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.
Who should choose which
- Choose Insert Affiliate if: you run an iOS or Android app and want to attribute, verify and pay affiliates on in-app purchases and subscriptions.
- Choose Refersion if: you run an online store on Shopify or a similar platform and want affiliate and influencer tracking on web sales.
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 for iOS and Android apps, where affiliate sales happen through in-app purchases Refersion can’t track. If you’re a subscription app, Insert Affiliate is designed for you.
