additional Breakdowns and re-enable Impression Device. You'll need to do this separately for each ad account you manage — there's no global toggle.
Two things to know before you do:
The data does not backfill. Opting in today means your device breakdown starts today. The gap between August 6 and your opt-in date is permanent.
If you manage multiple accounts, this is a manual sweep. Agencies with large client footprints will need a process for this — it's not something that can be fixed from a single account-level settings change.
October 27 is the next forcing function
This change is part of the Meta Graph API v26.0 cycle, which shipped July 29. October 27 is when v26.0 deprecations roll out to all remaining API versions, including unversioned calls. Third-party tools have until then to migrate their connectors. DataSlayer has already flagged the timeline; most major platforms are aware.
The opt-in for reporting breakdowns is separate from the broader October deadline — you need to act now, not in October. But October 27 matters to anyone running custom API integrations or using tools that haven't confirmed their migration status. The v26.0 changes also blocked 47 Commerce Order Management endpoints, so if your reporting infrastructure touches order data via the API, that's worth auditing in the same pass.
The default-to-working assumption is gone
The bigger problem here isn't the device breakdown. It's the pattern.
Meta has shipped several silent changes in 2026: the Media Views metric migration in June, the off-platform retargeting opt-out change in July, and now this. None of them caused an error. Each one changed what the data means without changing how the UI looks.
Operating on data you haven't verified is the real risk. Not because Meta is being adversarial — this is just platform evolution — but because the assumption that your reporting is complete by default doesn't hold anymore.
A quick account audit is the fastest way to find out what else might be missing. The free Gromerce audit tool surfaces these kinds of gaps in a few minutes without requiring API access.
Sources: Meta Developer Documentation, ppc.land, August 2026
