Facebook and Instagram Owner Meta Launches AI Sandbox for Advertisers

Social media giant Meta Platforms is set to begin testing AI-powered ad tools that can create content like image backgrounds and variations of written text.

A select group of advertisers will be invited to experiment with the tools in a "testing playground" that the company is calling the AI Sandbox, Meta executives said at a press event in New York.

Meta's planned to grant access to more advertisers in July and integrate some of the features into general-purpose ad products later in the year, they said.

The announcement marks Facebook and Instagram owner's first foray into rolling out products that use generative AI technology, which mines vast stores of past data to generate new content like prose, art, and software code.

Interest in the technology has surged since Microsoft-backed startup OpenAI launched chatbot ChatGPT in the fall, and Meta's announcement follows Google's announcement that it would offer integrations of the technology in its search, email, and photo products.

The move is part of Meta's broader push into AI and is expected to give advertisers greater flexibility and control over their ad content, while potentially reducing production costs and increasing efficiency.

The race for AI-powered ad products is heating up, and Meta's entry into the field is likely to intensify competition with rivals like Google and Amazon, as well as smaller players like Cognitivescale and Persado.