Video Ad Serving Template
{{Short description|Metadata format for video advertising}}
Video Ad Serving Template (VAST) is a specification defined and released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) that sets a standard for communication requirements between ad servers and video players in order to present video ads.
It is a data structure declared using XML.
VAST has 8 versions: 1.0 (deprecated), 1.1 (deprecated),{{Cite journal|url = https://www.iab.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/VASTv3_0.pdf|title = Video Ad Serving Template (VAST) Version 3.0|last = Grenager|first = Teg|date = 2012-07-19|journal = Interactive Advertising Bureau|access-date = 2015-05-14|page = 8}} 2.0, 2.0.1 (the schema version as the official VAST 2.0 schema),{{Cite news|url=https://www.iab.com/guidelines/digital-video-ad-serving-template-vast-2-0/|title=Digital Video Ad Serving Template (VAST) 2.0|work=IAB - Empowering the Marketing and Media Industries to Thrive in the Digital Economy|access-date=2017-06-01|language=en-US}} 2.6, 3.0,{{cite web | url=https://www.iab.com/guidelines/digital-video-ad-serving-template-vast-3-0/ | title=Digital Video Ad Serving Template (VAST) }} 4.0,{{cite web | url=https://www.iab.com/guidelines/digital-video-ad-serving-template-vast-4-0/ | title=Digital Video Ad Serving Template (VAST) }} 4.1 and 4.2.
Request
In order to play a video ad in a video player, the video player sends a request to a VAST ad server.
It is a simple HTTP based URL that typically appears as follows:
http://www.example.com/?LR_PUBLISHER_ID=1331&LR_CAMPAIGN_ID=229&LR_SCHEMA=vast2-vpaid
Response
The ad server responds with a VAST data structure that declares these parameters:{{Citation needed|date=January 2023}}
- The ad media that should be played
- How the ad media should be played
- What should be tracked as the media is played
- The companion ad that should be displayed alongside the master ad
For example, the above request returns the following response (trimmed):
.......
.......
......
......
References
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