How to Check Negative Keywords in Google Ads

Negative keywords are a crucial part of any successful Google Ads account.

They help prevent unnecessary spend by stopping your ads from showing for irrelevant searches and guide your budget towards people who are more likely to make a commercial purchase. If you are not actively checking and managing your negative keywords, you may be paying for clicks that will never convert.

If you are wondering where to find your negative keywords in Google Ads, the steps below will show you exactly how to do it.

Where to Find Negative Keywords in Google Ads

To view your negative keywords, log in to your Google Ads account and follow these steps:

1. Click on Campaigns in the left hand menu

2. Select Audiences, keywords, and content

3. Click on Keywords

4. At the top, select Negative keywords

You will now see the negative keywords in the selected view. Check the campaign and ad-group filters before assuming you are looking at the whole account. You can also see the level and match type of each exclusion.

This overview is useful for understanding how your account is structured and where exclusions are already in place.

How to Remove Negative Keywords

If you want to remove a negative keyword, the process is simple:

1. Tick the box next to the negative keyword you want to remove

2. Click Edit

3. Select Remove

Once removed, your ads may begin showing for searches that were previously excluded, so it is always worth monitoring performance after making changes.

How to Add Negative Keywords

To add new negative keywords:

1. Click the plus button

2. Hover over it until you see Negative keywords

3. Click it and enter the negative keywords you want to add

4. Choose whether to apply them at campaign or ad group level

Adding negative keywords regularly is a great way to refine traffic quality and improve overall performance.

Finding Negative Keywords by Campaign or Ad Group

If you want to find more specific negative keywords for individual campaigns or ad groups, use the filters at the top of the table. You can filter by campaign, ad group, or other criteria to quickly narrow down your search and review only the data that matters.

This is especially helpful in larger accounts where multiple campaigns are running at the same time.

Check Shared Lists and Account-Level Exclusions Too

A campaign can also inherit exclusions from a shared negative keyword list or an account-level list. Review which lists apply before removing an individual negative: the same term could still be blocked elsewhere.

Negative Match Types Work Differently

For Search campaigns, broad negatives block searches containing all their terms, phrase negatives block the terms in the same order, and exact negatives block that search without extra words.

Negative keywords do not expand to synonyms or singular and plural versions in the same way as positive keywords. Google does account for casing and misspellings. For example, excluding jobs may still leave job searches available, so check the variations you actually see. See Google’s negative keyword guide for examples.

If you need help putting these checks into practice, my Google Ads management service can help you review the account and decide what to work on next.

Conclusion

Negative keywords are one of the most effective ways to reduce unnecessary clicks and control spend. Regularly reviewing them helps keep your traffic relevant, but exclusions cannot guarantee that every remaining search will convert.

If you would like external Google Ads support, I help businesses worldwide with their Google Ads accounts. Simply visit my contact form and we can discuss whether ongoing support would be a good fit for you.