Why Ad Platforms 'Forget' — and What the Memory Gap Costs You
In 2026, Google and Meta both shrank how long your data and change history survive. If you're not keeping your own record, you're losing it on their schedule.
Your ad platforms are designed to forget, and in 2026 they got more aggressive about it. The two largest both shrank the window in which your data and history exist — quietly, on their schedule, not yours. If you rely on the platforms to remember what happened in your account, you are steadily losing institutional memory you can never get back.
Google now deletes granular data after 37 months
This isn't speculation. Starting June 1, 2026, Google Ads moved to a 37-month retention policy for granular performance data — daily, hourly, and weekly stats older than that simply return an error. Google's own guidance is explicit: "If you require granular historical data beyond 37 months, we recommend exporting it prior to the deadline." Worse for accountability, the change history tool only goes back two years, so who-changed-what context older than 24 months doesn't exist in-platform at all.
Meta cut its attribution memory in January
Meta went further. As of January 12, 2026, Meta removed the 7-day-view and 28-day-view attribution windows entirely, and capped a set of key historical fields — unique clicks, unique CTR, hourly breakdowns — to the previous 13 months. Longer customer journeys that those windows used to capture are now invisible.
The fix is a record you control
If the platforms forget on their timeline, the only answer is to remember on yours. That's the entire premise of Memory: a permanent, timestamped record of every change and every setting, kept outside the platform, on your schedule. When Google eventually shrinks its window again, your record doesn't change with it.