The July 2026 edition of the StatsDrone Affiliate Software Report, published on Nousviz, confirms Affilka as the number one third party iGaming affiliate tracking platform by program count, with 418 programs against MyAffiliates’ 384 and a widening lead. This case study reviews the primary data, quotes the StatsDrone co founders on record, and unpacks what the numbers do and do not say.
The report and the data set
The StatsDrone Affiliate Software Report is a quarterly market analysis of the affiliate tracking software platforms used across the iGaming sector, published by Nousviz in partnership with StatsDrone. The Q2 2026 edition tracks 2,669 affiliate programs and 3,715 active brands across 51 platforms (32 net new since May 2024), with data anchored to the StatsDrone admin as at 1 July 2026. The full ASR Q2 2026 analysis PDF is downloadable from Nousviz.
The methodology matters for a case study of this kind. Program counts are the frozen 2026-07-01 active app figures per platform, reconciling to the StatsDrone admin dashboard. Brand counts are the admin’s active brand count, slug deduplicated, with each brand attributed to the platform of its linked program. The report is authored by Darrell Helyar and co produced with StatsDrone Co Founder John Wright. The analysis period runs from May 2024 through July 2026.
The headline result: Affilka #1 by programs
Excluding proprietary in house tracking, Affilka now sits at the top of the ranking by tracked program count, at 418 programs, holding a 19.02% share of the third party market. That is up from 142 programs at the start of the analysis window in May 2024, a +194.4% increase across the tracked window. In the Q2 quarter alone, Affilka added +39 programs, the largest single quarter move recorded by any platform in the ASR.
Behind Affilka the ranking runs: MyAffiliates 384 programs (17.47%), Cellxpert 230 programs (10.46%), Income Access 174, NetRefer 120, ReferOn 92, RavenTrack 74, Affigates 71, Smartico 68, and PartnerMatrix 63. The lead Affilka now holds over MyAffiliates is 34 programs, up from just 6 in the Q1 2026 edition. That is the story of the quarter: the change of guard first recorded in Q1 has consolidated into a clear gap.
The nuance the report insists on: programs are not brands
The ASR carries a second ranking that changes the picture. By active brands (the actual operator brands each platform powers, not the count of programs), MyAffiliates sits at 595 brands against Affilka’s 468. The proprietary in house category is the largest single group at 636 brands, though its share of the brand total is receding. StatsDrone’s own summary calls this out directly: the program leader is not the reach leader. Programs measure breadth of adoption. Brands measure the size of the operator groups those adoptions represent.
The mechanics are visible in the brands per program ratio. RavenTrack sits at 2.16 brands per program and MAP at 2.15, both signals of multi brand operator groups running one platform across a portfolio. Affilka’s ratio is 1.12, a signature of the many single brand programs that make up its 418 count. MyAffiliates lands between the two extremes at a ratio near 1.55. This is not a weakness of any platform; it is a description of the operator profile each one serves. Gamblers Connect flags it here because a case study anchored to program count without the brand count would be a partial reading of the same underlying report.
What StatsDrone say on record
StatsDrone Co Founder John Wright published a public comment on the release, on LinkedIn, that reads directly on Affilka’s product position. Reproduced verbatim below.
Co Founder, John Wright, StatsDrone
“I think Affilka has timed the market perfectly or the stars aligned for them. Of course they wouldn’t have the top spot on the ASR if they didn’t have good affiliate software. If you talk to the team at Affilka, they are very product focused and passionate at what they do. In the last 2 years, they’ve rolled out a lot of features. For affiliates they have a unique combo of dynamic variables paired with postbacks. Usually an affiliate platform will give these features separately but Affilka has this baked in which I think educates affiliates on the value of both tracking mechanisms.”
The comment is significant for two reasons. First, it is on record from the same organisation whose data ranked Affilka number one, which is the strongest form of primary source available for a case study of this kind. Second, it names a specific technical feature, dynamic variables paired with postbacks in one flow, as a differentiator on the affiliate side rather than the operator side. That is a different claim to make than a brand or coverage claim, and one that Gamblers Connect will follow up in coverage of the operator experience of the platform.
The market backdrop: consolidation, not land grab
The Q2 2026 ASR reads the wider market as maturing. Total tracked programs grew +3.6% QoQ, the slowest in the tracked history, after +107.4% growth over the two year window. Of the +93 net new programs added in Q2, roughly 88 came from just four platforms: Affilka (+39), Proprietary in house (+29), MyAffiliates (+11), and Cellxpert (+9). The remaining 47 platforms combined for around 5. That distribution is the textbook shape of a maturing market where share is transferred rather than newly created.
Two legacy incumbents lost share on this measure. Income Access fell 5.66 points of share since May 2024 despite holding at 174 programs, and NetRefer fell 4.66 points to 5.46% share with modest absolute growth. Even MyAffiliates, still growing by count, has ceded 1.22 points of share across the same window. A clear second tier is forming behind the top three, with Scaleo (+1,267% since May 2024, 3 to 41 programs), Alanbase (+875%), ReferOn (+820%), Smartico (+224%), and Affise (+200%) combining program growth with rising brand share. The proprietary in house segment holds the most brands overall at 636, but its share of the brand total fell 3.78 points as operators move to third party platforms.
What the result means for operators and affiliates
For operators evaluating an affiliate platform, the Q2 2026 ASR carries three signals worth acting on. First, the market is now clearly stratified: three platforms hold the top of the ranking, a second tier of four to five is emerging, and a long tail of 40 plus platforms holds the remainder. Second, the leader is Affilka on program count, which is the closest available proxy for breadth of live adoption in the tracked window. Third, MyAffiliates leads by operator brand reach, which is the closest available proxy for the scale of the operator brands each platform serves. Depending on whether an operator is a single brand deployment or a multi brand group, the two rankings answer different questions.
For affiliates, the John Wright comment on the dynamic variables paired with postbacks combination is the specific technical point flagged by a credible outside voice. Gamblers Connect readers who want to compare that feature against what other platforms ship should treat the ASR ranking as market context, not as a substitute for their own evaluation. The ASR reports adoption and growth. It does not rank features, integrations, or fit for a specific operator profile.
Affilka’s own statement
Affilka’s response to the ranking was published on the Affilka blog on 22 July 2026, authored by Maksim Bodnar, and worth reproducing in the honest short form Affilka used itself. In one part of the post that reads unusually cleanly for a category leader, the piece states, and Gamblers Connect quotes verbatim:
“It’s worth noting that Statsdrone reflects one of the perspectives on the market, based on the data from sources connected to its ecosystem. As a result, it may not fully represent the broader landscape. Even so, the data still offers a useful snapshot of the market.”
Gamblers Connect flags this framing because it matches the reading the report itself invites. The ASR is the most comprehensive publicly available data set on iGaming affiliate software adoption, and it is one lens on the market. Case studies published under the Gamblers Connect editorial standard are held to the same test: primary sources named, methodology declared, competing readings acknowledged.
The full report
The StatsDrone Affiliate Software Report is published every quarter on Nousviz. The full Q2 2026 analysis PDF, with the complete platform tables, methodology notes, and executive summary, is linked in the Sources card immediately below.
