Adsterra Review: Best CPM Ad Network for All Publishers

Last Updated: August 9, 2024
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What is Adsterra?


If you’ve been asking yourself, when was the last time an ad monetization platform came along and truly shook things up, chances are the answer is – not recently. The average consumer sees about 600-1000 ads per day— leaving publishers to wonder if they could cut through the noise and reach the right audience effectively and profitably. After all, isn’t that what every creator wants? 

This brings us to Adsterra, one of the highest paying ad networks whose unique Partner Care approach delivers as a publisher’s first-choice platform and the best Adsense alternative, with over 35K direct publishers and 15K top brands. Adsterra is not new to the scene, its decade-long presence has cemented a name in the industry, parallel to world-known networks that offer the best solutions to publishers. With over 35 billion global ad impressions per month and a presence in 248 GEOs, Adsterra adheres to top ad safety and traffic quality standards to ensure optimum returns for both publishers and advertisers. Expert managers assist in improving ad strategy for publishers, and the network also offers guidance on optimizing campaigns and monetizing traffic. Adsterra’s diverse ad formats, and competitive CPM rates, coupled with one of the fastest (NET-15) payment cycles in the industry make it a lucrative self-serve platform for publishers to try.

In this Adsterra review, we will go through an in-depth exploration of the platform, to show what it can do, what makes it different, its features and capabilities, and why we recommend it as one of the best CPM ad networks.

Summary
  • Adsterra Review: Best CPM Ad Network for All Publishers
    • 1. What is Adsterra?
    • 2. Adsterra Ad Formats
    • 3. Adsterra Features & Capabilities
    • 4. How to Get Started with Adsterra: Signup & Onboarding Process
    • 5. Adsterra Account Overview
    • 6. Requirements to Monetize Websites
    • 7. Adsterra CPM Rates
    • 8. Adsterra Payment and Payout Info
    • 9. Adsterra Revenue Share
    • 10. Top Geos Served
    • 11. Customer Support Information
    • 12. The Bottom Line

Adsterra Review: Ad Formats


Adsterra offers a variety of flexible ad formats, that include:

  • Social Bar: Adsterra’s flagship ad format - Social Bar is a teaser format that doesn’t require opt-ins. It is fully customizable and can take after almost any shape. Social Bar ads can be static and dynamic, plus they are mobile-friendly and do not require any additional space on your website. Social Bar uses dynamic iFrames that don't block web content. With this ad format, publishers can gain higher CPMs with over $300 weekly revenue from the start. Adsterra’s Social Bar includes many subformats with the most well-known being In-Page Pushes and Interstitials.
  • Popunder: Adsterra’s Popunder ads perform very well with verticals such as iGaming, e-commerce, and VPN. Popunders remain one of the most stable, high-revenue ad formats that are also UX-friendly.
  • In-Page Push: In-Page Push ad is a more effective replacement to web push. Adsterra serves you several best-converting templates that will never bore users returning massive clicks and conversions.
  • Interstitials: Adsterra’s Interstitials don’t require any fixed space on your website because they cover the whole screen. Users are likelier to interact with the ad because of full-screen coverage, so you can expect stellar revenues.
  • Banner Ads: One of the oldest types of online advertising, banner ads have proven efficiency, and therefore, are often used for massive worldwide campaigns delivering unprecedented performance to publishers. They are also universal and can complement any web page, from blogs to news platforms and e-shops.
  • Native Ads: Native ads mimic the look and feel of the environment they are placed on, ensuring relevance to users’ interests and on-page content. For publishers, native banners are a true goldmine as they are trusted by users and prompt numerous clicks and high CPMs.

Adsterra Review: Features & Capabilities


  • High Payouts: Adsterra matches the most competitive CPM rates on the market, with NET-15 payouts and a minimum payout threshold of USD 5 for WebMoney and Paxum. Other payment methods include PayPal and local currencies of 40+ countries with a minimum threshold of USD 50,  and Wire Transfer with a minimum threshold of USD 1000. 
  • Referral Program: Publishers get a +5% extra income from referrals.
  • Top-performing Ad Formats: The network’s range from classic to proprietary ad formats ensures high CPMs, a positive user experience, and 100% fill rates.
  • Partner Care Program: Adsterra is known for its unique Partner Care approach that extends 24/7 live support for publishers with expert managers who have deep expertise in traffic monetization. More than 80% of the partners say Adsterra’s managers are most approachable and helpful and always respond promptly. All managers undergo a unique in-house training program called Partner Care before working with real users.
  • Fast Approval: Adsterra approves publishers fairly quickly. Onboarding is easy, and it only takes about 10 minutes to add a website and start monetizing.
  • 100% Safety: The network’s anti-fraud and anti-malware solutions adhere to a 3-level security system to protect publishers’ inventory.
  • Best-matching Ad Feed: smart algorithms find relevant ads with the highest current bids for your traffic, and the Anti-AdBlock feature helps you monetize 100% of your traffic. 
  • Intuitive Dashboard: The Adsterra publisher dashboard is straightforward and user-friendly, with key metrics like CPM, CTR, revenue, and clicks at a glance.
  • Quality over quantity: There are no restrictions on your website's traffic volume, but traffic quality matters a lot.

