In a nutshell: LinkedIn Ads has two kinds of window, and both are about time. The attribution window sets how many days after a click or a view a conversion still counts for the ad: the default is 30 days for clicks and 7 for views, you can go up to 90, and for leads, qualified leads and a few other categories sent through the API, up to 180 or 365 days. The audience window sets how long ago someone interacted with you: 30, 60, 90, 180 or 365 days. The more recent, the warmer. Combine windows with exclusions (engaged in the last 180 days minus engaged in the last 30) and you split your funnel into stages and talk to each one the right way. And your attribution window has to fit your sales cycle, or the media that opened the door gets zero credit.
The window is the most underrated setting in LinkedIn Ads.
Everyone sets it once, leaves the default and forgets about it.
The thing is, it decides two things that matter way too much to leave on default: how much credit your campaign gets and who sees which message.
There are two kinds of window:
- Attribution window (or conversion window): how long after someone sees or clicks your ad a conversion still counts for the campaign.
- Audience window: how long ago someone took the action that put them in a retargeting audience.
The first one measures the funnel. The second one builds it.
Let’s break both down and put it all together at the end.
What is the attribution window in LinkedIn Ads?
It’s the period during which a conversion still gets credited to an ad. If someone clicked today and filled out the form on your site 20 days later, the conversion only counts for the campaign if the click window is 20 days or longer.
Every LinkedIn conversion rule has two windows:
| Window | What counts | Default | Options |
|---|---|---|---|
| Post-click | Conversions from people who clicked the ad | 30 days | 1, 7, 30 or 90 days (180 and 365 for some categories) |
| Post-view (view-through) | Conversions from people who saw the ad without clicking | 7 days | 1, 7, 30 or 90 days (180 and 365 for some categories) |
The 180- and 365-day windows apply to specific categories: lead, qualified lead, marketing qualified lead (MQL), sales qualified lead (SQL), submit application, purchase and add to cart. The 365-day window arrived in 2025 and the 180-day one in September 2026, according to the LinkedIn Marketing API changelog.
One important detail: these long windows are for conversions that come in through the Conversions API or a CSV upload. They’re not a universal Insight Tag option.
How to set up the rule, with screenshots, is in the post on LinkedIn Ads conversion tracking.
Why does the view-through window matter so much in B2B?
Because in B2B most people see and don’t click.
The CFO scrolls the feed, sees your ad three times in a month and doesn’t click anything.
Weeks later, they go to Google, type your company name and ask for a meeting.
With click-only attribution, the campaign that made them remember you gets zero credit.
Yep. The media that opened the door disappears from the report.
A view is a weaker signal than a click, sure. Seeing isn’t wanting. That’s why the view window is usually shorter than the click window.
But making it too short throws away exactly the part of the story that matters most on LinkedIn.
Which attribution window should you use: 30, 90, 180 or 365 days?
The one that fits your sales cycle. The conversion you measure has to happen inside the window. Otherwise it exists in your CRM and doesn’t exist in LinkedIn.
A starting point:
| Time between the ad and the conversion you measure | Click | View |
|---|---|---|
| Up to 30 days (content download, webinar, free trial) | 30 days | 7 days |
| 1 to 3 months (meeting, proposal) | 90 days | 30 days |
| 3 to 6 months (qualified lead, opportunity) | 180 days | 30 to 90 days |
| Over 6 months (enterprise deal) | 365 days | 90 days |
Notice that the cycle that matters is the one of the event you measure.
A form fill happens fast. A qualified lead takes longer. A closed-won deal takes way longer.
And long cycles aren’t an exaggeration: Dreamdata has a whole study on winning with LinkedIn Ads across a 272-day sales cycle. With a 30-day window, almost none of that journey shows up.
Three things to watch:
- A longer window shows more conversions. That doesn’t mean the campaign got better. It just gets credit for longer. Never compare campaigns or periods measured with different windows.
- Pick it upfront and stick with it. Changing the window mid-analysis mixes criteria and wrecks any comparison.
- Attribution isn’t causation. A long window credits whoever was on the path, but it doesn’t prove the ad caused the sale. I talk about that limit in the post on influenced pipeline.
What is the audience window in LinkedIn Ads retargeting?
It’s how long ago someone took the action that put them in the audience. When you create a retargeting audience, you pick the source (video, lead gen form, company page, ad, event or website) and the window.
On LinkedIn, engagement windows are 30, 60, 90, 180 or 365 days. For website visitors, the maximum is 180 days, according to the engagement retargeting documentation.
And here’s the logic I like the most:
The more recent the interaction, the warmer the person.
Someone who watched 75% of your video yesterday has you top of mind. Someone who watched it five months ago may not even remember.
They’re people at different moments. It makes no sense to show them the same ad.
The audience types and how to create each one are in the guide to LinkedIn Ads retargeting.
How do you build a full funnel by combining windows in LinkedIn Ads?
By using different windows with exclusions, so each person sits in one stage only.
Here’s the trick: the 180-day audience contains the 30-day audience. Whoever engaged last week also engaged in the last 180 days.
If you don’t exclude, the same person gets both messages.
