What 243 SaaS affiliate programs pay
The short answer: across 243 SaaS affiliate programs, the median starting commission is 25% (203 programs state a percentage). 138 pay a recurring share, 59 of them for as long as the customer pays. Where a cookie length is stated (146 programs), the median is 90 days.
I read each program's terms on the vendor's own page between 9 November 2026 and 11 November 2026. Every figure below is arithmetic on those records, the same ones the marketplace lists, and the whole table is free to download and reuse.
Disclosure: the join links in the marketplace earn me nothing. One of the 243 programs is my own: I founded Causality Engine and own it. It is counted here like any other.
How the programs pay
The type decides what a referral is worth more than the rate does. A 30% share that stops after a year and a 30% share that never stops are different offers with the same headline.
| COMMISSION TYPE | WHAT IT MEANS | PROGRAMS | SHARE | MEDIAN STARTING RATE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Recurring | A share of each payment, for a stated number of months | 79 | 33% | 25% |
| Lifetime recurring | A share of each payment for as long as the customer pays | 59 | 24% | 25% |
| Tiered | The rate depends on volume, plan or partner level | 47 | 19% | 20% |
| One-time | One payment per sale, as a share of it | 20 | 8% | 22.5% |
| Flat bounty | A fixed amount per sale or sign-up | 11 | 5% | No percentage |
| Hybrid | A fixed amount plus a share | 9 | 4% | 20% |
| Not stated | The public terms do not say | 18 | 7% | 30% |
138 programs are recurring by type. The 56 tiered and hybrid programs may pay a recurring share as well, and I count them separately because their public terms tie the rate to something else first.
How long a recurring commission lasts
Of the 138 recurring programs, 59 pay for as long as the customer pays and 67 state a limit. The median limit is 12 months.
| RECURRING LENGTH | PROGRAMS |
|---|---|
| For as long as the customer pays | 59 |
| 12 months | 61 |
| 24 months | 5 |
| 36 months | 1 |
| Recurring, length not stated | 12 |
Cookie length
The cookie is how long after a click a sale still counts as yours. 146 of 243 programs state a length in days, and the median is 90 days.
| COOKIE LENGTH | PROGRAMS | SHARE |
|---|---|---|
| 30 days or fewer | 35 | 14% |
| 31 to 60 days | 37 | 15% |
| 61 to 90 days | 60 | 25% |
| More than 90 days | 14 | 6% |
| The referral never expires | 3 | 1% |
| Not stated in the public terms | 94 | 39% |
By category
Categories with three or more checked programs, largest first. A median over three programs says little, so read the count beside it. 11 smaller categories are in the CSV.
| CATEGORY | PROGRAMS | MEDIAN STARTING RATE | RECURRING | MEDIAN COOKIE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SEO | 17 | 30% | 53% | 60 days |
| Video | 15 | 25% | 60% | 60 days |
| CRM | 14 | 25% | 50% | 90 days |
| Email marketing | 14 | 30% | 36% | 60 days |
| Social media management | 13 | 20% | 46% | 90 days |
| AI agents and automation | 10 | 25% | 70% | 227.5 days |
| Lead data | 10 | 22.5% | 70% | 60 days |
| Ads and creative | 8 | 25% | 88% | 60 days |
| Cold email and outreach | 7 | 20% | 43% | 90 days |
| CRO and popups | 7 | 20% | 71% | 90 days |
| Landing pages and funnels | 7 | 30% | 86% | 90 days |
| Webinars | 7 | 22.5% | 71% | 30 days |
| Affiliate software | 6 | 25% | 17% | 75 days |
| Data connectors | 6 | 20% | 83% | 90 days |
| Hosting | 6 | 10% | 0% | 60 days |
| LinkedIn automation | 6 | 27.5% | 67% | 60 days |
| Web analytics | 6 | 20% | 67% | 22 days |
| AI productivity | 5 | 35% | 40% | 60 days |
| AI voice and chat | 5 | 22% | 60% | 30 days |
| Design | 5 | 30% | 60% | 45 days |
| Email deliverability | 5 | 20% | 60% | 60 days |
| Forms and quizzes | 5 | 30% | 100% | 180 days |
| Meetings and notes | 5 | 30% | 60% | 90 days |
| Reporting and dashboards | 5 | 20% | 80% | 90 days |
| Customer support | 4 | 20% | 50% | 90 days |
| Influencer marketing | 4 | 20% | 50% | 60 days |
| Presentations | 4 | 30% | 0% | 60 days |
| Shopify page builders | 4 | 40% | 50% | Not stated |
| Chat marketing | 3 | 25% | 33% | 90 days |
| Ecommerce platforms | 3 | 37.5% | 33% | 60 days |
| Rank tracking | 3 | 20% | 100% | 227.5 days |
| Website builders | 3 | 50% | 100% | 90 days |
| WordPress plugins | 3 | 45% | 33% | 45 days |
By affiliate platform
The platform is the software a vendor runs its program on. It decides how you are paid and often how long the cookie lasts. Platforms with three or more programs are shown. "In-house" means the vendor runs its own tracking. 17 programs do not name a platform in their public terms.
