Mawthooq Licence: What Brands Must Check Before Hiring Saudi Influencers

Saudi shoppers buy on recommendation, so a Snapchat creator showing your serum in her morning routine can sell more than a month of display ads.

There's one rule to get right first: every creator who advertises to Saudi audiences needs a Mawthooq licence.

Mawthooq (موثوق, "trusted") is issued by Saudi Arabia's media regulator, and the creator pays for it. Your job as the brand is simpler: book licensed creators, label the ads and put it in writing.

Here's what the licence covers, how to check one in five minutes, and what to put in your contracts.

What is the Mawthooq licence?

Mawthooq is a licence that lets an individual publish advertising content on social media in Saudi Arabia. It's issued by the General Authority for Media Regulation (GAMR), which was called GCAM until 2023.

It became mandatory on 1 October 2022, and since then paid posts by unlicensed individuals have been illegal.

The licence covers any kind of advertising: video, audio, photos or text, on Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, X or YouTube. Licensed creators must:

• Advertise only through the accounts registered and linked to their licence.
• Follow GAMR's content and age-rating rules.
• Remove content when GAMR orders it.

For you, that's good news, because the licence works like a quality filter. Kolsquare found the number of active Saudi creators fell 35% after Mawthooq started.

The ones left are the professionals who treat advertising as a real business.

For platforms, rates and campaign planning, see our influencer marketing guide for the Gulf.

Who needs a Mawthooq licence?

Anyone who earns from advertising to Saudi audiences on social media needs one, whatever their follower count.

The foreign-creator rule matters most for international brands. In 2022, Saudi Arabia banned unlicensed ads by non-Saudi residents and visitors. The Ministry of Commerce also told businesses not to use non-Saudi advertisers unless they work through a licensed commercial entity.

So a Dubai, London or Shanghai creator with a big Saudi following can't just post for you. Book them through a licensed Saudi agency that takes legal responsibility for the content.

How much does Mawthooq cost, and who pays?

The creator pays. The licence costs SAR 15,000 for 3 years, and GAMR takes about 30 business days to issue it once the application is complete.

To qualify, the applicant must:

• Be 18 or older.
• Have no conviction for crimes involving honour or trust.
• Have no final GAMR violation decision in the last 6 months.
• Have posted compliant content on their accounts for the last 6 months.

The fee hasn't changed since launch, and creators build it into their rates. Agencies quote Saudi micro creators (10k–100k followers) at SAR 2,500–15,000 per post, so a busy creator recovers the cost quickly.

How do you verify a creator's Mawthooq licence?

Ask for the licence before you talk about rates, because the check takes a few minutes and protects your whole campaign.

1

Ask for the licence certificate

Request the Mawthooq licence number, the holder's full name and the expiry date. A professional creator sends this in one message.

2

Match the name

The holder's name on the certificate must match the creator's ID and the person you're contracting. If anything looks off, ask the creator to confirm it with GAMR, or have your agency check it.

3

Match the account

Make sure the handle that will post your content is the account linked to the licence. A licensed creator posting from a second, unlinked account is still unlicensed.

4

Check the expiry against your dates

The licence must be valid on every posting date, including any reposts or paid boosts later in the year.

5

Review 6 months of content

Look for anything that breaks GAMR's content rules: wealth-flaunting, filming children, misleading claims. Content risk becomes your brand risk.

6

Keep a copy on file

Save the certificate and screenshots with the contract. If a regulator or platform asks, you can show your checks in minutes.

What must brands do under Saudi advertising rules?

The creator holds the licence, but the ad is yours too, since Saudi law treats the advertiser as a party to the content.

Three rules apply to every campaign.

Label every post as an ad

The Implementing Regulations of the E-Commerce Law (Article 10) require every e-advert to be clearly marked as an advertisement, with the label at the start of the content.

In practice:

• Say it out loud and on screen. Use the word “إعلان” (ad) at the start of the story, video or post.
• Use the platform tools. Turn on Snapchat's Paid Partnership label and TikTok's commercial-content toggle. Use Instagram's paid partnership tag.
• Give real information. The ad must name the product and give enough detail for an informed decision. Article 11 of the law bans false or misleading claims.

An e-advert also counts as part of the sales contract, so what the creator promises, you must deliver.

