Key takeaways
- Negative keywords are the cheapest way to stop wasting Google Ads budget. Here is what they are, plus starter lists for UK small businesses.
- Negative match types work in reverse: negative broad blocks the widest range of searches, negative exact blocks only the precise query, so broad is usually the safe default.
- Negatives do not match close variants, synonyms or plurals the way normal keywords do, so you add those yourself. They do cover misspellings and casing for you.
- The search terms report shows what people actually typed. Read it weekly, and add the waste as negatives in a few clicks.
- Performance Max and Smart campaigns take campaign-level negatives too, but those negatives only apply to Search and Shopping inventory, not YouTube, Display or Gmail.
Negative keywords are search terms you tell Google Ads never to match, so your ads stop showing for searches that will never become customers. They are the cheapest way to stop wasting ad spend: no new budget, no new creative, no landing page changes. You simply stop paying for clicks that were never going to convert, and the budget you reclaim goes back to the searches that do.
For a small business on a modest budget, this matters more than it does for a big spender. Every pound counts, and a handful of bad search terms can quietly eat a week’s budget before lunch. This guide covers what negatives are, the three match types, starter lists you can use today, the weekly routine that finds more, and the catch with Performance Max and Smart campaigns.
What negative keywords are, and why they save money
A negative keyword stops your ad from showing when someone’s search includes that word or phrase. Positive keywords say “show my ad for these searches”. Negatives say “but never these”.
Google matches your keywords to real searches, and that matching is deliberately loose, so a keyword like “office chairs” can trigger ads for “free office chairs”, “office chair repair jobs” or “how to fix an office chair”. None of those people want to buy a chair from you, but without negatives you pay for every click. Add “free”, “repair”, “jobs” and “how to” as negatives and that waste stops. The spend you reclaim is spent again on searches with real intent, which is why negatives are the first thing we check in any Google Ads audit.
The three negative keyword match types
Negative keywords come in broad, phrase and exact match, and they behave in reverse to the positive versions you may know. Choose the match type by how widely you want to block.
| Match type | How you write it | What it blocks | Example (negative is “running shoes”) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Negative broad | running shoes | Searches that contain all your words, in any order | Blocks “shoes for running”, allows “running socks” |
| Negative phrase | “running shoes” | Searches with your exact words in the same order | Blocks “best running shoes”, allows “shoes running” |
| Negative exact | [running shoes] | Only that exact search, with no extra words | Blocks “running shoes”, allows “running shoes uk” |
One rule trips up almost everyone. Negative keywords do not match close variants the way positive keywords do, so they will not automatically block synonyms or singular and plural forms. Exclude “course” and “courses” still gets through, so you add both. They do, however, account for misspellings and capitalisation on your behalf, so you can skip those (Google Ads Help, About negative keywords). For a starter set, negative phrase is a sensible middle ground: wide enough to catch real waste, tight enough not to block good traffic by accident.
Where negatives live: ad group, campaign, list and account
You can add negatives at four levels, and most small businesses only need two of them to start. Match the level to how widely the exclusion should apply.
- Campaign level is home for most of your negatives: words that are wrong for the whole campaign, like “free” or “jobs”. They apply to every ad group inside that campaign.
- Ad group level is for finer control, usually to stop two ad groups stealing each other’s searches. Useful later, rarely needed on day one.
- Negative keyword lists are reusable lists you build once and apply to many campaigns at the same time. Change the list, and every campaign using it updates. You can keep up to 20 lists of 5,000 keywords each (Google Ads Help, About negative keyword lists).
- Account level blocks a term everywhere at once, across Search, Shopping, Performance Max and more, with a cap of 1,000 terms. It is the right home for brand-safety words you never want to appear against (Google Ads Help, About account-level negative keywords).
For most new accounts, a solid campaign-level set plus one shared list of universal junk does the job.
Starter negative keyword lists by business type
Begin with a universal list of time-wasters, then add the ones that fit your sector. These are a sensible starting point, not a finished list, because your own search terms report will always know your customers better than any template.
Universal starters (fit almost everyone): free, cheap, cheapest, diy, how to, jobs, career, salary, vacancy, apprenticeship, internship, course, training, reddit, used, second hand, wholesale, template, meaning, definition.
Local service business (plumber, electrician, dentist, salon): jobs, apprenticeship, courses, qualifications, salary, diy, how to, parts, supplies, wholesale, volunteer, free. People searching these want a career, a lesson or a product, not to book your service.
Ecommerce and retail: free, voucher code, discount code, coupon, used, second hand, wholesale, bulk, repair, manual, spare parts, how to, recall, fake, replica, counterfeit. These catch bargain-hunters, repairers and researchers who rarely buy at your price.
B2B and professional services: jobs, salary, intern, internship, free, template, example, course, certification, definition, what is, student, cheap, remote jobs. These strip out students, jobseekers and people after a free download rather than a supplier.
Paste the universal list in first, add your sector list, then let the next section keep it growing.
Find more every week: the search terms report
The search terms report shows the actual phrases people typed before they saw your ad, and it is the best source of new negatives you have. Templates get you started; this report keeps you tidy.
The routine takes about ten minutes a week:
- In Google Ads, open the campaign, then go to Insights and reports, then Search terms.
- Read down the list for terms that are related to what you sell but are not actually it: the “free”, the “jobs”, the “how to”.
- Tick the wasteful ones and choose Add as negative keyword.
- Pick where to add them: this campaign, an ad group, or one of your shared lists.
- Save, then check the match type. Google adds them as negative exact by default, so switch to phrase or broad if you want to block a wider set (Google Ads Help, Get negative keyword ideas using the search terms report).
Do this weekly while a campaign is new and spending, then monthly once it settles. A small, steady habit beats a big annual cleanup, because the waste compounds while you are not looking.
The catch with Performance Max and Smart campaigns
Automated campaign types take negatives too now, but with limits worth knowing before you rely on them. This is where a lot of older advice is out of date.
Performance Max used to be a closed box. It is not any more. You can add campaign-level negative keywords to every Performance Max campaign, apply shared negative keyword lists to them, and read a search terms report for all of them (Google Ads Help, more visibility and control in Performance Max). The important caveat: those negatives apply to Search and Shopping inventory only, so they do not block YouTube, Display or Gmail placements. For the wider strategy behind these campaigns, see our guide to running Performance Max well in 2026.
Smart campaigns, the simplified type many small businesses start on, also accept negative keywords, though with less control than a standard Search campaign. Account-level negatives reach further still, applying across Search, Performance Max, Shopping and Smart campaigns in one place. Wherever you add them, the same habit holds: check what you are actually matching, and cut what does not belong.
Stop paying for the wrong clicks
Negatives are not glamorous, and that is the point. No campaign rebuild, no bigger budget, just less money handed over for searches that were never going to buy. For a UK small business watching every pound of ad spend, it is often the highest-return hour you will spend in the account all month.
If you would rather have it done properly, our Google Ads and PPC management covers the audit, the starter lists and the weekly search-terms routine as standard. Book a free growth review or get in touch, and we will tell you where your budget is leaking and what to fix first.