Google announced on November 6, 2025, two major updates to Performance Max: Waze ads inventory for store goals campaigns and expanded channel performance reporting across all campaigns. These additions build on the campaign-level negative keywords that rolled out earlier this year, the feature advertisers had requested since PMax launched in 2021.
The November updates specifically target two persistent pain points: reaching customers during physical shopping journeys and understanding where your budget actually goes across Google's network.
The four biggest changes:
- Waze inventory for store campaigns - Your ads appear as "Promoted Places in Navigation" pins for 150M+ active drivers
- Channel reporting for everyone - Every Performance Max campaign now shows where ads run and which channels convert
- Search partner visibility - Channel reports will include search partner performance in coming weeks
- Manager account access - Agencies can now view portfolio-level channel data across multiple clients
How Waze Inventory Changes Local Advertising
Performance Max for store goals campaigns in the United States can now serve ads on Waze. Businesses appear as "Promoted Places in Navigation" pins on users' maps during their drives.
This targets a different moment than traditional search ads. Someone searching "coffee shops near me" is researching options. Someone seeing your coffee shop pin while navigating to work is making real-time decisions about where to stop.
The feature requires no setup. Performance Max automatically uses existing assets to optimize for Store Visits, Store Sales, or Local Actions Directions.
Real-World Application
A sporting goods chain running Performance Max for store goals saw Waze inventory appear automatically after the announcement. Their existing creative,, images of running shoes, headlines about "Find Your Perfect Fit",,, started showing as navigation pins to nearby drivers.
What makes Waze placements different:
- Timing: Reaches people already in transit
- Intent: Captures last-minute shopping decisions during journeys
- Geography: Automatically applies radius targeting around your store locations
- Creative: Uses your existing PMax assets
Google specifically noted the feature proves "especially helpful during last-minute trips or long journeys over the holidays." This seasonal timing matters, retail traffic peaks when people make unplanned stops between destinations.
Current limitation: Waze ads launch only in the United States. Google plans international expansion in 2026 but hasn't specified which markets.
Channel Reporting Finally Shows Where Budget Goes
The "black box" criticism of Performance Max centered on one question: where are my ads actually running? Channel performance reporting now extends to all campaigns, providing visibility into where ads run across Google's network.
Before November, only select beta accounts had this. Now it's standard.
What You See in Channel Reports
The reporting shows clicks, conversions, conversion value, and cost broken down by individual channels: YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail, Maps, and (soon) search partners.
Example breakdown from a $5,000/month PMax campaign:
This changes optimization. If YouTube drives conversions at twice the CPA of Search, you might adjust asset groups to favor search-specific creative over video content.
Manager Account Access for Agencies
Manager account (MCC) access addresses a workflow gap for agencies running PMax across dozens of clients. Instead of checking channel performance in 30 individual accounts, you now see aggregated data across your entire portfolio.
To access channel reporting: Navigate to your Performance Max campaign → "Insights and reports" → "Channel performance."
The Negative Keywords Story: Why 15% Cost Reduction Matters
The November updates build on changes from earlier in 2025. The biggest: campaign-level negative keywords, which finally rolled out in January after being PMax's #1 complaint since launch.
One sporting goods advertiser saw an immediate 15% cost reduction by adding "free" and "used" as negative keywords. Performance Max was showing up for "free sneakers" searches, completely unprofitable traffic.
What changed in 2025:
- January 23: Campaign-level negative keywords rolled out to all advertisers
- March: Limit increased from 100 to 10,000 keywords per campaign
- Now: Add them directly in Google Ads interface in under a minute
Before January, advertisers had to submit modification request forms through Google support. The manual process took days.
How to Add Negative Keywords
- Navigate to your Performance Max campaign → "Keywords" → "Negative keywords"
- Click the blue "+" button
- Enter keywords (up to 10,000 per campaign)
- Choose match type: broad, phrase, or exact
- Click "Save"
Common negative keywords by business type:
- E-commerce: "free," "DIY," "wholesale," "job"
- B2B software: "student," "personal use," "crack," "pirated"
- Local services: "franchise," "training," "careers"
- Luxury goods: "cheap," "discount," "replica," "fake"
Important limitation: Campaign-level negative keywords only block Search and Shopping inventory. They don't prevent ads on Display, YouTube, Gmail, or Discover. For those channels, use placement exclusions and topic exclusions instead.
High-Value Customer Acquisition: Bidding Smarter for Better Customers
Google's high-value customer acquisition mode, now rolling out to all advertisers, lets you specify your best customers through Customer Match. Google AI predicts which new users are likely to maximize lifetime value and bids more for them.
You upload a list of your highest LTV customers. Google identifies characteristics these customers share: demographics, behavior patterns, device usage, ... then finds similar users and increases bids when they appear in auctions.
Setting Up High-Value Acquisition
Requirements:
- Conversion tracking for new customer acquisitions
- Customer Match list of high LTV customers (minimum 1,000 contacts)
- Historical conversion data for at least 30 days
- Clear definition of "high-value" for your business
Example: Subscription box service
- Export customers with LTV >$500 (top 20% of customer base)
- Upload to Customer Match as "High LTV Customers"
- Enable new customer acquisition goal in PMax settings
- Select "High value mode" and choose your Customer Match list
Campaign-level reporting shows how many new customers your campaign drives and how many were high-value.
A fitness app company using this feature saw average first-month LTV increase from $47 to $71 over 60 days, even though total new customer volume decreased by 18%. The trade-off: fewer customers, but each worth more.
Google's AI typically needs 2-3 weeks to identify patterns and start adjusting bids. You'll see initial results within 14 days, but the system continues learning for 60-90 days.
What These Updates Mean for Your Campaign Strategy
The combination of Waze inventory, channel reporting, and control features changes how you should approach Performance Max.
