ClickBank is an online marketplace that connects people who create digital and physical products with affiliate marketers who promote and sell those products for a commission. Founded in 1998, it operates as both a storefront and a payment processor, handling checkout, sales tracking, commission splits, and payouts so that neither the seller nor the affiliate has to build that infrastructure themselves. The platform hosts over 4,000 products and reaches more than 200 million customers worldwide.
How ClickBank Works
ClickBank sits between three parties: vendors (product creators), affiliates (marketers), and buyers. A vendor lists a product in the ClickBank marketplace, sets a retail price, and chooses how much commission to offer affiliates. An affiliate browses the marketplace, picks a product to promote, and gets a unique tracking link. When a customer clicks that link and buys the product, ClickBank processes the payment, takes its cut, pays the affiliate their commission, and sends the rest to the vendor.
There are two ways to earn on the platform. You can create your own product and list it for affiliates to promote, or you can skip product creation entirely and earn commissions by promoting other people’s products. Many users start as affiliates because there’s no upfront cost, then move into selling their own products once they understand the marketplace.
What’s Sold on the Marketplace
ClickBank is best known for digital products: ebooks, online courses, video training programs, software tools, and membership sites. But the marketplace also includes physical goods, particularly health supplements and fitness products. Categories span a wide range, including health and fitness, self-help, business and investing, e-business and e-marketing, cooking, education, sports, home and garden, and parenting. Within each category you’ll find dozens of subcategories. E-business and e-marketing alone covers affiliate marketing, SEO, email marketing, social media marketing, copywriting, and more.
The most popular niches tend to be health, wealth, and relationships. Products in those areas typically have the highest sales volume and the most affiliates competing to promote them.
Commission Rates and How Affiliates Get Paid
Vendors set their own commission rates, anywhere from 1% to 75% of the sale price. Many digital products offer commissions in the 50% to 75% range because the cost of delivering a digital file is essentially zero, so vendors can afford to share a large portion of revenue with the affiliates driving traffic. Physical products tend to carry lower commissions because of manufacturing and shipping costs.
Some products use a subscription model, which means affiliates can earn recurring commissions each time a customer’s subscription renews. This makes subscription products particularly attractive because a single referral can generate income over many months.
ClickBank pays affiliates through direct deposit, wire transfer, check, or Payoneer for international transfers. If you receive payments by direct deposit or wire, you can get paid weekly or biweekly. Checks are issued every two weeks. The default minimum payment threshold is $100, but you can adjust it to any amount between $50 and $1,000,000. Each payment issued carries a $5 processing fee.
Fees for Sellers
Listing a product in the marketplace is free at first. ClickBank charges a one-time $49.95 activation fee only after your first product is approved. If your product doesn’t get approved, you’re not charged. There is no monthly subscription fee.
The main ongoing cost is ClickBank’s transaction fee. On every sale, ClickBank keeps 7.5% of the sale price plus $1. So on a $50 product, ClickBank takes $4.75 (7.5% of $50) plus $1, totaling $5.75. The remaining $44.25 is split between you and the affiliate based on whatever commission rate you set. Subscription rebills under $40 have a slightly different structure, with ClickBank keeping 9.9% of the rebill price.
There are a few smaller charges to be aware of. Refunds carry a fee of $0.50 or $1 depending on the product price and when the refund happens. And if your account sits with a positive balance but no earnings for an extended period, ClickBank considers it dormant and begins charging a maintenance fee.
Buyer Protections and Refund Policy
ClickBank acts as the retailer of record, meaning it processes the transaction and handles customer service disputes. The default refund window for buyers is 60 days. Sellers can customize this to anywhere between 30 and 90 days, or request an extended window of up to 364 days through ClickBank’s support team. Purchases made through PayPal carry a 180-day refund period regardless of the seller’s settings.
This generous refund policy cuts both ways. Buyers get meaningful protection when trying digital products they can’t preview before purchasing. But sellers and affiliates need to account for refund rates when projecting their income, since commissions on refunded sales get clawed back.
Getting Started as an Affiliate
Signing up as a ClickBank affiliate is free. You create an account, browse the marketplace, and generate a unique affiliate link (called a “hoplink”) for any product you want to promote. You can promote through a blog, YouTube channel, email list, social media, or paid advertising. When someone clicks your link and completes a purchase, ClickBank tracks the sale and credits your account.
The marketplace provides data to help you pick products. Each listing shows a “gravity” score, which reflects how many distinct affiliates have made at least one sale of that product recently. A high gravity score means the product is selling well, but it also means more affiliates are competing to promote it. A moderate gravity score often signals a product with proven demand and less competition.
Getting Started as a Vendor
Vendors create their product, build a sales page, and submit the product to ClickBank for approval. Once approved, the $49.95 activation fee is charged and the product goes live in the marketplace. You set your price, commission percentage, and refund period. From there, affiliates can discover your product and start driving traffic to your sales page.
The biggest advantage for vendors is access to ClickBank’s network of over six million affiliates. Instead of building your own marketing operation from scratch, you let affiliates do the promotion and only pay them when they generate an actual sale. This makes affiliate commissions a performance-based marketing expense rather than an upfront advertising cost.
Who ClickBank Is Best Suited For
ClickBank works well for digital product creators who want distribution without building their own affiliate program, payment system, and tracking infrastructure. It’s also a natural starting point for people new to affiliate marketing, since there’s no cost to join as an affiliate and the marketplace makes it easy to find products with existing demand.
The platform is less ideal for sellers of high-end physical goods or SaaS products that need complex billing logic. Its strength remains in the information product space: courses, guides, coaching programs, and digital tools, particularly in the health, wealth, and self-improvement niches where the marketplace has its deepest inventory and most active affiliate base.