Affiliate Commission and Payout Calculator

Affiliate income is easy to overestimate. The number of referred orders is the exciting part, but the money that reaches you is smaller: some orders are refunded, the commission rate may depend on how much you sell, a network or payment fee may be deducted, and the programme may not pay until your balance reaches a threshold. This page walks through those steps and shows the payout, and what each click you send is worth.

From orders to net sales

Enter the orders you referred and their average value. The page multiplies them to get referred sales, then removes the share that is refunded or cancelled to get net sales. These are the sales on which commission is paid. If you do not know the refund share, check your programme’s reports for a few months; it varies a lot between products.

The commission

Choose a flat rate or tiers. With a flat rate the commission is net sales times the percentage. With tiers, enter lines such as 5000 | 8, meaning that from 5,000 of net sales the rate is 8%. The page offers the band method, where each slice is paid at its own rate, and the whole-amount method, where the top tier reached applies to everything. The table of tiers appears under the result when you use tiers.

Fees, thresholds and clicks

A fee percentage, for example from a payment platform, is taken from the commission. The minimum payout is compared with what is left, and if the payout is below it the result line says it is held until your balance reaches the threshold. If you enter the clicks you sent, the page adds earnings per click, EPC, and the orders per 100 clicks. EPC lets you compare traffic sources or programmes on one scale.

A worked example

The default is 120 referred orders of 80, so 9,600 of sales, with 5% refunded. Net sales are 9,120, and a flat 8% gives a commission of 729.60, an effective rate of 8.00%. With no fee the payout is 729.60, which is above the 50 minimum. From 3,000 clicks, EPC is 0.243 and there are 4.00 orders per 100 clicks. The tiered sample has 300 orders, so 24,000 of sales and 22,800 net, with tiers of 5% from 0, 8% from 5,000 and 10% from 15,000, paid by band. The tiers pay 250.00, 800.00 and 780.00 on 5,000, 10,000 and 7,800 of net sales, a commission of 1,830.00 or 8.03%. A 2% fee takes 36.60, so the payout is 1,793.40. EPC is 0.598 and there are 10.00 orders per 100 clicks.

Using EPC to compare sources

Suppose one source sends 3,000 clicks and earns 0.243 each, and another sends 1,000 and earns 0.60 each. The second pays better per visitor, even though it sends fewer. Knowing EPC helps you decide where to spend your effort, and whether a programme with a lower rate but a better-converting product beats one with a higher rate.

Edge cases

Refunds and the fee must be from 0 to 100. A programme with no minimum can be modelled by clearing the minimum box. If the commission is zero, no payout is held. The clicks box needs a number above zero. Tiers must be valid lines with different starting amounts, or the page names the line it cannot read.

Limits

Cookie windows, delayed approval of commissions, currency conversion, tax on your earnings and bonuses for reaching targets are not modelled. Programmes differ on whether refunds reverse commission and on payment dates, so use your programme’s own terms for any decision that matters. The page shows estimates for planning, not figures that the programme has confirmed.

Related tools

• Sales Commission and Tiered Payout Calculator applies the same band and top-tier methods to a salesperson’s sales.
• ROAS, CPM, CPC and CTR Calculator shows the cost side if you pay for traffic.
• Email Marketing ROI and Click Rate Calculator measures an email promotion of an affiliate link.
• Percentage Calculator works out a single commission quickly.