The modern Refersion alternative
for Shopify brands.
Refersion has run affiliate programs for Shopify merchants since April 2013, and the maturity shows: first-party tracking it positions as cookie-free, SKU-level commissions, a built-in recruiting marketplace, and real W-9/W-8 plus 1099 handling through its Trolley integration. But the pricing model changed. The old conversion-capped tiers are retired, and today's plans are $39/mo plus 3% of your affiliate-driven sales, or $199/mo plus 2%, billed to your credit card by Refersion, Inc. outside your Shopify invoice. Rekomi charges flat plans plus 3% of the payouts you actually make, and bills through Shopify. So the real question is which base you want your percentage charged on, and this page works that through with live numbers.
When to pick which.
You want the percentage fee charged on the small number (the commissions you pay out), not the big one (every affiliate-driven sale). You want the whole program embedded in your Shopify admin and billed on your Shopify invoice, tracking backed by an app web pixel plus the buyer journey Shopify records on each order, per-affiliate real Shopify discount codes you can scope to specific products, payouts that run themselves to 150+ countries over Stripe Express, bank deposits, and PayPal, real-time fraud scoring on every plan, and API access without a $199/mo gate.
Your program leans on what Refersion genuinely does well: the Trolley-powered tax stack that collects W-9s and W-8s and generates 1099s and 1042-S forms, SKU-level and tiered commission structures, or the Refersion Marketplace for recruiting. A Shopify app running since 2013 with a 4.8-star rating across 462 reviews is a known quantity, and if yours works, that is worth something real.
The full comparison.
How we keep this honest
Every row reflects real product behavior on the date above. We update this page when either product ships material changes. Nothing here is invented to make Rekomi look better.
Which one fits your situation.
Affiliate platforms are not one-size-fits-all. Here is a straight read on which tool wins for each profile we see.
Shopify DTC brand paying typical 10-20% commissions
The fee base decides this one. On $10,000/mo of affiliate-driven sales at a 15% commission rate, Refersion Launch costs $39 + $300 = $339/mo. Rekomi Growth costs $49 + 3% of the $1,500 you paid out = $94/mo. The gap widens as affiliate revenue grows, which is exactly when you least want your platform fee scaling with sales.
Brand whose accountant loves the Trolley tax flow
If your program already runs W-9/W-8 collection, reviewed-before-payment enforcement, and 1099/1042-S generation through Refersion's Trolley integration, that is a genuinely mature tax stack and a real reason to stay. Rekomi collects W-9s natively in payout onboarding and preps a 1099-NEC worksheet, but if the Trolley flow plus the Refersion Marketplace are load-bearing for you, Refersion earns the recommendation honestly.
Merchant who wants everything inside the Shopify admin
Rekomi's app runs the whole program embedded in the Shopify admin and bills through Shopify, so charges appear on the invoice you already reconcile. Refersion's listing discloses that external charges may be billed by Refersion, Inc. separately from your Shopify invoice, and recent 1-star reviews describe annual contracts that were hard to exit.
Established Refersion program on a Scale contract that runs clean
Scale is a custom flat subscription for $1M+ GMV brands with white-glove support, and a working program is an asset. The moment to re-evaluate is contract renewal: model your affiliate-driven sales against a flat Rekomi plan plus 3% of payouts, and remember Rekomi's Refersion importer brings your roster across with rfsn links intact in one API pull.
Where the modern build pays off.
The pillars below summarise the side-by-side above. We keep the read honest by including the cases where Refersion still wins today.
Our case.
Economics and surface area. The percentage fee lands on payouts actually made, not on every affiliate-driven sale, which at normal commission rates is the difference between $94 and $339 a month on the same program. Billing runs through Shopify on one invoice instead of a separate Refersion, Inc. card charge. Payouts run themselves to 150+ countries with no pre-funded Trolley account and no batch day. Fraud scoring, full API access, data export, and sub-affiliate recruiting come on every plan instead of behind a $199/mo gate. Plus the modern surface: AI co-pilot, event webhooks, MCP, and a 21-source importer with Refersion on the list.
What both ship.
Stripe-native tracking, refund-aware attribution, signed S2S hooks, and standard commission models. Both tools clear the bar on the table-stakes. The differences live in everything built on top of that foundation.
No spin.
Thirteen years on Shopify have produced real depth: a 4.8-star listing with 462 reviews, first-party tracking it documents as cookie-free with an adjustable 90-day attribution window, SKU-level and tiered commission structures with bulk CSV upload, the Refersion Marketplace as a built-in recruiting channel, and a tax stack most Shopify affiliate apps cannot touch: W-9/W-8 collection, reviewed-before-payment enforcement, and 1099 plus 1042-S generation through the Trolley integration. Its 2023 acquisition figures claim over $2B in affiliate revenue driven. This is a mature product with genuine strengths.
Our straight answer.
