Free affiliate agreement template
Fill in your program's terms and get a complete affiliate agreement template, assembled live as you type: commission structure, attribution window, payout schedule, refund clawbacks, prohibited conduct, and termination. Copy it, download it, take it to your lawyer. Everything runs in your browser; nothing is uploaded, logged, or gated behind an email.
This is a starting point to take to your lawyer, not legal advice. Laws differ by state and country; have a professional review the final document before anyone signs it.
AFFILIATE PROGRAM AGREEMENT This Affiliate Program Agreement (the "Agreement") is entered into between [Company Name] (the "Company"), operator of [company website], and the undersigned participant (the "Affiliate") in the [Company Name] Affiliate Program (the "Program"). 1. ENROLLMENT Participation in the Program begins when the Company approves the Affiliate's application and the Affiliate accepts this Agreement. The Company may approve or decline any application at its discretion. 2. COMMISSION The Company will pay the Affiliate a commission of 20% of the revenue from each Qualified Referral. Commission applies to every payment made by the referred customer during their first 12 months as a customer. A Qualified Referral is a new customer who signs up through the Affiliate's tracking link or code and completes a paid purchase. 3. TRACKING AND ATTRIBUTION Referrals are tracked through the unique link and/or code assigned to the Affiliate. A referral is attributed to the Affiliate when the customer arrives through the Affiliate's link or uses the Affiliate's code within 60 days of first clicking the link (the "Attribution Window"). The Company's tracking records are the system of record for attribution and commission calculations. 4. PAYOUTS Approved commission is paid monthly, within 15 days after the end of each calendar month. Payouts are made once the Affiliate's approved balance reaches $50; balances below the minimum roll over to the next payout period. The Affiliate is responsible for providing accurate payout details and any tax information the Company reasonably requests before payment can be made. 5. REFUNDS AND CLAWBACKS If a referred purchase is refunded, charged back, or cancelled within 60 days of the transaction, the corresponding commission is reversed. Reversed commission that has already been paid may be deducted from the Affiliate's future payouts. 6. PROHIBITED CONDUCT The Affiliate agrees NOT to engage in any of the following: a. bidding on the Company's brand name, trademarks, or misspellings of them in paid search advertising, or directing paid traffic to the Company's website through ads that use the Company's brand terms; b. posting assigned coupon or discount codes to coupon aggregator sites, or presenting codes in a way that intercepts customers who were already in the Company's checkout process; c. self-referral: using their own affiliate link or code, directly or through an intermediary, to purchase for themselves or for any business they control; d. promoting through unsolicited bulk email, misleading claims about the Company's products, cookie stuffing, forced clicks, or any technique that fabricates referrals that did not come from a genuine recommendation; Violation of this section is grounds for immediate termination and forfeiture of unpaid commission connected to the violation. 7. DISCLOSURE COMPLIANCE The Affiliate agrees to clearly disclose their material connection to the Company wherever they promote the Program, in accordance with the FTC's endorsement guidelines and any equivalent rules that apply in the Affiliate's jurisdiction. 8. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY The Company grants the Affiliate a limited, revocable, non-exclusive license to use the Company's name, logo, and approved marketing materials solely to promote the Program. All goodwill from such use accrues to the Company. The license ends when this Agreement ends. 9. RELATIONSHIP OF THE PARTIES The Affiliate is an independent contractor. Nothing in this Agreement creates an employment, agency, partnership, or joint venture relationship. The Affiliate has no authority to make commitments on the Company's behalf. 10. TERMINATION Either party may terminate this Agreement with 30 days' written notice. The Company may terminate immediately for violation of Section 6 or for fraud. Upon termination, the Affiliate must stop representing the Program, and approved commission earned before the effective date (and not subject to reversal) will be paid on the normal schedule. 11. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY The Company's total liability to the Affiliate under this Agreement is limited to the commission owed and unpaid at the time a claim arises. Neither party is liable for indirect, incidental, or consequential damages. 12. CHANGES TO THE PROGRAM The Company may update commission rates, the Attribution Window, or Program rules prospectively with reasonable notice to the Affiliate. Changes do not apply retroactively to commission already earned. 13. GOVERNING LAW This Agreement is governed by the laws of the State of Delaware, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. AGREED: Company: [Company Name] Affiliate: ______________________ Signature: ______________ Signature: ______________________ Date: ___________________ Date: ___________________________
What an affiliate agreement must cover
A good affiliate program agreement template answers the eight questions every partner dispute eventually comes down to. If your document answers them clearly, the dispute never starts.