Before vs. After November 2025
Before: You set up PMax with asset groups and conversion goals, then waited to see aggregate results. Budget disappeared into a black box.
After: You add negative keywords to block waste. You check channel reports weekly to see where budget goes. If Display performs poorly, you adjust asset groups. If you run store campaigns, Waze automatically extends reach to drivers making real-time decisions.
When to Use Performance Max
Use PMax when:
- You have strong conversion tracking
- You can create 4+ quality image assets and 1+ video
- Your business has multiple conversion points across channels
- You want to test which channels perform best
- You run physical stores and want navigation-based traffic
Avoid PMax when:
- You need granular keyword-level control (use standard Search)
- Your budget is under $30/day (automation needs volume)
- You only care about one channel like YouTube
- Brand protection is critical (PMax still makes aggressive matching decisions)
Tracking Performance Across Channels
You can export channel data from the reporting interface or automate the pull if you're combining PMax data with other campaigns. PPC reporting gets complex when you're tracking multiple campaigns across platforms, automating data collection prevents the manual errors that often mess up performance analysis.
Weekly optimization workflow:
- Export channel performance report
- Calculate CPA and ROAS by channel
- Identify underperforming channels (CPA >2x campaign average)
- Review assets, are they optimized for that channel?
- Add negative keywords if Search shows irrelevant queries
- Check placement exclusions for Display/YouTube
- Adjust bid strategy if one channel consistently outperforms
Performance Max in 2025: The Transparency Evolution
Performance Max serves over one million advertisers, but criticism about limited control persists. The 2025 updates like negative keywords, channel reporting, search themes expansion, ... represent Google's response to advertiser feedback.
What changed in 2025:
- January: Campaign-level negative keywords
- March: Negative keyword limit increased to 10,000
- April: Channel performance reporting beta
- May: Search themes limit doubled to 50
- September: Bulk reporting and download capabilities
- November: Channel reporting for all + Waze inventory
The strategic question remains: does adding transparency features make Performance Max as controllable as standard campaigns, or just less opaque? Channel reporting tells you where budget went, but you still can't directly control allocation. Negative keywords block obvious waste, but only on Search and Shopping.
Performance Max remains an automated system with new windows into how it operates. The November updates make those windows bigger and clearer.
FAQ: Performance Max Updates November 2025
How do I enable Waze ads for my Performance Max campaign?
Waze inventory appears automatically in Performance Max for store goals campaigns in the United States. No setup required, your existing assets show as "Promoted Places in Navigation" pins on Waze maps if your campaign optimizes for Store Visits, Store Sales, or Local Actions Directions.
International rollout planned for 2026, but no specific markets announced yet.
Can I see Waze performance separately in channel reports?
Not yet. Waze likely shows aggregated with Maps inventory since both target location-based conversions. Compare your Maps channel performance before and after November 6, 2025, to estimate Waze impact, any significant increase probably includes Waze contribution.
Do campaign-level negative keywords block ads on all Performance Max channels?
No, they only block Search and Shopping inventory. Your ads can still show on Display, YouTube, Gmail, Discover, and Maps even if you add negative keywords.
For non-search channels, use placement exclusions (block specific sites/videos), topic exclusions (block categories), and content exclusions (block mature content).
How quickly does Google's AI learn from high-value customer data?
Expect 2-3 weeks to see initial results, with the system continuing to learn for 60-90 days. List quality matters more than size, 1,000 similar customers teach the AI faster than 10,000 diverse customers.
To speed learning: only include customers who became high-value in the past 12 months, ensure at least 1,000 contacts, and remove outliers.
Should I pause my standard Search campaigns if I'm running Performance Max?
Run both in parallel for 30 days first. If PMax matches or beats your Search CPAs on your best terms, gradually reduce Search budgets. If PMax wastes money on broad matches, keep Search for your most valuable terms.
Best practice: run exact match keywords for top performers in Search, let PMax handle discovery. Use negative keywords in PMax to prevent overlap.
Can I control how much budget goes to each channel in Performance Max?
No, Google's automation decides based on predicted conversions. You can't set channel-specific budgets.
You can influence allocation: add more search themes for search traffic, upload multiple videos for video placements, or use negative keywords to reduce Search/Shopping waste (which shifts budget elsewhere).
For precise control, split campaigns: standard Search for controlled terms, standard Shopping for products, PMax for prospecting only.
How do I access channel performance reports?
Navigate to your Performance Max campaign → "Insights and reports" → "Channel performance." Click "Channel distribution table" for detailed metrics by channel.
To download: click the download icon, select format (CSV, Sheets, Excel). For manager accounts, access portfolio-level reporting in your MCC dashboard by selecting multiple accounts → "Channel performance" from bulk actions.
What to Do This Week with Your Performance Max Campaigns
Immediate actions:
- Check if your store goals campaigns show Waze inventory (U.S. only, review placements)
- Access channel performance reports and download your last 30 days of data
- Identify your worst-performing channel by CPA, is it 2x higher than your best?
This month:
- Add 50-100 negative keywords based on search terms report (focus on "free," "jobs," "DIY")
- Review Customer Match lists, ,do you have a high-LTV segment for high-value acquisition mode?
- Export channel performance data weekly and track trends over time
This quarter:
- If spending >$3,000/month on PMax, test high-value customer acquisition by uploading your top 20% customers by LTV
- Compare PMax results to standard Shopping and Search campaigns, does PMax beat them on CPA or ROAS?
- Build a reporting dashboard showing channel performance trends alongside other campaign types
The November 2025 Performance Max updates won't change your campaigns overnight. But channel visibility and Waze inventory give you new tools to optimize systematically instead of guessing where budget goes.
Start with channel reports this week. Everything else builds from understanding which channels actually drive your results.
