In this list, I include both advertising and affiliate networks.

An advertising network connects advertisers (merchants) with website owners that host advertisements on their properties. Companies that want to advertise their products and services take advantage of this business model in order to save time and reduce cost by letting the ad networks deliver their ads to the most relevant publishers.

On the other hand, publishers can generate streams of passive income by hosting these external ads on their websites.

Publishers are getting paid via various payment models and the most common are:

• Pay per click
• Pay or cost per sale
• Cost per impressions
• Cost per action (CPA, CPL, CPI, CPS, CPD)
• Pay per lead

Every ad network has its own rules and guidelines but the majority of them will pay publishers for ad clicks, ad impressions, or leads for the merchants.

For the vast majority of ad networks, the merchants will have to pay an entrance fee in order to participate, but publishers will join for free. However, publishers will not get paid unless they manage to monetize their traffic.

An affiliate network acts as a middleman between publishers (affiliates) and merchants that want to advertise their products and services. Affiliates that participate in an affiliate network can choose any product or service they want to advertise on their properties.

Affiliate networks provide affiliates and merchants with various tools like tracking technology, reporting, payment processing, product APIs.

Again, merchants will have to pay an entrance fee and affiliates can join affiliate networks for free. There are networks that charge merchants an extra fee, a percentage of the commissions paid to affiliates (override).

In essence, an affiliate network is an advertising network but there are some differences between those two types of networks.

In affiliate networks, publishers can choose any advertiser to promote and they can use various forms of campaigns (digital content, posts, landing pages, banners, videos, audio, social media, emails), but in ad networks, the ads running are controlled only by the network (but there are some networks that will allow publishers to remove certain ads ie…from their competitors).

In affiliate networks, the advertisers (merchants) know which affiliates are promoting their products, but in ad networks, they don’t.

Publishers can participate in affiliate networks without having to own a web property as they can utilize affiliate marketing via other channels (social media, emails, webinars). But publishers need to own a web property in order to participate in ad networks.

Ad networks give advertisers (merchants) various targeting options but affiliate networks don’t.

I also include in this list ad networks that are being used by advertisers (merchants) and affiliates (publishers) that want to promote their offers on their own, like it happens with Google AdWords or Facebook ads.

Advertisers or affiliates can advertise their offers on social media, search engines, or other properties, and they have to pay when someone clicks on their ads.

This is the pay per click advertising model, in which companies, advertisers, or affiliates pay whenever someone clicks on their ads. They are buying traffic to their offers, the opposite of organic, free, or earned traffic.

• 1BetterNetwork

• 401Ads

• 7Offers

• A4G

• AboveAllOffers

• ActionAds

• ActionPay

• Ad1

• Ad4Gate

• AdAttract

• AdCombo

• Addiliate

• AdFish

• AdGateMedia 

• AdGenius

• AdLockMedia

• AdMedia

• AdMitad

• AdMusketeer

• AdPepper

• AdPerio

• AdPump

• AdScendMedia

• AdShares

• AdsMain

• AdSmart

• AdSup

• AdTegrity

• Advertise.ru

• AdWool

• AdWorkMedia

• AdxMaster

• AdZoneMediaGroup

• AffiliateAdi

• AffiliateFuture

• AffiliateTrading

• AffiliateWindow

• Affiliaxe 

• AffRevenue

• AffShark

• AlfaConvert

• Amazon

• Appave.mobi

• Aragon-Advertising 

• AstoriaCompany

• AvanGate

• AvantLink

• AvazuINC

• Awin

• Babos

• BannerConnect

• BardzoMedia

• BidderPlace

• Bidvertiser

• BizProfits

• BlogAds

• BraveNetMedia

• BraveryMob

• BraziumAdvertising

• C3PA

• Chitika (discontinued) 

• CJ Affiliate

• ClickBank

• ClickBooth (discontinued – merged with AdPerio and Ignite OPM to create Perform – see below)

• ClickDealer

• Clickky

• ClickOnik

• ClickSor

• ClickSure (discontinued)

• Clicxy

• ClixGalore

• CommissionFactory

• CommissionSoup

• Convert2Media

• Copeac

• CPA Affiliates Network

• CPA Best Offer

• CPA Dawn (discontinued)

• CPA Empire

• CPA Full

• CPA Getti

• CPA Lance

• CPA Lead

• CPA Lock

• CPA Matica

• CrakRevenue

• CTR.ru

• DigitalConceptz

• DMS Affiliates

• Ebay

• EffectMobi

• ElonLeads

• eMediaTraffic (discontinued) 

• Evadav

• Exelo 

• ExoClick

• ExpertMobi

• ExplodingAds 

• EZmob

• FeedBurner

• FlexOffers

• Flickstree

• G4Offers

• Glispa

• Glize

• GlobalFastAds

• GlobalWideMedia

• GoogleAdSense

• HasOffers

• HerAgency

• HootMobi 

• HyperTargetMarketing

• iMonetizeIt

• ImpactRadius

• IndustryBrains 

• InSense

• InstaForex

• InternetMarketersConnect

• Involve.asia 

• IQoption

• JungleTap

• JVZoo

• KitaraMedia (discontinued)

• LaserMediaGroup

• LeadBit

• Leads.su

• LeadTrade

• LinkConnector

• LinkWorth

• M1Shop

• Madrivo

• Matomy

• MaxBounty

• MediaShakers

• Mirago

• Mobaloo

• Mobidea

• MobiOffers

• Mobipium

• Mobusi

• Mobzie 

• Monetizer

• MonsterLeads

• MundoMedia

• NamOffers

• OctoLead

• OfferSeven

• OneByAOL

• OneNetworkDirect 

• OutBrain

• PaloMobile

• PantheraNetwork

• PartnersEdge

• PartnerStack

• PayKickStart

• PaySale

• PeerFly

• PepperJam 

• PepperStonePartners

• Perform (cb)

• PerformanceHorizon

• PerformanceRevenues

• PlatformLead

• PointClickTrack 

• PX

• QpidAffiliate

• RainMaker

• Rakuten

• Refersion

• RevenueWire

• ReviMedia (now PX)

• Rextopia

• RingPanther

• RunCPA

• SalesDoubler

• Sellineo

• Shakes

• Shareasale

• ShareResults

• SirenLTD

• SmartADV

• SonarClick

• Systeme

• Taffiliate

• Tapgerine

• Targeleon

• TerraLeads

• TopAdsMedia

• Tractas

• TradeDoubler

• TradeTracker 

• Traffic Company

• ValuLeads

• vCommission

• ViceOffers (discontinued)

• VIP Offers 

• Visiqua

• W4

• WapEmpire

• WebGains

• WeveMedia

• WhiteMobi

• WowTRK

• XM

• YTZ

• ZeroParallel 

• ZeroPark