Where they overlap
The two share a lot on paper: affiliate tracking, commission management, an affiliate marketplace, subscription/recurring commissions and affiliate payouts. Refersion is genuinely strong and well established at what it does (e-commerce affiliate and influencer marketing), with first-party tracking and deep Shopify integration. The split is the sales channel, not the feature list.
The key difference: online stores vs app in-app purchases
Refersion tracks e-commerce sales. Its integrations are online-store platforms (Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce, Magento) plus web Stripe payments, and it provides no native mobile SDK, so it cannot attribute or verify App Store or Google Play in-app purchases and subscriptions. Its “subscription commissions” are web and Stripe subscriptions, not native app-store IAP.
Insert Affiliate is purpose-built for app in-app purchases: deep-link attribution, receipt verification via RevenueCat, Adapty, Apphud, Iaptic or the stores directly, a free affiliate marketplace, and Stripe Connect payouts with VAT-compliant self-billing invoices. If your subscriptions are sold inside an app, that is the toolset you need. If you also sell on the web through Stripe, those purchases and renewals are tracked too and credited to the same affiliate.
Refersion pricing in 2026
Refersion charges a monthly fee plus a percentage of the sales your affiliates drive. Every paid plan includes unlimited affiliates, clicks and conversions, and paying yearly takes 20% off the monthly fee.
| Refersion plan | Monthly price | Share of affiliate sales |
|---|---|---|
| Marketplace listing | Free | None (a public listing that affiliates can apply to) |
| Launch | $39, or $29 a month billed yearly | 3% |
| Growth | $199, or $159 a month billed yearly | 2% |
| Scale | Custom, through sales | Flat monthly subscription |
Launch covers the basics: first-party tracking, one-click payouts and the standard commission types. Growth adds advanced commissions, tracking by product and customer email, API access, more than 30 integrations and multi-store management.
Insert Affiliate uses a similar shape, a monthly fee plus a share, with a free tier to start on.
| Insert Affiliate plan | Monthly price | Share of affiliate revenue |
|---|---|---|
| Free | ÂŁ0 | None (2 affiliates, 100 transactions) |
| Starter | ÂŁ20 | 10% |
| Growth | ÂŁ70 | 8% |
| Enterprise | ÂŁ200 | 7.5% |
A fixed-price option is available on request. The two are priced for different kinds of sale, though. Refersion’s percentage applies to online shop orders, and Insert Affiliate’s applies to in-app purchases, subscriptions and Stripe sales on the web. So the first question is still where your sales happen, and price comes second.
Who should choose which
- Choose Insert Affiliate if: you run an iOS or Android app, or sell software or subscriptions on the web through Stripe, and want to attribute, verify and pay affiliates on those sales.
- Choose Refersion if: you run an online store selling physical products on Shopify or a similar platform. Refersion is built for that, and Insert Affiliate is not a fit for that kind of business.
Bottom line
Refersion and Insert Affiliate are both strong affiliate platforms for different channels. Refersion is a mature choice for e-commerce and Shopify brands. Insert Affiliate is built first for iOS and Android apps, where affiliate sales happen through in-app purchases Refersion can’t track, and it also runs web-only programmes for businesses that sell through Stripe. If you’re an app or software business, Insert Affiliate is the one designed for you.
