ShareASale Review 2026: The Beginner Affiliate Network I Recommend

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Update (October 2026): ShareASale no longer exists as a separate network. Awin, which owned it, moved all ShareASale advertisers and publishers onto the Awin platform in 2025, and shareasale.com now forwards to Awin. If you want the programs described below, you now apply for them through Awin. The EPC lessons in this review still apply to any affiliate network.

ShareASale was a free affiliate network with thousands of programs across many niches. Its programs now run on Awin.

The key to choosing the right affiliate program is the EPC (earnings per click) metric, which tells you how much affiliates have earned on average per visitor sent. It is an average, not a promise.

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My Honest ShareASale Review

This is a review of ShareASale, written while it was still a standalone affiliate network. It is now part of Awin.

ShareASale has so many different offers that you can find pretty much anything you want to promote.

They even have products in some markets like basketball and similar sports, where people are super passionate.

The good thing with sports is that, if someone is a fan of a team, they are very likely to go and buy products related to that team.

What Niches Can You Promote on ShareASale?

You can find markets like: Home and garden, fashion, hosting providers, accounting software, wedding rings, travel, debt relief, financial products, relationships, weight loss, and much more.

The good thing with ShareASale was that you did not have to pay anything to gain access to the platform.

Awin, which now runs these programs, asks new publishers for a small sign-up deposit that is refunded with your first payout, so joining still costs you nothing in the end.

In addition, you can find some really good products that people are raving about.

For example, makeup products are extremely easy to sell. The makeup market is not going to expire anytime soon.

It will be very easy for you to sell products and earn commissions.

You also have detailed reporting showing all the clicks, leads and sales that you made in the last couple of days or months.

How to Find the Best Affiliate Programs

When looking for the best affiliate program, you can sort the results by: brand, trending merchant, or category.

If you take the sports market, for example, you can even sort the results by team: New York Giants shop, Denver Broncos, Houston Texans, Miami Dolphins.

For example, finding someone who lives in Miami and is a fan of the Dolphins is not hard at all. There are millions of them.

Let’s say you wanted to promote the Giants. If the merchant paid a 10% commission per sale, all you would have to do is target New Yorkers and there is a good chance you would find suitable candidates.

Understanding EPC (Earnings Per Click)

The number you want to pay attention to is the EPC (earnings per click). It means that for every click you generate, you’ll earn X many dollars, on average.

For example, if a program showed an EPC of $8, affiliates had earned on average eight dollars per click.

That does not mean a hundred of your clicks will earn $800. It is an average across other affiliates, as the EPC trap section below explains.

High EPC Niches: Wedding Offers

People spend a ridiculous amount of money for their wedding and this is one of the rare occasions where prices don’t matter as much.

You can find information on who is going to get married in places like Facebook. People will change their status to engaged and you can easily target people who got engaged less than 6 months ago. These people are very likely to need wedding products.

The EPCs on wedding offers can be high because order values are high.

You apply to these brands individually. If they accept you in their program, you could earn good commissions.

How to Sign Up

Make sure to click on the link on this page.

That’s my referral link, so I may earn a referral reward if you sign up through it.

ShareASale accounts are now Awin accounts. Click here to sign up.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is ShareASale?

ShareASale was a free affiliate marketing network that connected publishers (affiliates) with merchants. It launched in 2000, was bought by Awin, and in 2025 all of its advertisers and publishers were moved onto the Awin platform. It no longer operates as a separate network.

Is ShareASale free to join?

ShareASale was free for affiliates, but you can no longer join it. Its programs now run on Awin, which asks new publishers for a small sign-up deposit that is refunded with the first payout.

What does EPC mean on ShareASale?

EPC stands for Earnings Per Click. It’s the average amount you earn for every click you send to a merchant’s offer. A higher EPC means the offer converts better and pays more on average. Use this metric to compare programs and pick the most profitable ones.

What are the best niches on ShareASale?

High-EPC niches on ShareASale included wedding products, fashion, home and garden, financial services, and sports merchandise. Wedding offers in particular can have high EPCs because of the high order values.


About the Author

Martin Ebongue is the founder of martinebongue.com, an online business and lifestyle design blog focused on helping aspiring entrepreneurs build location-independent businesses. Since 2014, he has been creating and scaling online ventures across multiple niches, from digital products and affiliate marketing to SaaS and content platforms, while traveling the world. He shares the real-world strategies, tools, and systems that work, with a particular focus on AI-powered automation for solopreneurs. Follow him on YouTube, X (Twitter), and Instagram.


Related Reading

The EPC trap most beginners fall into

EPC is the number everyone quotes and almost nobody reads correctly. Earnings per click is an average across every affiliate promoting that offer, not a promise to you. A high EPC on a program with a tiny sample size means almost nothing. A beginner can pick the highest EPC on the page, send traffic, and earn nothing, because that number may have been built on a handful of clicks from one lucky affiliate.

Here is the rule I use. I want a decent EPC and a healthy volume behind it, not the biggest number in the list. A steady offer that has paid hundreds of affiliates beats a spike that paid one. That is the same discipline that separates a real business from a lucky month, and it is the mindset I keep coming back to across the Freedom by Choice podcast.

The three niches I would start with

If I were starting on an affiliate network such as Awin today with no audience, I would pick a market people buy in without thinking twice. Home and garden, because the products are cheap enough for impulse buys and wide enough for content. Business software, because the commissions are recurring and the buyers have money. And a passion niche like a sports team store, because fans buy on emotion and buy again.

None of this is guesswork. The reason affiliate income compounds is the same reason recurring business models win, which Stripe Atlas explains well in its founder guides, and the buyer psychology behind impulse niches is documented in Harvard Business Review’s work on how people actually make purchase decisions. Affiliate marketing is just one automated income stream on top of a real system, and I show how it fits the bigger picture in my growth hacking playlist.

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