The short answer
You can use AI video in advertising. But «can» is made up of four checks, and failing any of them costs more than you save on filming:
- The service’s terms. Does your plan allow commercial use.
- What is in the frame. Are there other people’s faces, brands, characters, music.
- Advertising law. Truthfulness and labelling.
- Rights to the result. What happens if the clip is copied.
1. The service’s terms and plan
Every generation service has terms of use, and they say what you may do with the result. The overall picture is this:
- Paid plans from most developers allow commercial use, and the service itself does not lay claim to the generated result.
- Free plans are often limited to personal non-commercial use and a watermark.
- Special conditions exist on paid plans too. For example, Midjourney requires the Pro or Mega plan from companies with annual revenue over 1 million dollars.
What to do: before a commercial project, open the terms of the service you generate through and find the section on rights to the result. Save the version in force on the date of generation. If you work through an aggregator, check its offer too: the aggregator passes your request to the model through the developer’s API.
2. What is in the frame
Even if the service allows commercial use, that gives you no rights to whatever ended up in the frame.
Other people’s faces. A person’s image is protected by Article 152.1 of the Russian Civil Code: it may be used only with consent. This also applies to a generated «double» of a recognisable person. A celebrity in an ad without a contract is a direct road to a lawsuit. More: deepfakes and the law.
Other people’s voices. The voice of a famous person or a voice-over artist generated without consent also creates risks. A breakdown: AI voice cloning.
Brands, logos, characters. Another company’s logo in the frame or a famous cartoon character in an ad infringes the rights to a trademark or a work. A separate article: other brands, logos and characters in AI.
Music. If the model generated sound resembling a well-known track, or you added someone else’s music, you need the rights to it. It is safer to use music from libraries with a commercial licence.
Real people you photographed. If the clip is made from a photo of an employee or a model, get written consent to use their image in advertising.
3. Advertising law
AI advertising follows the same rules as any other.
Truthfulness. You cannot show the product as better than it is: a different colour, features it does not have, a result that will not happen. This is especially relevant for AI, because the model happily «improves» the product. The rule: the product in the clip comes only from a real photo; the surroundings can change, the product itself cannot.
Labelling the ad. Online advertising must be labelled under the advertising law; how it was produced does not matter.
A «created by AI» label. Under the 2026 law on the development of AI technologies, such a label is voluntary for users, while large platforms have obligations. More: AI content labelling.
4. Rights to the clip itself
There is an important nuance here that few people think about. Under Russian law only a human can be an author. If a clip is created entirely by AI from a short prompt, an exclusive right to it may not arise. The practical meaning: you can use the clip, but it will be hard to stop a competitor from using the same or a very similar one.
How to strengthen your rights: put human creative work into the clip. Your own script, storyboard, editing, text, voice-over, a composition of several generations. The more human decisions in the result, the stronger your position. More: copyright for AI images.
Checklist before launching an ad
- The plan is paid, and the service’s terms allow commercial use. A copy of the terms is saved.
- There are no recognisable people in the frame without written consent.
- No other companies’ logos, brands or characters.
- Music and voice have a commercial licence or are generated without imitating a specific person.
- The product in the video matches the real one.
- The ad is labelled.
- The source materials are saved: prompts, references, script, editing project. This is proof of your creative contribution.
How to make the clip itself: AI product ad video.
If you make AI content for clients, how to price it: how much to charge for AI video.
In short
AI video can be used in advertising if the plan allows commercial use, there are no other people’s faces, brands or music in the frame, and the ad is truthful and labelled. An exclusive right to a purely generated clip may not arise, so add human input: script, editing, text. For a large campaign, show the clip to a lawyer before launch.
