Affiliate and Referral Program for WooCommerce

Affiliate and Referral Program for WooCommerce runs three growth programs from one plugin: a complete affiliate program for WooCommerce, a customer refer-a-friend program, and multi-tier MLM (multi-level marketing) commissions with Binary, Forced Matrix and Unilevel plans. Set your commission rules once, hand partners their links, coupons and QR codes, and pay everyone from the same dashboard.

It is a WordPress affiliate plugin built specifically for WooCommerce. Commissions are calculated from real WooCommerce orders, affiliate coupons are standard WooCommerce coupons, and every record your program creates stays in your own database. If your storefront runs on WooCommerce, this is the affiliate plugin for WordPress that was written for exactly that stack.

Affiliate and Referral Program for WooCommerce is an all-in-one WooCommerce affiliate plugin that combines affiliate management, customer referrals, MLM commission networks, coupon attribution, and PayPal, Stripe and Paystack payouts inside your WordPress dashboard.

Excellence verified on the WooCommerce Marketplace, tested against current WordPress and WooCommerce releases, and shipped with nine translations.

Three programs in one plugin

Affiliate management, a customer referral program and MLM commissions are usually three separate purchases. Here they are three modules of one plugin:

• Affiliate program — recruit creators, publishers and partners, pay them by product rules or by performance level, and track every order they send.
• Customer referral program — a separate Refer & Earn system for everyday shoppers, with its own rewards, its own wallet and its own tab in My Account. Affiliates never see it; customers never see affiliate tools.
• MLM networks — Binary, Forced Matrix, Unilevel or Unlimited structures with per-level commission rates and a genealogy tree.

Assembling the same stack from separate products runs $300 or more a year. This is one $96 plugin.

Launch your WooCommerce affiliate program in three steps

A WooCommerce affiliate program plugin should take minutes to launch:

1. Install and activate. The plugin creates your affiliate dashboard page and sensible defaults on activation.
2. Set your rules. A single global rate is enough to go live; product, category, per-affiliate and performance-level rules can come whenever you need them.
3. Invite partners. Affiliates register, pick up their links and coupons, and every tracked order lands in your approval queue.

Every module is a switch. Referrals, MLM, bonuses, QR codes — enable them when you need them, ignore them when you don’t.

Affiliate commission rules: product-based or performance-based direct commission

Direct commission is what the referring affiliate earns on the orders they send. It comes in two modes, chosen once under Commission Based On, and you can switch between them without touching anything else:

In product-based mode, commission rules layer and the first match wins:

• Per-affiliate rates, optionally narrowed by product tag
• Per-affiliate category rates and date-windowed category promotions
• Per-product and per-category rates, then your global default
• Calculated per line item, on the amount the customer actually paid after discounts — a coupon-discounted order never over-pays its affiliate
• Monthly caps per affiliate — the engine clamps the last commission to fit rather than silently dropping it

That sounds abstract until you use it: give Rosa 12% on everything, run 20% on Hoodies for one promotional week, keep gift cards at zero, and leave the rest of the store at 5%. The engine picks the right rule for every line item in the order. Switch to performance-based mode and the product rules step aside: the affiliate’s current level alone sets their rate, and promotion happens without a spreadsheet (Performance-Based Direct Commission with Affiliate Levels).

Recurring commissions pay the affiliate again on every WooCommerce Subscriptions renewal, at their own renewal rate. Lifetime commissions tie a referred customer with an account to the affiliate who brought them, so later orders keep paying them, cookie or not, under first-click or last-click attribution as you prefer. Two-way commission rewards both sides of a referral: the customer who buys through an affiliate link gets an instant discount at checkout while the affiliate still earns full commission on the order.

Affiliates always know what a sale is worth to them. Their dashboard carries a commission table showing what each product and category pays, and logged-in affiliates can see the commission amount on product pages while they browse. Commission behavior — including rule precedence, monthly caps and refund handling — is covered by 103 automated integration tests run against real WooCommerce orders. When we say a rule works, we can point at the test.