Brief within GAMR's content rules

In September 2025, GAMR adopted new content rules for creators. Your brief must keep the content inside them:

• No filming children or domestic workers in daily content.
• No flaunting wealth or possessions.
• No bullying, mockery or exposing family privacy.
• No tribal, sectarian or racist content, and no vulgar language.
• No misleading information.
• A modest dress code: no revealing, tight or transparent clothing.

That rules out a few briefs common elsewhere, such as an unboxing set among luxury cars or a “day with my kids” routine.

Get product approvals first

Health, food, supplement and cosmetic products need SFDA (Saudi Food and Drug Authority) approval before they're advertised, so get your product listed first and brief creators after.

For the wider picture of what Saudi shoppers trust, see our guide to trust signals for Gulf stores.

What should an influencer contract include?

A written contract is your proof that you did things right. Keep it short, but cover these points:

• Licence warranty. The creator confirms a valid Mawthooq licence for the whole term, with the number and expiry written in.
• Posting accounts. List the exact handles. Only licensed, linked accounts may post.
• Disclosure. The “إعلان” label at the start, plus the platform's paid-partnership tag.
• Deliverables. Formats, number of posts, dialect (Saudi Arabic usually converts best), posting windows and approval rights.
• Content rules. A reference to GAMR's content standards and your right to request edits.
• Usage rights. Whether you can reuse the content in paid ads, for how long, and the fee for it.
• Removal and pause. The creator removes content if GAMR or the Ministry of Commerce orders it, and you can pause if the licence lapses.
• Agency responsibility. For foreign creators, the Saudi agency takes legal responsibility for the content.

Want a brand-safe shortlist and the paperwork handled for you? Licensed Saudi agencies do exactly this.

What are the penalties for brands and creators?

Penalties fall on the creator and on the business behind the ad.

The bigger cost is usually commercial: a removed campaign wastes the budget, and a public violation hurts the trust you're trying to build.

What changed in 2025 and 2026?

The rules have tightened step by step, and each step favours brands that work with professionals.

Worked example: a skincare brand's first Saudi campaign

Say you're a foreign skincare brand launching on noon and your own Arabic store, and you want 5 Saudi micro creators on Snapchat and TikTok for Ramadan.

What about the Dubai creator with a big Saudi audience? You book her through a licensed Saudi agency, and the agency adds its margin.

Every story opens with “إعلان” and the paid-partnership tag, and each creator gets a discount code so you can see which one actually sells.

Compare that with the risk. One unlicensed creator posting your ad carries a SAR 30,000 penalty on its own, and a five-minute check removes it.

Mawthooq vs the UAE Advertiser Permit

Running the same campaign in Dubai? The UAE has its own licence with different rules.

	Saudi Mawthooq	UAE Advertiser Permit
Regulator	GAMR	UAE Media Council / National Media Authority
Cost	SAR 15,000 for 3 years	Free for residents for the first 3 years
Validity	3 years	1 year, renewable
Covers unpaid or gifted posts
Foreign creators	Via a licensed Saudi agency	Visitor permit via an approved agency (AED 500)
Fine without licence	SAR 30,000	AED 10,000 first offence
Mandatory since	Oct 2022	Feb 2026

For the UAE details, read our guide to the UAE Advertiser Permit.

Notes for foreign and Chinese brands

• Always go through a licensed Saudi agency for creators who aren't Saudi residents. That includes creators in the UAE, Egypt, China or the US who reach Saudi audiences.
• Keep the agency's licence on file alongside each creator's. Ask for its advertising licence number.
• Write the brief in Arabic. Saudi dialect and local references matter more than polished production. Our guide to Saudi consumer preferences explains what lands.
• Pay in SAR through the agency. It handles creator payments and invoices, which keeps your books simple.

Notes for beauty, health, food and property brands

• Beauty and cosmetics. List products with SFDA before any creator posts. Avoid before-and-after claims you can't prove.
• Supplements and health. Medical claims need SFDA approval. Creators can share experience, not promise results.
• Food and drinks. Follow SFDA labelling and approval rules, and keep Ramadan content respectful.
• Real estate. Ask property creators for their FAL licence number as well as Mawthooq. Each property ad also needs its own REGA advertising licence, which you can look up through REGA's online inquiry service.

Where to find licensed Saudi creators

The fastest route is a Saudi influencer agency that checks licences, handles Arabic briefs and pays creators. Ask any agency to show its own advertising licence before you sign.

Compare more options in our directory of Saudi influencer agencies, or browse the wider Gulf influencer agency list.