Affiliate marketing keeps getting more competitive and more technical. In 2026, AI tools, better tracking, and smarter buying strategies matter more than ever. Networks also face pressure to deliver cleaner traffic, transparent stats, and tools that actually help affiliates make money.
In this brief overview, the ROIads team breaks down what’s changing and what media buyers should pay attention to in the year ahead.
How Affiliate Marketing Is Evolving in 2026
Let’s open our roundup with affiliate marketing trends for 2026 from the ROIads team, starting with Aleksey Guden, Inbound sales manager at ROIads, and his perspective based on daily work with push and pop traffic, real campaigns, and advertiser results.
We see mobile traffic growth in 2025, and I expect this trend will keep developing in 2026. For push and pop traffic, it means you need to remember that landing page, creatives, and overall UI/UX convenience should be adapted for mobile devices.
If a website, landing page, or offer is poorly optimized for mobile devices, that’s already a disadvantage. A “mobile-first” approach is becoming critical for affiliate marketing.
AI will continue to play an important role — from analyzing user behavior to optimizing campaigns, personalizing experiences, and preventing fraud.
With AI affiliates can target more accurately, deliver personalized offers and improve ROI.
Perspective offers connected to online services, subscriptions, and digital products will continue its growth, because users are already accustomed to paying for convenience.
The behavioral habit of paying regularly has already been formed. This means:
- it’s easier to explain the product’s value,
- it’s easier to convert cold users,
- higher retention,
- higher LTV.
Here are Daniil’s predictions for 2026, based on his experience as a media buyer and affiliate.
Based on what I’m seeing now from client feedback and expert opinions shared by major iGaming media, demand for gambling traffic in Southeast Asia, LATAM, and Africa will grow even more in 2026. This is driven by ongoing regulatory reforms and rising taxes targeting European operators, especially those operating without proper licenses.
At the same time, payout policies from affiliate programs and operators toward media buyers are likely to become stricter — if they haven’t already. The focus will shift fully to LTV and real profit from traffic, rather than just FTDs.
To wrap it up, we’ll likely see growing interest in ad networks compared to traditional PPC channels like Meta, Google, and TikTok. Those platforms keep getting more expensive at auction and increasingly strict when it comes to moderation rules.
Next, Nadia Said Shakh, Head of customer service at ROIads, shares her view on how automation and AI will reshape push and pop traffic scaling in 2026.
Automation is also reshaping how push and pop traffic is scaled. Instead of manually testing dozens of setups, advertisers get self-learning campaigns that automatically shift budgets toward the most profitable sources and audience segments. In 2026, the teams that win will be those using AI not only for bid and creative optimization, but also to predict audience fatigue, manage frequency caps, and reduce banner blindness. Push and pop formats are moving away from being “mass” tools and are increasingly becoming personalized communication channels — driven by algorithms rather than manual settings.
Next, Alex, account manager, shares his perspective on the growing role of independent casinos and how push and pop traffic will reshape competition in 2026.
Next year, affiliate marketing will see a clear shift toward the growth of independent casino platforms, while large brands begin to lose part of their dominance. Users are increasingly looking for more flexible, niche, and less “mass-market” products, and smaller casinos adapt to these expectations faster — offering localized deals, non-standard bonus mechanics, and more aggressive terms for partners. Push and pop-up / pop-under formats are becoming key growth channels for these platforms, as they allow fast scaling without the massive media budgets traditionally available to big brands.
For independent casinos, push notifications and pop traffic make it possible to compete directly for user attention while bypassing expensive brand-driven channels. With bolder creatives, higher testing frequency, and rapid offer rotation, smaller platforms adapt better to their audiences and often achieve higher CTR and CR. As a result, push and pop formats will become a tool for traffic redistribution in favor of new and independent players in the coming year.
Conclusion
As the market shifts toward smarter buying and cleaner inventory, ROIads matches these trends with practical tools and formats. Traffic comes through push, in-page push, pops, and direct link — formats that still scale in volatile geos and verticals.
Features like AI bidding technology, CPA Goal, Micro bidding, Optimization rules, and premium traffic segmentation align with how affiliates now optimize: faster tests, precise bid control, and less wasted budget.
For media buyers expecting 2026 to get tougher, this stack covers what actually matters for profitable scaling.