Built-in customer referral program (Refer & Earn)

The customer referral program is a separate module with its own settings, not the affiliate system under another label, so the two audiences never blur:

• A floating Refer & Earn button — or a shortcode, if you prefer placement control — invites shoppers to share their link
• Their friend gets a percentage or fixed discount at checkout, your call
• The referrer earns store credit in a customer wallet of its own, shown in their My Account tab, and converts it into coupons they spend in your store
• Referrals auto-approve on completed or processing orders, or wait for your review

The separation is enforced in the code, not just the copy: registered affiliates never see the customer widget, customers never see affiliate tooling, and the two wallets never mix.

Affiliate coupons that track without clicks

Assign any WooCommerce coupon to an affiliate and every order that redeems it credits them — no referral link, no click, no cookie required:

• Instagram bios, podcast reads and printed cards become trackable channels
• When a link and a coupon disagree, the coupon’s owner wins attribution
• Affiliates convert their own wallet balance into store coupons, turning commission liabilities into repeat orders

Affiliate management: registration, approval and one-click import

Recruiting starts on a registration page the plugin creates for you, or inside My Account if you prefer:

• Four registration form templates with your own custom fields, so you can ask for a website, a channel, or an audience size before you approve anyone
• Approve applicants one at a time or in bulk, and turn existing customers into affiliates from the user list without a new signup
• Per-affiliate settings in one place: commission rate, assigned coupons, payment method, network sponsor, and status, with the affiliate list searchable and exportable to CSV (Approving and Managing Affiliates)
• Coming from another affiliate plugin? Import your existing affiliates in one click and keep their referral links working, as described under Switching below

An affiliate dashboard your partners will actually use

Affiliates get a frontend dashboard — on its own page or inside My Account, in either of two layouts — with everything they need to promote and get paid:

• Earnings cards and charts, a commission table showing exactly what each product and category pays, and a referral log with CSV or PDF export
• A link generator that deep-links to any product or page on your store, downloadable QR codes, and one-click sharing to X, Facebook, WhatsApp and email
• A banner library you stock in ten standard sizes, plus ready-made product creatives
• Per-link statistics — hits and purchases for every link they generate — and a product feed download for the categories they promote
• An in-dashboard notification center where your announcements land with an unread badge

Your controls: dashboard colors, cover image, tab labels, a custom CSS box, and editable email templates for signup, approval and withdrawal notices (Affiliate Dashboard and Affiliate Area Guide).

Multi-tier MLM commissions with Binary, Forced Matrix and Unilevel plans

Two different streams, kept apart on purpose:

• Direct commission is what the referring affiliate earns on their own referred order, under product-based rules or performance-based rates
• MLM commission is a separate upline commission from sales inside an affiliate’s downline network, under a Binary, Forced Matrix, Unilevel or Unlimited plan. It never sets anyone’s direct rate

Pick a multi-level marketing plan type, then set how many direct recruits each position holds and how deep the multi-tier commission flows:

• Every network level gets its own percentage or fixed rate, calculated on product price or on the direct earner’s commission
• Unilevel-style chains work out of the box
• Enrollment is automatic: recruits join the network under their sponsor, subject to the width your plan allows
• Re-parent members from the admin when a team restructures, and decide whether MLM earnings count toward monthly caps
• Genealogy tree in wp-admin and in every affiliate’s dashboard, plus a downline sales CSV export

Setup is documented step by step, with the four plan types compared. Built for stores and direct-selling teams that run structured networks — the plugin manages structure and commissions; what you promise recruits is your business, and it should be realistic.

Ranks and six ways to reward performance

Ranks promote affiliates by criteria you define — signups sponsored, organization size, or reaching a named rank — and can pay a bonus on promotion. A rank rewards a milestone under either commission mode without changing the rate.

Six bonus types ship ready to switch on:

• Signup bonuses and performance milestones
• Sharing bonuses with daily, weekly or monthly limits
• Rank bonuses paid on promotion
• Pay-per-click bonuses de-duplicated by IP
• Lead bonuses for Contact Form 7 submissions

You can pay for traffic and leads, not just orders.

Affiliate payouts and wallets, without extra plugins

Automated payouts run through the PayPal Payouts API: select every approved balance and pay all of them in one action, in live or sandbox mode. Stripe payouts are provided through our free Stripe add-on, because the WooCommerce Marketplace does not allow bundling the required SDK in the main package. Paystack and direct bank transfer round out the options.

