What Is an End Card in Advertising? Definition, Types and Examples

An end card is the final screen of an ad: the frame that appears when a video finishes or a playable ends, and stays on screen until the viewer taps through or closes it. It usually shows what is being advertised, one line about why it is worth having, and a button that takes the viewer to the store or the website. In mobile advertising it is often the most important single screen in the ad, because it is where the click actually happens.

The term is used loosely, and people searching for it usually mean one of three different things. This guide separates them, then covers the types of end card used in app advertising, what goes on one, and what makes one work.

Three things called an end card

• The end card of an in-app video or playable ad. On networks that show full-screen ads inside other apps, a video plays and is followed by a screen with the app's icon, name and an install button. This is the meaning most people in user acquisition have in mind, and the one this article is about.
• The closing frame of a social or TV-style video. The last two or three seconds of a video made for feeds or connected TV often carry a logo, a tagline and a call to action. It is part of the video file rather than a separate screen, but it does the same job.
• A YouTube end screen. YouTube lets a creator place clickable elements (a subscribe button, another video, a playlist, a link) over the last 5 to 20 seconds of a video. YouTube calls these end screens, and separately offers cards, which can appear at any point. Neither is an ad format, though many people search for them as "end cards".

Where end cards appear in mobile advertising

Most in-app ad networks show full-screen video in two placements: rewarded, where the viewer chooses to watch in exchange for something in the game they are playing, and interstitial, shown at a natural break. In both, the video is followed by an end card, and the network's container keeps it on screen until the viewer acts. A playable ad usually ends the same way: the mini-game finishes and a final scene presents the offer. The mobile ad formats guide covers those placements in more detail.

The timing matters. By the time the end card appears the viewer has spent fifteen or thirty seconds with the ad, and in a rewarded placement they have just been given what they wanted. The end card is the moment of highest attention in the whole impression, and also the last chance: once it is closed, the impression is over.

The four types of end card

1. The network default

If an advertiser supplies only a video, many networks build an end card automatically from the store listing: icon, name, rating and an install button on a plain background. It is better than nothing and it is accurate, but it looks the same as every other advertiser's default card, so it does nothing to carry the story of the video into the click.

2. The static image end card

A designed image, usually one per orientation, shown after the video. It can continue the video's visual world and put the strongest selling line in front of the button. It is cheap to make and easy to test, and it is still the most common type.

3. The HTML or animated end card

An HTML5 end card can move: the headline arrives, the product turns, coins fall, the button pulses. It is built like a playable (a single self-contained file that runs inside the ad container) and it is accepted by the same networks that accept playables. Motion draws the eye to the button without the viewer having to do anything.

4. The interactive end card

An interactive end card, often shortened to IEC, asks for one small action before the offer: spin a wheel, scratch a card, drag the last piece into place, pick a colour. It sits between a static card and a full playable. The interaction is short, a few seconds at most, and the reward of completing it is the CTA itself. Interactive end cards versus playable ads explains when each one is the better choice.

What goes on an end card

The space is small and the viewer is about to leave, so every element has to earn its place. Most effective cards contain the same short list:

• Identity: the app icon and name, large enough to recognise again in the store.
• One headline: the payoff, in a few words. "Build your own city" says more than a list of features.
• A hero visual: the character, product or moment from the video, so the card reads as the end of the same story rather than a new ad.
• One call to action: a large, high-contrast button with a verb on it. CTA button design and copy covers the wording.
• Optional proof: a rating or an award, but only one that is true today. A claim the store page contradicts is a policy problem, not a design choice.

What it should not contain is just as important: a second button that competes with the first, a paragraph of text, small print that has to be read, or anything that imitates a system dialog or a close button. The policy guide lists the patterns reviewers reject.

End card examples, by kind of advertiser

• A puzzle game: the board from the video, solved, with a "Level complete" banner, three stars and a Play Free button.
• A strategy game: the base the viewer watched being built, a single line about raiding friends, and the button over a dark plate so it reads against a busy picture.
• A shopping app: the product from the video at an angle, the price or offer in one line, and a Shop Now button.
• A finance app: the result of a calculation the viewer just made, such as a savings figure, with a button to open an account.
• A travel app: the destination the viewer picked in the ad, a photograph of it, and a Book Now button.

The pattern in each is the same: the card shows the outcome of what came before it. That continuity is what separates a card that converts from one that merely sits there. End card templates and the structures that convert goes further into layouts.

Design rules that hold across networks

1. Show the button at once. A button that animates in after two seconds loses everyone who wanted to tap in those two seconds.
2. Design both orientations. Phones are held both ways and many networks serve both; a card designed in portrait and stretched to landscape looks broken. See portrait and landscape playable ads.
3. Keep the important things away from the edges. The container draws its own close button and sometimes a timer in a corner.
4. Make it light. An end card that loads slowly shows a blank frame at the moment of highest attention. Reducing file size covers how.
5. Match the video. Same palette, same character, same world. A sudden change of style reads as a different advertiser.

How end cards are measured

Networks report the click-through rate of the ad as a whole, and installs per thousand impressions (IPM) is the figure most UA teams compare creatives on. Because the end card is where most clicks happen, it moves both. Test end cards the way you test anything else: one change at a time against the current card, enough impressions to settle, judged on installs and on what those players do afterwards rather than on clicks alone. Playable ad metrics and benchmarks and A/B testing cover both.

How to make an end card

A static card can be made in any design tool. An HTML or interactive card needs to be built as a self-contained file that calls the right store-exit function for each network and stays under each network's size cap, which is where most hand-built cards fail review.

Playable Ads Maker's End Cards Maker starts from 40 interactive end card templates, lets you change the art, copy, colours and motion, and exports the same card to 13 ad networks in the format each one asks for. Every button on an end card made there is the click-through, so there is nothing to wire. If you would rather start from a description of your app, the AI end card generator explains that route.