Commission and duration. Not just the rate: what it applies to (first payment, twelve months, lifetime), and what counts as a qualified referral in the first place.
Attribution. The cookie window, and whose records decide when two claims collide. Your tracking system should be named the system of record, because someone has to be.
Payouts and clawbacks. When money moves, the minimum balance that triggers it, and precisely how refunds reverse commission. This is the clause most template documents skip and the one accountants care about most. Partner codes themselves are the easy part; our free referral code generator handles that job.
Conduct, disclosure, and exit. What promotion methods are off-limits (brand bidding, coupon-site abuse, self-referral), the FTC disclosure obligation, and how either side walks away cleanly. The FTC's endorsement guides are the reference worth linking inside your own program docs too.
The three commission structures that work
Percent of sale
The default for SaaS and anything subscription-shaped. Aligns affiliate income with customer retention: partners profit most from referring customers who stay. Decide up front whether it runs for 12 months or for the customer's lifetime.
Flat bounty
Predictable cost per acquisition, easiest math to explain, and strongest where order values cluster tightly. The risk is over-paying for low-value customers, so pair it with a qualification bar (first paid invoice, not just a signup).
Tiered
Base rate for everyone, a better rate once a partner proves volume. Rewards the affiliates who actually move the needle without raising your blended cost across the long tail. Write the threshold into the agreement so promotion to the top tier is automatic, not negotiated.
The agreement sets the rules. Something has to enforce them.
Every clause in the document above has an operational twin. The commission clause is only as good as the attribution behind it: if you cannot tell which affiliate sent which sale, the rate is a promise you cannot keep. That is a tracking problem before it is a legal one.
The same goes for the conduct section. A no-self-referral clause without fraud screening is a rule nobody checks; a clawback window without refund-aware commission math means you pay out on money you returned. And the payout clause assumes you can actually pay people, across whatever countries your affiliates live in, with the tax forms handled.
Write the agreement first, in whatever tool you like, this one included. Then make sure the software running your program can honor every promise the paper makes. And use the right document for the relationship: creator content deals belong in the influencer contract builder, and B2B lead-passing partners in the referral partner version.
Affiliate agreement questions, answered.
Is this affiliate agreement template free?
Yes. No signup, no email gate, no watermark. The builder runs entirely in your browser, nothing you type is sent to a server, and you can copy the result or download it as plain text and edit it however you like.
Is the generated agreement legally binding?
It can be once both parties sign it, but treat it as a head start rather than a finished contract. It is a plain-English affiliate marketing agreement covering the clauses most programs need; laws differ by state and country, so have a lawyer review the final version before anyone signs.
What commission rate is standard for affiliate programs?
For SaaS, 20-30% recurring is the common band, with some programs paying for the first 12 months and others for the customer's lifetime. For ecommerce and physical products, 5-15% of the order is typical. Flat bounties ($20-100 per referral) show up where order values are predictable. Pick a rate you can sustain at scale, not the highest one you can advertise.
What cookie window should I use?
30, 60, and 90 days are the standard options, and 60 is a solid default: long enough that affiliates trust they will get credit for considered purchases, short enough that attribution stays honest. First-touch versus last-touch matters more than raw length once multiple affiliates promote you; whatever you choose, write it into the agreement so nobody argues later.
How should refunds affect commission?
Commission on a refunded or charged-back sale should be reversed, and the agreement should say exactly how long that reversal window lasts. Matching your clawback window to your refund policy (30-60 days for most products) is the fair version; paying commission on money you returned is how programs lose their margins.
How do I actually enforce an affiliate agreement?
The paper sets the rules; enforcement lives in your tooling. You need tracking that attributes each sale to the right affiliate, fraud screening that catches self-referrals and coupon abuse, refund-aware commission math, and payouts that only release approved balances. That operational half is what affiliate software exists for.
Make every clause in this agreement enforceable.
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