The latest forecast from eMarketer projects affiliate marketing to continue its double-digit growth as it converges with social and influencer.
Affiliate marketing spend is forecast to grow 11.4% year-on-year in 2026, with brands on track to spend over $14m on the channel in the US.
This marks the sixth year spend in the channel has seen a double-digit growth, according to eMarketer.
By 2030, eMarketer estimates brands will spend close to $20bn on affiliate marketing, which is more than three times the $5.64m spent at the start of the decade.
The latest Affiliate Marketing 2026 forecast report from the market research company suggests that growth in the channel has been driven by a growing interest using creators, expanding retail e-commerce activities and using affiliate publishers to improve brand visibility in AI chatbots.
While spend across affiliate marketing is lower in the US when compared to advertising channels such as social media or commerce media, where spend is estimated to reach $137.2bn and $85.3bn in 2026, respectively, it has become a key entry point for brands into other channels.
For example, it is the third largest source of income for creators in the US, with many relying on commission earnt through affiliate marketing as a source of revenue. And many large retailers and brands are also making moves to support and use this group.
Affiliate marketing has become a core part of buy now, pay later (BNPL) apps’ revenue. eMarkter predicts that almost 100 million US consumers will use a BNPL service in 2026 – more than double the 49.3 million that used it five years ago.
Affiliate marketing vs e-commerce
The rise of retail e-commerce has been a key driver of growth in adspend within affiliate marketing. US consumers are spending more and more online, with each digital buyer estimated to be spending over $5,800 in 2026.
According to eMarketer, online shopping – which includes the hunt for coupons, reading or watching product reviews and gifts guides – is powering affiliate marketing spending. As a result, it is outpacing the growth of sales in e-commerce.
The research firm has projected that affiliate marketing will grow at twice the pace of retail sales online and this will continue to be the trend until 2030.
By the end of the decade, sales from affiliate-driven e-commerce and retail is expected to exceed $250bn. At that point, affiliate marketing will also be responsible for 13.7% of all e-commerce sales in the US – up from 9.5% in 2020.
Mixed-signal economy favours affiliates
From trade tariffs to the wars in the Middle East, the last few years have been plagued with global economic uncertainty.
During tough times, affiliate marketing’s biggest publisher groups – discount coupons, cash back, loyalty and rewards programmes – tend to thrive as consumers are more motivated to save.
“AI is changing how consumers discover products, but people still want expert advice, recommendations and reassurance that they’re spending their money wisely,” Anthony Clements, country manager from impact.com told Affiliate Leaders.
“With consumers researching their purchases more carefully and retailers under pressure to demonstrate results, affiliate marketing has a valuable role to play.
Data from impact.com, cited in the eMarketer report, showed that consumers bought fewer items with affiliate involvement in H1 2026 than they did in the same period in 2025.
Affiliate clicks increased by 12.1% in the first half of 2026, even as actions declined by 4.5%. Yet commissions grew by 12.5% and revenues rose by 7.1%.
“Shoppers might be taking longer to make purchasing decisions, but partnerships are continuing to deliver commercial value.
“We’re also seeing creators bring new audiences and investment into the channel. For retailers, the opportunity is to reach consumers wherever they’re researching, whether that’s through a specialist review, a creator recommendation or an AI-generated answer. As these journeys evolve, recognising and rewarding the partners influencing purchasing decisions will become increasingly important,” he added.
Meanwhile, 11 out of the 14 types of publisher types tracked by Awim showed that brands are reducing their reliance on coupons in H1 2026. This is a significant difference from last year, when seven out of the 10 of the publisher types saw share of coupon-influenced conversions increase
According to Awin, discounts and promotions; editorial content; plus content creators and influencers represented 69% of spend on its network this year. Of the three listed, use of coupons accounted for no more than 15.2%.
Google referrals tank
Affiliates have historically relied on Google and SEO practices to refer traffic. But the rise of AI chatbots like Gemini or OpenAI’s ChatGPT has forced them to rethink their content distribution strategies.
This is reflected in the figures. Google search slid from 11.1% of traffic referrals in June 2025 to just 6.3% in 2026 in North America, Chartbeat data found.
eMarketer’s report suggested that smaller publishers were hit harder. Referencing the Chartbeat figures, larger publishers – those with more than 100,000 visits per day – saw Google search traffic fall from 8.2% to 4.5% in the past 14 months. While sites that get no more than 10,000 visits per day, that figure stood at 8.5%, down from 12.8% in the same period.
Clements highlighted that “publishers are having to find new ways to reach their audiences”.
“We’re seeing greater investment in newsletters, direct audience relationships and alternative distribution channels, as well as renewed emphasis on original content that gives people a reason to seek them out.”
He also pointed out that AI is creating opportunities for specialist and editorial publishers – the reviews, comparisons and expert recommendations help inform AI-generated answers, even when consumers never visit their websites.
“That creates a new kind of influence,” he said. “But it also raises an important commercial question: how do publishers get rewarded when their content helps drive a purchase without generating a click?
This is where brands need to rethink attribution. Publishers creating genuinely useful content are contributing value much earlier in the shopping journey, and partnership models need to reflect that. It’s particularly important for smaller publishers, which may lack the resources to adapt as quickly as larger businesses,” Clements added.
Influencer and affiliate convergence
This is also why there is a growing interest from brands in the use of creators and influencers, which has been spurred by TikTok Shop and Amazon.
The report highlighted that affiliate marketing helped propel Amazon to its dominant position within e-commerce in the US. Its advertising arm is also growing and affiliate marketing with creators is at the centre of that.
Its success has seen the likes of Walmart and Target copy Amazon’s model, which could see the role of affiliate advertisers rise.
From a consumer perspective, Clements explained “there isn’t really an affiliate journey and an influencer journey”, it’s “one shopping journey, even if brands have traditionally managed those activities separately”.
But that’s changing. Brands are moving beyond one-off influencer campaigns towards longer-term creator partnerships that combine upfront fees with performance-based commissions.
This means “creators can be rewarded for both the content they produce and the sales they help generate”, he added.
“I expect we’ll see much more of this as brands bring their affiliate and creator activities together, with consistent measurement and more flexible ways of rewarding partners. But it’s important that creators retain their independence and creative freedom. Their relationship with their audience is what makes these partnerships valuable in the first place.”
And this trend is likely to continue with the “boundaries between affiliate, influencer and other forms of partnership marketing” becoming more and more blurred by 2030.
“Brands will increasingly manage creators, publishers and other partners as part of one connected strategy, recognising the different ways they contribute to sales,” Clements said.