Refersion is the strongest incumbent on this list for tax handling, and we will not pretend otherwise: the Trolley stack is real and most competitors have nothing like it. But two things changed. Refersion's pricing moved to a base fee plus a percentage of your affiliate-driven sales, which taxes your growth on the big number, and its charges bill outside Shopify to a separate card, with recent reviews citing hard-to-exit annual contracts. Rekomi runs the same job billed through Shopify at a flat $29 to $99 plus 3% of only what you pay affiliates, with payouts and fraud handled natively on every plan. If you are choosing fresh for a Shopify store, Rekomi is the straightforward pick. If you are on Refersion today, run the math below on your own volume; when the gap gets uncomfortable, the dedicated importer moves your roster with rfsn links intact in one afternoon.
Common questions.
What does Refersion pricing look like in 2026?
Current Refersion pricing (from its live pricing page, checked 2026-08-20): Launch at $39/mo, or $29/mo billed annually, plus 3% of affiliate-driven sales; Growth at $199/mo, or $159/mo billed annually, plus 2% of affiliate-driven sales; and Scale, a custom flat subscription for brands over $1M GMV per year. A free Marketplace Listing tier exists but is a recruiting listing, not a working plan. Note that many directories still show the retired $99/$249 conversion-capped tiers; those are gone for new customers. The percentage fee is calculated on affiliate-driven sales only, not total store revenue, and billed monthly.
How do the percentage fees actually differ?
Refersion charges its 3% (Launch) or 2% (Growth) on affiliate-driven sales: every dollar of revenue your affiliates generate. Rekomi charges 3% (2.5% on Enterprise) on affiliate payouts: the commissions you actually pay out. At a 15% commission rate those bases differ by roughly 6-7x. Example: $10,000/mo in affiliate sales with $1,500 paid in commissions costs $300 in percentage fees on Refersion Launch versus $45 on Rekomi, before the base plans ($39 vs $29-99). Refersion also stacks the percentage on top of a higher entry price, so both levers move against you as you grow.
How does each platform handle W-9s, W-8s, and 1099s?
Refersion handles this well, through its Trolley integration: affiliates complete W-9 (US) or W-8 (non-US) forms, a form must reach reviewed status before payment, and the system supports 1099 generation for US affiliates and 1042-S for non-US. The trade-off is that it rides on Trolley: you pre-fund a Trolley account, onboarding takes 3+ business days, and Trolley refuses certain business categories. Rekomi does it natively and included: W-9s are collected during Stripe Express payout onboarding (W-8 handling on the PayPal rail), and at year end you export a 1099-NEC candidates worksheet for your accountant. On both platforms your brand is payer of record and does the filing.
What does running payouts involve on Refersion versus Rekomi?
On Refersion, payouts are brand-funded batches: bulk ACH or PayPal through Trolley (after pre-funding the Trolley account: ACH takes 1-2 business days, direct debit up to 5), direct PayPal from your own PayPal Business account, digital gift cards, or manual reconciliation, with a recommended $5 minimum threshold. On Rekomi there is no payout day: payouts run automatically on schedule over Stripe Express, bank deposits, and PayPal to affiliates in 150+ countries, on every plan, with per-campaign minimum thresholds if you want them.
How does migration from Refersion to Rekomi work?
Rekomi ships a dedicated Refersion importer. In Refersion, open Account, Settings, Refersion API and copy your Public Key and Secret Key (Refersion's API requires its Growth plan or higher), then paste both into Rekomi's migration screen; the keys are used once and never stored. One pull imports your roster with each affiliate's ?rfsn= link value preserved in full as their Rekomi slug, and since rfsn is a built-in Rekomi attribution param, existing links keep attributing the moment you swap tracking. Refersion's API does not expose conversion history, so the pull is roster-focused; historical conversions come in through a Step 2 CSV from your own records, and Refersion's emailed affiliate CSV export works as a roster fallback if you lack API access. See /docs/brands/migrations/refersion.
Refersion has 4.8 stars on the Shopify App Store. Why would I switch?
That rating is real: 4.8 stars across 462 reviews, accumulated since April 2013, and it reflects a product many merchants like. Two pieces of context: on Capterra the picture is more mixed, listed at 4.2 stars across 56 reviews, and the recent 1-2 star Shopify reviews cluster on specific themes: pricing ('overpriced, outdated, and completely inflexible', November 2025), legacy conversion caps, annual contracts described as having no exit policy, and slow support. None of that erases thirteen years of mostly happy merchants. It does suggest the friction concentrates exactly where this page differs: pricing model and billing terms.
Refersion has been on Shopify since 2013. Is Rekomi mature enough?
Fair question, and age is Refersion's honest advantage: its app predates most of the category and its feature depth reflects that. Rekomi's answer is architecture rather than tenure: the Shopify app is built on today's platform primitives (app web pixel, the buyer journey Shopify records on each order, server-side order webhooks, Shopify-managed billing), the payout rail and fraud scoring are native rather than integrations, and the same engine already runs programs across Stripe, Paddle, and nine other platforms. Every claim on this page is fact-checked against live sources on the date shown, and the 14-day trial plus one-pull importer make verifying it against your own program cheap.
