# Monitors & projects

> **Title:** Monitors & projects — Rival Ads Docs
> **Description:** Understand monitors, channels, locations and projects before setting up competitor tracking.
> **Canonical URL:** https://www.rivalads.io/docs/monitors
> **Note:** This is the markdown twin of https://www.rivalads.io/docs/monitors. Append `.md` to any Rival Ads page URL to get markdown.

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A **monitor** tracks one competitor on one advertising channel. Tracking the same competitor on Meta and Google creates two monitors because each channel has its own source, ads and history. Your plan allowance is measured in monitors.

## What a monitor contains

Each monitor has:

- A competitor name.
- One channel: Meta, Google, TikTok or LinkedIn.
- A source for that channel, such as a Facebook page URL, website domain or advertiser name.
- One to five **Locations to monitor**. The first location is the default results filter.
- A project.
- Its own ad history, read state and **Instant new-ad alerts** setting.

The channel icon appears beside the competitor name throughout the product. The same name can therefore be used once per channel.

## Projects

Projects group monitors, usually by client, brand or business unit. Every workspace starts with a **General** project.

Owners and admins can select **New project**, enter a **Project name**, and optionally choose a **Client language**. The client language controls strategy reads, public reports, PDFs and client copy-sheet labels for monitors in that project unless a report link uses its own language.

A project can be renamed as long as no other project in the workspace uses that name. It can be deleted only when it is empty; move or delete its monitors first. Deleting a project does not silently delete monitor history.

## Moving a monitor

Open a monitor and select **Edit**, then choose a different **Project** and **Save changes**. Project-level access follows the destination project, so moving a monitor can change who sees it.

For example, moving a Meta monitor from “Internal research” to “Client A” immediately makes it visible to members with **Whole project** access to Client A and removes access that came only from the old project.

If the destination project changes the monitor’s effective client-facing language, Rival Ads also prepares a matching strategy read. A monitor-specific **Report language** can keep the language unchanged. See [Languages & translated content](/docs/languages).

## What admins and members can do

Owners and admins see every monitor and can add, edit, assign, sync and delete them. Members see only monitors granted through a project or direct assignment. Their **Library**, alerts and weekly digest follow the same visibility.

Use [Team, roles & access](/docs/team) for the permission model or [Manage client access](/docs/manage-access) for a step-by-step setup.

## Monitor actions

- **Sync now** requests a fresh source check without waiting for the next scheduled fetch.
- **Edit** changes the monitor name, source, project and instant-alert setting.
- **Assign** grants quick direct access to selected members.
- **Delete monitor** permanently removes the monitor and its full history.

Replacing the source is different from correcting its formatting. When the product asks you to confirm **Replace this monitor source**, it will clear existing ads, saved ads, read history, strategy reports and the public report link. Review the warning before continuing.

To create one, follow [Add a competitor](/docs/add-competitor). For source-specific requirements, see [Supported channels](/docs/channels).