How to Get Started with Adsterra: Signup & Onboarding Process


  1. Account Setup and Approval: Signing up to Adsterra is easy, all you need to do is fill up the details illustrated in the screenshot below to get started:
  2. Onboarding and Integration: Once your publisher account is successfully set up, you are directed to the Adsterra dashboard. Now you can add one or more websites using the “Add Website” button. Enter your website URL, select the category that describes your website best, tick the Ad Unit you'd like to add, leave out the campaigns that don't fit your audience, and then click ‘Add’.
  3. Implementing the Ad Code on Your Website: You can find all Ad Units that you added to a particular website by clicking the website's name or down arrow next to it. From here, you can find and copy the unique zone (website) and placement ID, copy the code by clicking 'Get code':
  4. Going Live: Once this is done, you are ready to check the status of your websites on your dashboard and go live!

Adsterra Account Overview


Up next in this Adsterra review is a comprehensive overview of its publisher account: intuitive, coherent, and user-friendly, it is equipped with numerous advanced features. Publishers can access sections like in-depth statistics, Direct Links, Payments, Support, Referrals, API, and, of course, their added websites. 

Here are its functionalities in further detail:

  • Statistics: Here you can have a quick overview of your stats- impressions, clicks, CTR, CPM, and revenue. Find the most effective traffic sources by adding domain, country, browser, OS, device, or placement filters.
  • Direct Links: If you have a social media group, a YouTube channel or a mobile app, you can use Adsterra’s Smart Direct Link to monetize your audience.
  • Websites: Here you can add a website and explore various types of ad units. 
  • Referrals: Track all your referral stats and commissions in the Referrals tab. 
  • API: This section lets you generate API tokens, and go through developer documentation. Adsterra’s API allows for monitoring real-time statistics to measure your traffic monetization success. 
  • Payments: Here you can find the payment schedule as well as your payment history.

Adsterra also has a ‘Freebies and Bonuses’ section with some special offers from partners that will come in handy when you need a certain trial or demo for a service. For example, you can enjoy promo codes from web analytics tools to improve your website’s SEO. 

Requirements to Monetize Websites


Adsterra doesn't have a minimum traffic threshold because the network prioritizes quality over quantity. The most crucial factor is the quality of the traffic, and even small websites and blogs can be permitted as long as their traffic is pure and genuine. However, we suggest publishers to have some quantifiable traffic before applying with any monetization platform. 

Adsterra Review: CPM Rates


CPM rates, or rates based on Cost Per Thousand impressions, are determined by multiple factors, some of which include ad format, audience demographics, and vertical in question. Whether you have mostly Tier-1 or Tier-3 traffic, your CPM will depend on the quality and performance of your audience. Although Adsterra offers industry-competitive CPM rates, they will undoubtedly vary from publisher to publisher depending on a number of circumstances. Check their guide to know how to improve your CPM. 

Adsterra Payment & Payout Info


Adsterra offers NET 15 automated payouts for new users. Publishers get paid twice a month, with multiple payment options including PayPal, Wire Transfer, Paxum, and others at request. The minimum payout amount is $5 if you use Paxum, $50 if you use PayPal or local currency (40+ countries available) and $1000 for Wire Transfer. To receive your first payment, you must reach the minimum payout threshold and wait two weeks for the funds to be automatically released.

Adsterra Revenue Share


Adsterra runs on a conversion-based CPA model which eventually gets reflected to effective CPM. The rates and revenue share are competitive; thereby allowing publishers to make significant revenue for their ad inventories. Additionally, Adsterra offers a generous 5% revenue share for all referrals that are brought through the publishers. 

Adsterra – Top GEOs Served


Adsterra operates globally and covers 248 GEOs. Adsterra’s publishers have extensive audiences from such countries as the US, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the UK,  LATAM, and various Asian GEOs.

Some of the top-performing GEOs by profit volume in 2023 were: 

  • Tier-1-2: US, DE, FR, GB, CA, IT, ES
  • LATAM: MX, BR,
  • Asia: IN, ID, TH, JP, PH, MY, BD, CN
  • Africa: NG, ZA, and others.

Adsterra Customer Support


Adsterra’s unique Partner Care approach prioritizes publishers’ needs with several ways to get in touch with support for swift resolutions, along with expert managers who have thorough expertise in traffic monetization. Publishers can chat with the managers directly from their personal Adsterra account. There’s a live chat where Adsterra’s trained managers are ready to help 24/7. They also have a dedicated email inbox for publishers - [email protected]

The Bottomline: Reasons to Join Adsterra as a Publisher


Summing up this Adsterra review: with multiple ad formats (flagship as well as classic), quick payment and payout terms, comprehensive support, a superior UX along with global reach, Adsterra stands out as a top CPM network for big as well as small publishers who are looking to amplify revenue streams through effective traffic monetization.

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Editorial Staff at Publisher Growth is a team of blogging and AdTech experts adept at creating how-to, tutorials, listings, and reviews that can publishers run their online businesses in a better way.

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