The best travel affiliate programs in 2026

Travel programs look alike from the outside and pay in completely different ways. One pays a slice of the hotel's commission, another a share of its rental profit, another 10% of a $30 data plan. Here are the 19 travel programs we verify, grouped the way a reader plans a trip, with what one booking actually earns you.

Published October 25, 2026 · Every row links to a listing checked on the program's own pages

What one booking really earns

A headline percentage means little until you know what it is a percentage of. Some programs pay on the full booking value, some on their own commission or profit. These examples use each program's own published rate or worked example.

The pattern is clear. A $120 tour on Viator earns about as much as a $400 hotel stay at Booking.com's base share, and a single car rental with full coverage at DiscoverCars beats both. That is why experienced travel affiliates link tours and transport inside every itinerary, not just the hotel.

Every travel affiliate program, grouped by what it sells

The last column shows when we last confirmed each program's terms on its own pages.

Hotels and stays

Hotels are what most readers book first, and the programs differ more than anywhere else in travel. Agoda publishes simple tiers on the booking value: 4% below 50 completed bookings a month, 4.5% from 50, and 5% from 300. It pays on completed stays, so the money follows the check out date.

Booking.com pays a share of the commission it earns from the hotel, reported at 25% to 40% of that commission depending on volume. It closed its direct program for most partners in June 2025, moved them to Awin, then ended the Awin program in June 2026; new affiliates now register through CJ. Our Booking.com affiliate guide covers the move and the money in detail.

Expedia Group's Travel Creator Program covers Expedia, Vrbo and Hotels.com from one account and pays up to 4% on eligible bookings, but credits only bookings inside a 7 day window. Trip.com advertises up to 7%, with a 30 day cookie on its website and 7 days in its app. Stay22 is a different kind of tool: one script that turns your hotel links into tracked links across several booking sites, with a commission split that starts at 30% of what Stay22 earns and payment within 30 days.

Tours and activities

Tours are the quiet winner in travel affiliate income, because the commission is taken from the full price of the activity. Viator pays 8% of every completed booking, cookies the reader for 30 days, and pays weekly if you choose PayPal. GetYourGuide pays 8% per booking on a 31 day cookie, and many publishers run both, linking whichever has the better listing for a given city.

Civitatis, strongest with Spanish speaking travellers, pays 8% to 10% by monthly volume and adds two rules that favour partners: if your rate rises and your sales then fall, it keeps you at the higher rate for three months, and it pays commission on cancellations it does not refund. It also pays €1 per participant over 12 on its free tours. Klook, the first stop for many travellers in Asia, does not publish its base rates; they are reported to vary by category.

Car rental, trains and transport

DiscoverCars has the most unusual structure in travel: 70% of its profit on the rental plus 30% of its Full Coverage revenue. It puts the average at about $20 per booking, and most of that comes from the coverage, so a rental sold with Full Coverage is worth far more to you than a bare one. Its 365 day cookie suits road trip content written months before the trip.

Omio covers trains, buses, flights and ferries across Europe. It agrees rates per market rather than posting one, pays by bank transfer 30 to 60 days after approving your invoice, and has a €100 minimum. Link the exact route, Rome to Florence rather than the home page, and rail content converts well.

eSIMs and mobile data

eSIMs became one of the most natural travel recommendations of the past two years. Airalo pays 10% of the final sale value after any discount, on the 28th of the following month, from a $15 minimum; PayPal payouts carry a 2% fee. Saily, from the company behind NordVPN, pays 15% on every new user. Holafly sells unlimited data plans and tracks sales by your personal coupon rather than a cookie, though it does not publish its rate.

Travel insurance

SafetyWing pays an affiliate fee benchmarked at about 10% of the premium on its Nomad Insurance, sold by the week or month to long term travellers. Its own earnings estimates run from about $8 a month for a smaller audience to $40 for a larger one. Insurance carries more rules than other travel products: recommend it as a product you have looked at, point readers to the policy wording, and do not tell anyone what a policy covers for them.

One account for many brands

Travelpayouts is a travel network: you join once and promote many brands, from flights to transfers, with one dashboard and automatic payouts by PayPal or bank on the same day each month. Rates are set per brand, so read each one before promoting it. The value is consolidation, one threshold and one payment instead of ten.

Cookie windows across travel

Travel is a slow purchase. Readers compare dates and prices for days or weeks, so the cookie decides how much of that delayed booking traffic you are paid for.

Which program for which travel content

How to build travel income that survives a program change

• Send links through your own domain. A link such as yoursite.com/go/hotel that redirects to the current tracking link makes a network move one edit, not hundreds. Booking.com's two moves since 2025 rewrote thousands of travel blogs.
• Earn on more than hotels. Tours, car rental and data plans pay on their own terms and come from companies that have not moved their programs twice in a year.
• Expect to be paid after the trip. Most hotel and tour programs pay on completed stays and activities. Plan your cash flow around travel dates, which run months behind bookings in peak season.
• Download your reports before any deadline. When a program closes a dashboard, your booking history is the evidence you need if a payment goes missing.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

1. Agoda Partners, partners.agoda.com, tiers and worked example, checked September 30, 2026.
2. Booking.com Affiliate Partners and Partnerships Hub, checked September 26, 2026.
3. Expedia Group Travel Creator Program and help pages, checked September 30, 2026.
4. Trip.com Affiliate Program, trip.com/partners, checked September 30, 2026.
5. Stay22 FAQ, stay22.com/faq, checked September 30, 2026.
6. Viator Affiliate Program partner resources, checked September 26, 2026.
7. GetYourGuide Partner Program, partner.getyourguide.com, as listed on AffiliateJob.
8. Civitatis affiliate program, civitatis.com/en/affiliates, checked September 30, 2026.
9. Klook affiliate program, affiliate.klook.com, checked September 30, 2026.
10. DiscoverCars affiliate program and worked example, discovercars.com/affiliate, checked September 30, 2026.
11. Omio affiliate programme and FAQ, omio.com/affiliate, checked September 30, 2026.
12. Airalo affiliate program, partners.airalo.com, checked September 30, 2026.
13. Saily affiliate program, saily.com/affiliate, checked September 30, 2026.
14. Holafly affiliate program, esim.holafly.com/affiliate-program, checked September 30, 2026.
15. SafetyWing Ambassador program, safetywing.com/ambassador, checked September 30, 2026.
16. Travelpayouts, travelpayouts.com, checked October 25, 2026.