So the funnel looks like this:
| Stage | Audience | Exclude | Message |
|---|---|---|---|
| Top (cold) | ICP: the companies and job titles in your targeting | Engaged in the last 365 days, and customers | Content that teaches and builds memory: video, Thought Leader Ads, document ads |
| Middle (warm) | Engaged in the last 180 days | Engaged in the last 30 days, and existing leads | Proof: case study, comparison, deeper content |
| Bottom (hot) | Engaged in the last 30 days | Existing leads and customers | Direct offer: assessment, demo, conversation |
In practice, in Campaign Manager:
- Create the same engagement audience in three windows. For example: “Engaged ads and videos – 30d”, “– 180d” and “– 365d”. Same source, different windows.
- Build one ad set per stage. In the middle ad set, include the 180-day audience and exclude the 30-day one. In the bottom one, include only the 30-day audience. In the top one, exclude the 365-day audience.
- Layer retargeting on top of your ICP. Pure retargeting picks up students, vendors and competitors. Adding the company and job title criteria from your main audience keeps the funnel clean.
- Remove whoever already moved forward. Leads, customers and open deals leave the acquisition funnel and get their own campaigns. The post on CRM audiences shows how to build each one.
- Give each stage its own message. The top teaches. The middle proves. The bottom invites.
Here’s the kicker: people move between stages on their own.
Someone who engaged 31 days ago leaves the bottom and drops into the middle. Someone who goes past 180 days without interacting leaves the middle. And someone who goes a full year without interacting goes back to the top.
You don’t have to move anyone by hand. The window does it.
That’s why I like this model so much: it’s a funnel that updates itself.
What if the audience gets too small?
LinkedIn only delivers to audiences with at least 300 members. And a new audience can take up to 48 hours to be ready.
Small account or brand-new campaign? Combine the sources into a single audience (all videos, ads and forms) or start with two stages: top and “engaged in the last 90 days”.
Once volume grows, then you split 30 from 180.
How do you know the windows are working?
Look at progression, not just cost.
The bottom has a higher cost per click and smaller reach, and that’s fine: it’s the most contested and most valuable audience.
What matters is whether accounts from the top are making it to the middle and the bottom, and whether the bottom turns into leads and meetings.
In LinkedScope, the Reached Companies screen shows which companies you’re reaching and how much each one engages, with the Intent Index for every account.
How do the attribution window and the audience window connect?
Your attribution window needs to be at least as long as the path your funnel takes.
Think about the funnel above.
Someone comes in through the top-of-funnel video, spends two months in the middle, drops to the bottom, asks for the assessment and becomes a qualified lead in month four.
With a 30-day click window, only the last campaign, the bottom one, gets the credit.
The top, which started it all, shows up as “doesn’t convert” and is the first thing cut when budget gets tight.
Classic. And wrong.
Rule of thumb: if the stages of your funnel add up to 4 to 6 months, the conversion you care about most (qualified lead) deserves a 180-day window. And then it has to come in through the Conversions API, which is where the long windows are available.
Even so, the conversion report measures people. In B2B, the buyer is the company, with several people on the buying committee.
To see the media’s influence on the whole account, you need to match the companies you reached against the deals in your CRM.
That’s what LinkedScope’s Pipeline Impact does: it looks at the last 2 years, treats a deal as influenced when its company was reached by your ads before the deal was created (7 impressions by default) and checks whether those deals close better than the rest.
It’s not full attribution. It’s an account-level read of influence, which covers exactly the part the conversion window can’t reach.
How to bring both reads into a report leadership actually understands is in the post on LinkedIn Ads reporting.
Want to see which companies your funnel is warming up and how much of your pipeline went through your ads? LinkedScope connects LinkedIn Ads to your CRM and shows it account by account. See how Pipeline Impact works and start your 15-day free trial. 😉
Frequently asked questions
What is the default attribution window in LinkedIn Ads?
It’s 30 days after a click and 7 days after a view. You can change it to 1, 7, 30 or 90 days and, for categories such as lead, qualified lead and purchase, to 180 or 365 days.
What is the best attribution window for B2B?
The one that fits the time between the ad and the conversion you measure. Content downloads and webinars fit in 30 days. Qualified leads and opportunities, with cycles of several months, call for 180 or 365 days after the click.
Does LinkedIn Ads have a 180-day attribution window?
Yes, since September 2026, alongside the 365-day window. It applies to lead, qualified lead (including MQL and SQL), submit application, purchase and add to cart, for conversions sent through the Conversions API or by CSV.
What’s the difference between the attribution window and the audience window?
The attribution window defines how long a conversion still counts for the ad. The audience window defines how long ago someone interacted with you to enter a retargeting audience. One measures the funnel, the other builds it.
How do you retarget by funnel stage in LinkedIn Ads?
Create the same engagement audience in different windows and use exclusions. The middle of the funnel gets people who engaged in the last 180 days, excluding those who engaged in the last 30. The bottom gets only people who engaged in the last 30 days.
How long does a retargeting audience take to be ready?
Up to 48 hours, and it needs at least 300 members to start delivering.
