Most comparisons of ad networks lead with revenue share. For a small site that is the wrong column: what decides whether you earn anything is the entry requirement and the payout threshold. This table leads with those, every figure is sourced to the company's own pages, and it is dated because these change.
| Network | Minimum to join | Publisher share | Payout threshold | Self-serve |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Perch | None | 75% | $65.00 | Yes |
| TinyAdz | None stated — explicitly open to small and niche sites | Not published | $100 | Yes |
| Ezoic | Not published | Not published | Not published | Yes |
| Google AdSense | No published traffic minimum, but every site goes through an approval review | 68% | $100 (£60) | Yes |
| EthicalAds | 50,000 monthly pageviews, and developer-focused sites only | 70% | $50 | No |
| Mediavine | $5,000+ in annual ad revenue for the main programme; the Journey tier starts at 1,000 sessions | Not published | Not published | No |
| Raptive | 25,000 monthly pageviews | Not published | Not published | No |
| BuySellAds | No published minimum — publishers must contact sales | Not published | Not published | No |
| Carbon Ads | Invite only — around 350 hand-picked sites worldwide | Not published | Not published | No |
Every figure above is taken from the named company's own published pages, or marked Not published where they do not state one. Checked 2026-08-26 — thresholds change, and a dated table is the only kind worth reading. Sources and the full comparison.
A site with 500 visits a month earns single-digit dollars on a network paying by impression. AdSense does not pay out below $100, and that balance simply carries forward — so a genuinely small site can run ads for years and be paid nothing at all. Perch's threshold is $65.00, and the money comes from a price you set rather than from a rate you find out about afterwards.
Perch, TinyAdz — no traffic threshold and no approval queue before you can list a slot.
Ezoic, Google AdSense — anyone may apply, but a review stands between you and serving ads, and it is the usual reason a small site is refused.
EthicalAds, Mediavine, Raptive, BuySellAds, Carbon Ads — a published traffic or revenue floor, or no public route in at all.
Each of these has its own page setting out where it wins. We would rather you picked the right one than the one whose page you happened to land on.
There is no official pageview threshold. The review is what functions as one, and it is the single most common reason a small site is turned away.
What it does better than Perch: Fill rate and scale. AdSense will put an ad in essentially every slot on essentially every page, in almost every country, without you ever finding an advertiser. Nothing here matches that, and for a site with large international traffic it is very hard to beat.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Revenue share (support.google.com/adsense/answer/180195) · Payment threshold (support.google.com/adsense/answer/1709871)
Ezoic has publicly removed a traffic minimum in the past; we have not verified the current position from their own documentation, so it is left unstated rather than guessed.
What it does better than Perch: Automated layout and placement testing. Ezoic will try ad positions against your own traffic and keep what earns most, which is real optimisation work that no publisher-set-price model does at all.
We could not verify current figures from this company's own documentation, so they are left blank rather than guessed.
Journey is the reason this entry is not simply 'closed to small sites' -- it is the lowest published entry point of any full-service network here.
What it does better than Perch: Revenue per thousand views, once you qualify. For a content site that clears the bar, a managed programmatic partner will almost always out-earn a direct-sold slot, and they handle the ad ops entirely.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Requirements (www.mediavine.com/mediavine-requirements)
Higher tiers additionally require prior ad revenue.
What it does better than Perch: Everything that comes with a managed partner at scale -- an ad ops team, direct-sold premium campaigns, and revenue guarantees on the upper tiers. This is a different business from ours, aimed at sites many times larger.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Creator requirements (raptive.com/creators)
Worth stating plainly because it surprises people: the privacy-first network in this list has a higher entry bar than AdSense, and will not take a site about anything other than software.
What it does better than Perch: A genuinely filled slot without you doing anything, and an advertiser pool that actually wants developer audiences. They also publish quarterly totals of money paid to publishers, which is a transparency standard worth copying.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Publisher policy (www.ethicalads.io/publisher-policy) · Publishers (www.ethicalads.io/publishers)
There is no application that succeeds by being small and good. Advertisers are also asked for minimums in the thousands of dollars a month.
What it does better than Perch: Format discipline and advertiser quality. Fifteen years of a single well-designed unit on curated sites is why readers tolerate it, and their published cumulative payouts to publishers are far beyond anything here.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Carbon Ads (www.carbonads.net)
The closest conceptual predecessor to what we do, and there is no way for a small publisher to onboard themselves. That gap is most of why this product exists.
What it does better than Perch: A real sales force. If your site is big enough for them to represent, they will go and find advertisers and negotiate on your behalf — which is work no self-serve marketplace does for you.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: BuySellAds (www.buysellads.com)
What it does better than Perch: Matching. TinyAdz finds the advertiser for you, so a slot can fill without you knowing anybody — whereas here the first sale usually comes from your own reader clicking the slot.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: TinyAdz (tinyadz.com)
Included because it is the direct ancestor of this model and people still search for a replacement. It sold time on a site by auction with no traffic minimum, and at its peak carried roughly 10,000 publishers.
What it does better than Perch: Nothing any more; it shut down in 2018. It is here for the reader who is looking for what replaced it.
Sources, checked 2026-08-26: Project Wonderful (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Wonderful) · Post-mortem by Matthew Skala (ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/345)
No traffic threshold, no approval queue, no review of your site before you can list a slot.
Where Perch is weakest: Nobody finds your advertiser for you. There is no demand pool to fall back on — the slot fills when one of your own readers, or a business you approach, buys it. On a site with no local or niche connection to its audience, that is a real disadvantage against a matched network.
Every value comes from the named company's own published page, or is marked Not published where they do not state one — which is itself worth knowing, and is the honest answer for several entries here. Nothing is estimated, rounded, or carried over from someone else's blog post.
Figures were last checked on 2026-08-26. If you find one that has changed, tell us and it will be corrected — a dated table that is wrong is worse than no table.
If a network with no traffic minimum is what you came for: create an ad space, or read what to do when AdSense turns your site down first.