| PLATFORM | PROGRAMS | MEDIAN STARTING RATE | RECURRING | MEDIAN COOKIE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PartnerStack | 57 | 20% | 56% | 90 days |
| In-house | 50 | 25% | 52% | 60 days |
| FirstPromoter | 37 | 22.5% | 76% | 60 days |
| Rewardful | 22 | 25% | 77% | 60 days |
| Impact | 15 | 25% | 33% | 90 days |
| Dub | 11 | 25% | 55% | 90 days |
| Tapfiliate | 7 | 20% | 43% | 45 days |
| Reditus | 4 | 20% | 75% | 30 days |
| Tolt | 4 | 27.5% | 75% | 45 days |
| Awin | 3 | 37.5% | 33% | 60 days |
| Cello | 3 | 27.5% | 67% | 90 days |
Who gets in
| APPROVAL | PROGRAMS | SHARE |
|---|---|---|
| Open sign-up | 95 | 39% |
| Application reviewed | 148 | 61% |
| invite | 0 | 0% |
The ten highest starting rates
Sorted by the stated percentage alone, ties in name order. A high one-time rate and a lower recurring rate are not the same kind of money, so the type is beside each one.
| PROGRAM | STARTING RATE | TYPE | CATEGORY |
|---|---|---|---|
| Adobe (Creative Cloud) | 85% | One-time | Design |
| Surfer | 75% | One-time | SEO |
| Systeme.io | 60% | Lifetime recurring | Landing pages and funnels |
| BigMarker | 50% | One-time | Webinars |
| Decktopus | 50% | Not stated | Presentations |
| EComposer | 50% | Lifetime recurring | Shopify page builders |
| Elegant Themes (Divi) | 50% | Lifetime recurring | WordPress plugins |
| Flodesk | 50% | Recurring | Email marketing |
| Framer | 50% | Recurring | Website builders |
| Kit | 50% | Tiered | Newsletters |
How these numbers were made, and where they stop
- The source is each vendor's own terms page. Every program page here links the page I read and shows the date. Where a landing page and the terms disagree, the terms win.
- The starting rate is what a new affiliate gets. A program that pays 20% and climbs to 40% counts as 20%. Programs that only state an amount of money, or no figure, are left out of the rate medians and counted everywhere else.
- This is not a sample of the whole market. The 243 programs are the affiliate programs of SaaS tools marketers buy, the ones this site already covers. Other software categories may pay differently.
- Medians, not averages. A few very high one-time rates would pull an average up. The median is the middle program.
- Terms change. These were read between 9 November 2026 and 11 November 2026. When a program is read again, this page and the CSV follow. If a row is wrong, the listing form reaches me, and the correction is made against the vendor's terms page.
The CSV has one row per program: type, starting rate, recurring length, cookie, platform, approval, payout, the vendor's terms page and the date it was read. It is published under CC BY 4.0: use it for anything, including commercial work, and credit it with a link to this page.
DOWNLOAD THE CSVTo cite it:
Joris van Huët, "SaaS affiliate program benchmarks: 243 programs", MarketingUpgrade.pro, terms read by 11 November 2026. https://www.marketingupgrade.pro/marketplace/benchmarks
Three questions, answered from the data
- What is a typical SaaS affiliate commission?
- The median starting commission is 25% across the 203 of 243 SaaS affiliate programs in this dataset that state a percentage. Terms were read on each vendor's own page between 9 November 2026 and 11 November 2026. It is a median of the rate a new affiliate starts on, not the top tier.
- How many SaaS affiliate programs pay recurring commission?
- 138 of 243 programs (57%) pay a recurring share by type. 59 of those pay for as long as the customer pays. The 67 that state a limit have a median of 12 months. Another 56 are tiered or hybrid and may recur as well.
- How long does a SaaS affiliate cookie last?
- Where the public terms state a length (146 of 243 programs), the median is 90 days. 3 programs say the referral never expires, and 94 do not state a length in their public terms.
Where to go from here
- Browse all 243 programs and filter by category, type and cookie.
- Run a SaaS affiliate program? See where your terms sit against your category, and list it free.
- The glossary weighs each tool's worst reviews. An affiliate inherits the complaints of what they sell.