Motion’s 2026 Creative Benchmarks report analyzed an anonymized dataset of +550,000 ads launched by +6,000 advertisers, representing roughly $1.3 billion in spend across Facebook and Instagram between September 2025 and early January 2026.

With this data, we can finally quantify what's really working in ad accounts.

Even better, we can see what the best-of-the-best teams are testing right now.

These five hook tactics are crushing for brands spending $1M+ per month, with strong usage and performance.

  1. Confession
  2. Bold claim
  3. Relatability
  4. Contrast
  5. Curiosity

The biggest spenders love these tactics, but you don’t need huge budgets to use them too. This guide will outline how to use them to stop the scroll for your own brand!

Please note: all ads shown in this guide are examples for educational purposes only, found from browsing ad libraries.

The Job of the Hook

Before we talk about building hooks, we need to define what makes a good hook, because most bad hooks come from misunderstanding the purpose of a hook. A hook has three jobs, and limited time to do them all:

  1. Stop the scroll - Catch the viewer’s attention enough to stay on their screen.
  2. Filter the audience - Make the right person feel seen and the wrong person scroll past.
  3. Earn the next 5 seconds - Create a reason to keep watching past the initial hook.

A good hook can’t just do one or two, it needs to fulfill all three jobs.