Saudi Arabia is the strictest market we serve for patient content. MOH rules ban patient testimonials and patient images in health ads, offers need MOH approval, paid creators need a Mawthooq licence, and doctors may not promote themselves by default.
This is a working summary for marketing teams, not legal advice. Every rule below names the instrument it comes from so you can read the source rather than take our word for it, and so you can tell when something here has gone out of date.
Who regulates healthcare advertising in Saudi Arabia
- Ministry of Health: Private Health Institutions Law (Royal Decree M/40) and MOH Annex 10, conditions for discounts and promotional offers and advertising content controls (Ed. 4)
- Law of Practicing Healthcare Professions (Royal Decree M/59) and its Implementing Regulations
- SCFHS Code of Ethics for Healthcare Practitioners (2014)
- SFDA Guide on Advertising Pharmaceutical and Herbal Products (OPS-G-012 v7.0, Jan 2026); device ads need prior SFDA approval
- GMedia (General Authority for Media Regulation): the Mawthooq influencer licence
- Personal Data Protection Law (Royal Decree M/19), enforceable since 14 Sep 2024
More than one of these usually applies at once. A campaign can satisfy the advertising regulator and still breach the data-protection one, which is the failure mode that catches most practices: the creative gets reviewed and the tracking does not.
The rules that actually change what you can publish
- No patient experiences, patient information or patient images in health ads, which rules out testimonials and before/after (MOH Annex 10).
- Banned claims include “the only”, “the expert”, “the most”, “guaranteed”, “instant treatment”, “eternal youth”, and “clinically proven” without evidence. No disparaging competitors (Annex 10).
- Ads must state the total fee. Discounts and offers need prior approval from the regional MOH health-licensing department, run up to 60 days, are limited to 3 approvals a year, and must display the approval (Annex 10).
- Practitioners may not advertise or promote themselves, directly or through an intermediary, except as the regulations allow (M/59 Art. 10(A)). Educational content is the safe lane.
- Paid creators need a Mawthooq licence and paid posts must be labelled. For SFDA-regulated products the influencer must be over 21, SFDA must be notified 12 hours before posting, and comments must be disabled (SFDA Guide v7).
- Prescription-only products such as botulinum toxin may not be advertised to the public. OTC and herbal ads need an SFDA licence, with its number and QR code on the ad.
- Health data is sensitive data under the PDPL: explicit consent, a DPIA for health-data processing, and consent with an opt-out for marketing messages.
At a glance: tactic by tactic
| Tactic | Where it stands | What applies |
|---|---|---|
| Patient testimonials | Not permitted | Patient experiences, patient information and patient images may not appear in health ads. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4). |
| Before-and-after images | Not permitted | Effectively banned in ads, because patient images may not be used. Outside ads, written consent, facility approval and a scientific purpose are required. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4); Royal Decree M/59, Implementing Reg. 5-3. |
| “Best”, “No.1” and guarantee claims | Not permitted | No “the only”, “the expert”, “the most”, “guaranteed”, “instant treatment”, or “clinically proven” without evidence, and no disparaging competitors. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4); SCFHS Code of Ethics (2014) §(C). |
| Prices, discounts and offers | Allowed with conditions | State the total fee. Each discount or offer needs prior MOH approval, runs 60 days at most, is limited to 3 approvals a year, and must display the approval. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4). |
| Influencers and endorsements | Narrow exceptions | Paid creators need a GMedia Mawthooq licence and paid posts must be labelled. Ads may not include patient experiences, so “my treatment at X” posts are high-risk. Source: GMedia Mawthooq licence; Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4). |
| A doctor promoting their own practice | Narrow exceptions | Practitioners may not advertise or promote themselves, directly or through an intermediary, except as the regulations allow. Stating status, degree and specialty, and educational content, are acceptable. Source: Royal Decree M/59 Art. 10(A); SCFHS Code of Ethics (2014) §(D). |
| AI-generated content | Narrow exceptions | No MOH AI rule found. Synthetic patients or results would breach the ban on patient content and misleading ads, and misleading deepfakes are prosecutable. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4); Anti-Cybercrime Law; SDAIA Deepfakes Guidelines (non-binding). |
| Patient images and data | Allowed with conditions | Health data is sensitive data: explicit consent, a DPIA and breach notice within 72 hours. Patient images need written consent and facility approval. Source: PDPL (Royal Decree M/19); Royal Decree M/59, Implementing Reg. 5-3. |
| Regulator approval before publishing | Process | Offers need prior MOH approval and product ads need an SFDA licence. No general MOH pre-clearance for service ads was found, but the Annex 10 content controls apply in full. Source: Saudi MOH Annex 10, advertising content controls (Ed. 4); SFDA Guide OPS-G-012 v7.0 (2026). |
How Branding Pioneers handles it
- Before any creative we check the facility's MOH licence and each practitioner's SCFHS registration and title.
- Every ad is in Arabic, labelled as an advertisement, and carries the facility name, contact details and hours. Procedure ads include risk and follow-up warnings.
- No testimonials, patient images or before/after in ads. We use illustration, models or anonymised education instead.
- Offers go to the regional MOH for approval first, and we track the 60-day and 3-a-year limits.
- Creators must hold a valid Mawthooq licence, and foreign creators are engaged only through a properly licensed Saudi entity.
- Doctors' accounts carry education only: no self-praise, no “book with me” calls and no patient footage.
- We keep an approvals file for every asset and can take content down the same day a regulator asks.
Tracking deserves the same scrutiny as copy. Analytics, pixels and remarketing tags routinely collect more than a healthcare provider is permitted to share, and the default installation of most of them is not compliant in Saudi Arabia. Audit what your tags send before you audit your ad copy.
Before you run anything
- Can you substantiate every claim in the creative, today, from a document you can produce?
- Do you have written consent for every patient who appears, covering this specific use?
- Has the approval or licence this market requires been granted, and is its number on the creative where required?
- Does your tracking send anything that identifies a patient or their condition?
- Has someone qualified in Saudi Arabia reviewed the campaign, not just the marketing team?
If the answer to the last one is no, that is the gap worth closing first. We work inside these rules daily and will tell you when something you want to publish is not worth the exposure, but we are a marketing agency, and a regulated market deserves a qualified reviewer as well.
Not legal advice. A planning summary of published rules, last checked on 11 October 2026. Rules change, so confirm the current text with the regulator or local counsel before relying on it.
