Is #ad enough in a video? What the FTC Q&A says

Not necessarily. The FTC's Q&A on its consumer reviews and testimonials rule says "#Ad" could work at the beginning of a text-only post, but it "may be too easy to miss in a video post." If you use a text disclosure in a video, it has to stand out so that viewers actually notice it.

The FTC wording is from its Q&A page, read 2026-10-01. This is a plain reading of that page, not legal advice. The Sume side comes from the Video captions and avatar video docs.

What does the FTC say about hashtags as disclosures?

The Q&A answers "maybe." Depending on wording and appearance, a hashtag can be a clear and conspicuous disclosure. Whether "#Ad" is adequate depends on context. The page ties the answer to where the reader looks: at the start of a text post it is more likely to be seen, and in a video it may not be.

Why is a caption-field hashtag a weak fit for video?

The FTC's standard is about what viewers notice. A hashtag in the caption field sits outside the frame, so it depends on a viewer reading the post text. Text drawn on the video is part of what plays. The Q&A does not name a specific size, color or duration, so do not treat any single style as a safe harbor.

How do I put stand-out text into a Sume video?

For an avatar video, optional captions on the talking-video request burns a style into the clean final MP4 after generation, using the spoken script text. For a finished clip, POST /v1/video-captions takes a public video_url and burns text onto it. To show your own wording rather than speech, pass cues (or segments) with text, start and end; that skips speech-to-text.

The black-outline style is documented as white fill on a thick black outline, mid-frame, "the safe default" for Hangul captions. The placement design override moves the line with anchor_ratio as a fraction of frame height. Those are the controls to make a line readable; whether a given render meets the FTC's test is your call, so check it on a phone screen. See also burning captions onto a video.

What should I do before publishing?

Put the disclosure on screen, early, in plain words, with strong contrast, and watch the final file at phone size. Keep the platform's own paid-promotion toggle too if it exists; the FTC page does not say a platform tool is enough on its own. Sume's docs do not describe a disclosure check, so the review stays with you.