How we rank creator platforms
Every platform gets five scores from 0 to 10. We weight them the same way for every platform and publish the sources behind each one.
The five criteria
| Criterion | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Pay | 25% | What a typical paid deal on the platform is worth to a creator with a mid-size audience. Published rate data, minimum budgets, and how pricing works all count. |
| Deal flow | 25% | How often real paid offers reach a typical creator. Open campaign boards and inbound offers score higher than invite-only programs that may never call. |
| Access | 20% | How easy it is to get in. Follower minimums, region limits, age rules, and invite-only gates all lower the score. |
| Fees and payout | 20% | How much of the deal you keep and how fast it reaches your bank. Commissions, service fees, payout thresholds, and payment delays lower the score. |
| Creator protection | 10% | What happens when something goes wrong. Escrow, clear usage-rights terms, dispute handling, and guaranteed payment raise the score. |
The overall score is the weighted average, rounded to one decimal. Pay and deal flow carry half the weight because a platform that never sends a paid offer is not worth your time, however fair its terms are.
Where the facts come from
We use each platform's own pricing pages, help center, creator FAQ, and terms of service. News coverage and public creator reports add context, and the review says so when we use them. Every review lists its sources with the date we checked them.
We do not claim hands-on testing. A review will say "the help center says creators are paid 7 days after approval," never "we were paid in 7 days."
What the scores are not
Scores are editorial judgments. Two careful editors could give a platform a 7.0 or a 7.5 on deal flow. We keep them consistent by scoring every platform against the same written criteria, and we explain each score in one sentence on the review.
A low overall score does not make a platform bad for everyone. A native program with a 10,000-follower minimum scores low on access, and it may still be the best option once you clear the bar. Read the "best for" line on each review.
When facts change
Platforms change fees and rules often. We recheck a review when a reader or the platform reports a change, and every review shows the date its facts were last checked. If a platform shuts down or stops accepting creators, we remove it from the ranking.
Money and independence
No platform can pay for a ranking, a score, or a review, and none has. Paid Brand Deals is independent and unsponsored, with no affiliate links or ads. See our independence statement and editorial policy.