Most rankings of an adult ad network sort by minimum deposit and call it a comparison. That produces a list where a Pornhub placement and an anonymous remnant impression sit two rows apart as though the difference were sixty dollars. The method used here starts somewhere else.
The three-layer model
Networks are graded by what they actually control, not by what they advertise. The full argument sits in the guide; the short version is three tiers with different failure modes.
- Layer 1 — owned inventory. The parent company owns the sites. Highest certainty about placement, and concentrated legal exposure, in the same purchase.
- Layer 2 — contracted supply. Independent publishers, signed and vetted. Risk is spread; the trade is that you cannot always name the page.
- Layer 3 — open exchange. RTB pools identified by source ID. Cheapest inventory, and since 2026 the pool carrying the highest enforcement risk.
The model is a working framework, not an industry standard, and no network describes itself this way. It is published separately so it can be disputed on its merits. It belongs to Christoph Trappe and is argued for in the guide rather than asserted.
What gets measured
- Cost of an honest first test — advertiser minimum, and the wire-transfer minimum underneath it, which is frequently five times higher.
- Publisher exit cost — lowest payout threshold, the rail it runs on, the schedule, and the wire threshold.
- Inventory control — can a buyer name the site, or only a source ID.
- Time to live — moderation windows, since a three-day review is a real cost on a short test.
- Regulatory exposure — how far the network's supply sits from the sites regulators are actively investigating.
Why the ranking is not by volume
Claimed impressions in this category are unaudited almost everywhere, including at the largest networks. A number nobody verifies is not a ranking input. Entry cost, payout thresholds and payment terms are all checkable against a published document, so those carry the ranking instead, under the sourcing rules in the editorial policy.
What this method cannot tell you
It cannot tell you conversion rate, because that belongs to your offer rather than to the network. It cannot rank creative quality or support responsiveness with any rigour. And it cannot replace running the same offer across two networks in the same layer for a week, which is the test the guide recommends over any table, including its own.
Commercial links exist on this site and are declared on the affiliate disclosure page. They are not an input to any of the criteria above. If you can show the method contradicts the ranking, send the working and the table changes.