Advertiser Disclosure
We earn money when you join a casino through our links. That creates a conflict of interest. Here is what that conflict actually is and what we do about it.
When you sign up at a casino through one of our links, we get paid. That’s how this site makes money. It creates a conflict of interest. This page explains exactly what that conflict is and what we actually do about it. You don’t have to use our links — you can read the reviews and go direct.
Affiliate relationships in gambling content create real conflicts of interest that can affect your financial decisions. Google’s quality guidelines classify this as “Your Money or Your Life” territory. This page exists to make that conflict fully transparent so you can weigh our recommendations accordingly.
Where the money comes from
Click a link to a casino on this site, create an account, and the casino pays us a commission. You don’t pay anything extra. The bonus and terms you get are identical regardless of whether you came through us or went directly. We’re just the referral source.
Three different structures:
We get a cut of the net revenue from players we refer. Percentages vary by casino and market.
A flat payment when a referred player makes their first qualifying deposit. Rate varies by operator.
An upfront CPA payment plus ongoing revenue share combined.
Worth noting: some perfectly good casinos don’t run affiliate programmes, which means they don’t appear on this site. Not because they’re bad — just because there’s no way for us to feature them commercially.
The conflict of interest — no softening it
Google’s quality guidelines, the UK’s ASA, and the US FTC all flag affiliate relationships as conflicts of interest. A site that earns money when you join a casino has a built-in incentive to point you toward casinos, regardless of quality. That’s the conflict. We can’t eliminate it.
What we can do is manage it properly. Here’s specifically what that looks like at BonusesOnline.com:
- Editorial and commercial operations are separated — the people writing reviews don’t see commission figures
- Ratings come from testing results, full stop
- We publish negative reviews even when they cost us affiliate income
- We’ve given 2-star scores to casinos that were paying us well at the time
- We’ve ended commercial relationships with operators who tried to leverage them against editorial decisions
- When commercial arrangements affect placement in a table, we label it Featured, Promoted, or Advertisement
Featured placement — what it means
Sometimes a casino appears at the top of a comparison table not because it scored highest but because of a commercial arrangement. When that’s the case, we label it. “Featured” or “Promoted” means the placement has a commercial element — not that we think it’s the best option for you.
Plenty of casinos sit at the top of our tables purely because they tested well. A casino sitting in position one with no promotional label got there on merit.
The casinos we warn against
We occasionally review casinos and recommend against using them. We don’t provide affiliate links for those — we don’t earn anything from them. They’re there because players deserve to know which operators have serious problems with withdrawals, terms, or customer service.
Which advertising rules we follow
| Market | Rules we follow |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and UK Gambling Commission standards |
| United States | Federal Trade Commission (FTC) endorsement and affiliate disclosure guidelines |
| Canada | Canadian advertising standards and provincial gaming regulations |
| New Zealand | Advertising Standards Authority New Zealand guidelines |
| Ireland | ASAI code and GRAI advertising standards |