• A real wallet sits between earning and payout — you control minimum and maximum withdrawal amounts and an optional withdrawal fee
• Withdrawal requests queue up on one Payouts screen, where you pay them in bulk or record a bank transfer, and payout history exports to CSV for reconciliation
• Affiliates can convert credit into store coupons instead — with partial-value carry-over, a $50 coupon used on a $20 cart keeps its remaining $30
• Earnings become store revenue instead of leaving
• No additional paid plugins are required for wallets, payouts or coupons

Referral tracking, fraud prevention and program protection

Three attribution paths cover how partners actually promote: referral links (deep-linked to any page), assigned coupons, and an affiliate code field on the block checkout. Fraud prevention is built into the same tracking, not bolted on afterwards:

• The referral cookie window is yours to set — 30 days by default — with first-click or last-click attribution, and lifetime attribution can tie a referred customer to their affiliate permanently
• IP- and device-based fraud detection: every tracked visit is logged with device, platform, browser and IP and de-duplicated hourly, so repeated or manufactured clicks stand out before you approve anything
• Duplicate referral prevention, so repeated or manipulated commission claims do not become payouts
• Optional self-referral restriction, and coupon ownership enforcement that removes another affiliate’s coupon from the cart automatically
• Referral validation safeguards and manual approval workflows: every commission starts as pending, and you decide whether it is paid
• Per-IP click-bonus de-duplication, and automatic rejection of pending commissions when an order is refunded

When a dispute comes — and in affiliate programs, sooner or later one does — you can open the visit log and settle it with data; who gets credit, and for how long, is spelled out in How Referral Tracking and Attribution Work, and the review queue in Managing and Approving Referrals.

Reports and analytics for you and your affiliates

Both sides of the program see what is working:

• Your side: total and per-status commissions, earnings broken out by type — direct, MLM, signup, performance — click-to-purchase conversion, device mix and day-wise tables
• A last-five-referrals feed and a top-affiliates board, so you always know who is carrying the program
• Their side: personal charts, per-link hits and purchases, and commission status at a glance
• Date-filtered referral tables export to CSV or PDF; affiliates, payouts, downlines and product feeds export to CSV (Reports and Exports)

Integrations and compatibility with the WooCommerce you run today

• WooCommerce Subscriptions — recurring commissions on renewals
• Contact Form 7 — lead bonuses on form submissions
• PayPal Payments, the free Stripe add-on and Paystack for payouts
• Commission tracking on both classic and block checkout, with an affiliate code field on block checkout
• High-Performance Order Storage (HPOS) declared and tested
• Nine shipped translations — German, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Indonesian and Chinese — plus a POT file for the rest
• Documented developer hooks for commission and payout events, with REST API support planned for an upcoming release
• Excellence verified, and tested against current WordPress and WooCommerce releases

Who runs their programs on it

• D2C brands replacing a $99-a-month SaaS with links, coupons and influencer codes they own.
• Influencer and creator programs tracked through assigned coupons and deep links.
• Stores whose best salespeople are their customers, running Refer & Earn alongside the affiliate program.
• Subscription businesses paying partners on renewals, not just first orders.
• Course creators and digital sellers recruiting the people their audience already trusts.
• Agencies, resellers and partner sales programs on per-affiliate rates and performance levels.
• Direct-selling and distributor networks that need real plan structures, genealogy and per-level rates.
• Coupon-led promotions that run on discount codes rather than links.

Switching from another affiliate plugin? Import your affiliates in one click

Switching is a short job, because nothing inside WooCommerce has to move:

• Import your existing affiliates from other WordPress affiliate plugins in one click. Their existing referral links keep working, so promotions already running are not interrupted, and you can restructure links later if you want to
• Your WooCommerce customers, orders and coupons stay exactly where they are — commissions are calculated from the orders your store already takes
• Commission rules take minutes to recreate: set a global rate to go live, then layer product, category, per-affiliate or performance-level rules
• Our support team helps with the move if you need it. The price difference stays with you every year: $96 here, against the $179–$300+ a year typical WooCommerce affiliate plugins charge

How it compares

Start your affiliate and referral program today

One plugin, three programs, and commission math you can verify — the affiliate plugin for WooCommerce that covers partners, customers and networks alike. Try the live demo, read the documentation, and launch with a 30-day money-back guarantee behind you.