Refersion's model changed. Run the new math.
Refersion retired its conversion-capped tiers (Professional at $99/mo for 50 conversions, Business at $249/mo for 200; one legacy reviewer cites $119 for 50) and replaced caps with a percentage of your affiliate-driven sales: $39/mo + 3% on Launch, $199/mo + 2% on Growth. Many directories still list the old prices; the table below uses only the live ones. Rekomi's percentage lands on a different base entirely: the commissions you actually pay, not the sales behind them.
| Affiliate sales / mo | Refersion Launch ($39 + 3% of sales) | Refersion Growth ($199 + 2% of sales) | Rekomi (flat plan + 3% of payouts) |
|---|---|---|---|
| $3,000 | $39 + $90 = $129/mo | $199 + $60 = $259/mo | $29 + $13.50 = $42.50/mo |
| $10,000 | $39 + $300 = $339/mo | $199 + $200 = $399/mo | $49 + $45 = $94/mo |
| $30,000 | $39 + $900 = $939/mo | $199 + $600 = $799/mo | $99 + $135 = $234/mo |
Assumes a 15% average commission rate, so payouts are $450, $1,500, and $4,500 respectively; Rekomi's 3% applies to those payout figures, and the Rekomi plan shown (Starter, Growth, Pro) is illustrative since plan choice depends on features, never volume. Refersion's annual billing trims the bases to $29 and $159/mo but the sales percentage is unchanged, and recent 1-star reviews describe annual contracts as difficult to exit, so model the full year before committing. The structural point survives any assumption you change: Refersion's fee scales with your revenue, Rekomi's scales with your commission spend, and the second number is a fraction of the first.
One Shopify invoice, or a second card on file.
An easy detail to miss until renewal: the two apps bill you through entirely different surfaces, and that decides how trials, charges, and cancellation actually behave.
- "External charges may be billed by Refersion, Inc. separately from your Shopify invoice" (verbatim listing disclosure, rare among Shopify apps)
- A second billing relationship: Refersion charges your credit card directly
- The monthly percentage of affiliate-driven sales is calculated and billed by Refersion, outside Shopify's systems
- Annual plans carry the discount ($29 or $159/mo effective) but recent 1-star reviews describe annual contracts with difficult cancellation and "no exit policy"
- 14-day free trial is widely reported, but trial terms are not shown on the live pricing page
- Billed through Shopify: charges appear on the Shopify invoice you already reconcile, no separate card on file
- The whole program runs embedded in your Shopify admin, install to payout
- 14-day trial handled by Shopify's managed app billing, the same flow as every other app you have trialed
- Month-to-month flat plans ($29/$49/$99); no annual contract required to get the listed price
- Cancellation is a Shopify app uninstall, with your data exportable on any plan first
Switching from Refersion: two keys, one pull.
Rekomi ships a dedicated Refersion importer. Copy your Public Key and Secret Key from Account, Settings, Refersion API (both are required, and Refersion gates API access to its Growth plan or higher), paste them once, and one pull brings your roster across. A typical team starts and finishes the switch inside one working day.
- The pull imports each affiliate's email, name, and status (Active imports as Approved, Pending as Pending, Denied as Rejected), deduped by email, so re-running it is safe.
- Tracking links carry over intact: Refersion links use ?rfsn={affiliateId}.{code}, and Rekomi preserves the full value as the affiliate's slug. rfsn is a built-in Rekomi attribution param, so existing links keep attributing the moment you swap the tracking snippet, with zero configuration.
- The importer is roster-focused: Refersion's REST API does not expose conversion or order history, so past conversions come in through the Step 2 CSV flow (affiliate email, amount, commission, currency, date) from your own records.
- No API access on your Refersion plan? The emailed affiliate CSV export from Refersion's dashboard works as the fallback; the importer matches email, name, and status columns tolerantly.
- Keys are used once, in memory, and never stored, logged, or shown again. Keep Refersion active for a 24-48 hour shadow period after the snippet swap, then cancel.
Looking at someone else?
Side by side, always
Every comparison page on Rekomi is fact-checked the same way. Pick the affiliate platform you are auditing and read the honest read.
Weighing Refersion against UpPromote or GoAffPro? Read those head-to-heads too; most teams comparing them shortlist Rekomi as the third option.
Switch from Refersion this week.
Self-serve importers ship for 21 platforms: Rewardful, Tapfiliate, FirstPromoter, PartnerStack, Dub Partners, Tolt, Lemon Squeezy, Gumroad, impact.com, PromoteKit, LeadDyno, Trackdesk, Partnero, UpPromote, GoAffPro, ReferralCandy, Refersion, BixGrow, Shopify Collabs, Everflow, and Post Affiliate Pro; most of the API pulls also bring leads, lifetime click counts, and commission history. White-glove sales and payout backfill included for early adopters. You stay in control.
- 14-day free trial
- Cancel anytime, $0 charged