What Meta Creative Hub did for ad mockups, previews and sharing, and five creative tools compared by job as of November 2026.
Meta Creative Hub was Meta's workspace for building ad mockups, previewing them on phone-sized screens and sharing them with clients or teammates before the ads were made. Today, the job it did splits in two: Meta's own tools for previewing ads, and separate tools for making and analyzing the creative itself.
One thing to be clear about up front: the Meta help page we checked in November 2026 covers troubleshooting mockup previews in Creative Hub, and it does not say whether Creative Hub is open to new users today. Confirm in your own Meta Business Suite before you build a process on it. Below you will find what Creative Hub was used for, and how to cover each job now, with five tools compared by what they do.
Generate image ads, save inspiration and see which ads win.
What Meta Creative Hub was and what we could confirm
Creative Hub let advertisers build mockups of ads, preview them the way people would see them on a phone, and send a preview link for feedback. That description comes from how Meta's help center explains its preview feature, in its page on troubleshooting mockup previews in Creative Hub.
What we could not confirm from Meta's pages is Creative Hub's current availability. If you are reading this because you want to use it, open Business Suite and check, and treat everything below as a guide to the jobs you need done, not as proof of what Creative Hub offers now.
What people used it for: mockups, previews and sharing
Meta's help page shows how the preview and sharing side worked. These are the facts it states:
| Job | How Creative Hub handled it |
|---|---|
| Preview on a phone | Install and log into the Facebook or Instagram app to preview a mockup on a mobile device |
| Preview without a phone | Use the preview window's dropdown menu and select Mobile Feed |
| Share with a client | A preview link shows the latest version of the mockup, so a client sees later updates |
| Link lifetime | Preview links expire after 3 months, for security reasons |
| Stop a client using a link | Delete the mockup |
| Freeze a version | Duplicate the mockup and send a new link when it is ready to preview |
| Show a business name | Use a business portfolio in Meta Business Suite; otherwise a link can show a personal name |
Two of those details are worth copying into any approval process you use, wherever it lives. First, a link that always shows the latest version means a client can see half-finished edits, so freeze the version you want signed off. Second, a link with an expiry date needs a calendar reminder if the approval runs longer than that.
Madgicx: generate image ads and analyze creative
Madgicx's strength here is the creative work itself: making image ads and learning from them. The AI Ad Generator creates image ads from a prompt, an image or any ad in the Meta Ad Library, ready to edit and use. AI image editing and templates are available, so you can adjust an ad without a design tool. For research, the Ad Library in Madgicx lets you browse other brands' ads and save them to inspiration boards, and you can turn a saved ad into a new one.
Once ads run, Creative Insights breaks down every creative, including video, to show what makes your winning ads win, and flags creative fatigue. Madgicx makes image ads only, so video comes from elsewhere. Plans start at $45 a month, priced by monthly ad spend, with a 7-day free trial.
Tools that go beyond mockups, compared by job
The table below uses facts we checked in November 2026. None of the facts we hold for these tools describe a client mockup preview link like Creative Hub's, so treat them as ways to make, score and research creative, not as a drop-in replacement for sharing mockups.
| Tool | Main job | What it does | Price (Nov 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Madgicx | Make image ads, analyze results | Image ads from a prompt, an image or a Meta Ad Library ad; Creative Insights on what wins | From $45 a month, priced by ad spend; 7-day free trial |
| AdCreative.ai | Make ads and score them before launch | Prompt-based images, banners from templates, product-to-video, and a creative score before launch (the over 90% accuracy figure is its own claim) | From $39 a month in credits; 7-day trial with 20 credits |
| Pencil | Make ads with a model trained on your account | Agents generate images and ads from briefs; a model trained on your own ad account data scores new creatives | From $14 a month in generations; no full-platform trial |
| Marpipe | Catalog ads for stores | Branded designs built from your product feed, with product-level video on Enterprise | Free Catalog Creative plan; Startup $199 a month, Enterprise $999 |
| Foreplay | Research other brands' ads | Swipe File saves ads from Meta, TikTok and LinkedIn ad libraries; Discovery searches over 100M ads | Basic $59 a month ($49 billed annually); 7-day trial |
AdCreative.ai
Choose it if you want images, video and ad text from one tool and a score for new ads before they go live. It pushes finished creatives to Meta, Google and LinkedIn accounts. Its own pricing page returned a 404 when we checked, so plans come from its home page, whose pricing sections disagree in places. Starter is $39 a month, Professional $249 and Ultimate $999.
Pencil
Choose it if you want a low entry price and scoring trained on your own ad account's data. Core is $14 a month ($11 billed annually) and Growth is $55 ($44 billed annually); Pro is custom. Its pages disagree on video: its blog and home page present it as live, while its pricing table marks AI video as Coming soon on every plan, so ask which plan includes it.
Marpipe
Choose it if you run catalog ads and want designs built from your product feed. Its Catalog Creative plan is free to start, Startup is $199 a month with a 500 SKU cap, and Enterprise is $999 a month. We saw no general-purpose ad generator for non-catalog ads on its pages.
Foreplay
Choose it if your main need is research. It saves and organizes other brands' ads and lets you search a large ad database. We saw no image or video ad generation on its pages. A card is required for the trial, and billing starts automatically after it.
How to set up a simple creative workflow
Whichever tools you pick, the workflow behind them is the same four steps:
- Collect references. Save ads you like to a board. Our answer on the Meta Ad Library for creative research shows how to search it well.
- Make a first version. Generate or design two or three image ads around one message each. Our guide to scaling ad creative production covers keeping the volume manageable.
- Get approval on a fixed version. Freeze the version, send it, and record who approved it and when. A frozen file does the job a duplicated Creative Hub mockup did.
- Launch, read and refresh. Check which creative elements win, and refresh before fatigue sets in. Our guide to preventing Meta creative burnout explains the signs.
Make and analyze your creative with Madgicx
If you want the make-and-learn part of this workflow in one place, start with a trial of Madgicx. Generate image ads in the AI Ad Generator, save inspiration to boards, and use Creative Insights after launch to see which ads win and when they tire.
FAQ
What is Meta Creative Hub?
It was Meta's workspace for building ad mockups, previewing them on mobile and sharing preview links. We could not confirm its current availability from Meta's pages, so check Business Suite.
How do I share an ad mockup with a client?
In Creative Hub, you sent a preview link, which showed the latest version of the mockup. To freeze a version for sign-off, Meta's help page says to duplicate the mockup and send a new link when it is ready.
How long do Creative Hub preview links last?
Meta's help page says preview links expire after 3 months, for security reasons.
How do I preview a mockup without a phone?
Use the dropdown menu in the preview window and select Mobile Feed, per Meta's help page. To preview on a phone, install and log into the Facebook or Instagram app.
What can I use instead of Meta Creative Hub?
It depends on the job. Madgicx, AdCreative.ai, Pencil and Marpipe make or score creative, and Foreplay researches other brands' ads. None of the facts we checked describe a mockup preview link for client approval.
