What is native advertising? How native ad networks work
Native ads match the look of the page around them and must be labelled as ads. How the formats, networks, pricing, FTC rules and gambling policies work.
Native advertising is paid content that takes on the look, format and placement of the page it appears on: a story in a feed, a tile in a "recommended for you" widget, or a sponsored article. It must still be labelled as an ad. For affiliates, native is a pay-per-click traffic source bought through native ad networks.
What is native advertising?
Native advertising is advertising designed to fit its environment instead of interrupting it. A banner sits in a box next to the content. A native unit borrows the content's own shape: the same headline style, thumbnail and position as the articles or posts around it.
The goal of native advertising is attention earned through relevance: a reader in reading mode gives an ad that looks worth reading a fairer hearing than a flashing rectangle. That is also why native in digital marketing carries a disclosure duty. An ad that blends in so well that people cannot tell it is paid becomes deceptive.
The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the US ad industry's standards body, judges whether a unit is native on four criteria in its Native Advertising Playbook 2.0: design, location, ad behavior and disclosure. A standard 300x250 slot can qualify, but only if it is styled to match the publisher's page. A generic banner dropped into the same slot is native display in name only.
Native ad formats, with examples
The IAB playbook lists three core types of native advertising. Two of them are ad units that send traffic somewhere, and the third is the paid content itself. All three must be disclosed as paid.
In-feed and in-content ads
In-feed ads sit inside a stream of content: between articles on a news homepage, products on a retail site or posts on a social app. In-content ads sit between paragraphs or under an article. A promoted post in a Reddit feed is a typical example (see our Reddit ads guide).
Content recommendation widgets
These are the grids of headlines and thumbnails under news articles, titled something like "Around the web" or "You may like". The IAB calls them content recommendation ads. A click always leaves the article for another page. This is the format most affiliates mean by "native traffic".
Sponsored content and advertorials
Sponsored content, which the IAB calls branded or native content, is a full article paid for by a brand and published in the site's editorial template, usually with the publisher's content team. The difference between sponsored content and native advertising is scope: sponsored content is one native format, while native advertising also covers the in-feed and widget units that promote such articles. An advertorial on the advertiser's own domain is the performance version.
Search ads and promoted listings
Paid search results technically meet the IAB definition, but the IAB dropped them from its core native list because the industry treats search as its own channel. Promoted listings on marketplaces count as in-feed ads on commerce sites.
How native ad networks work
Native ad networks connect publishers that have widget or feed space with advertisers that want clicks. The flow is similar on most of them:
The publisher installs the network's code. The widget or feed unit renders in the site's own fonts and layout.
The advertiser builds a campaign: headlines, thumbnails, a destination URL, targeting (country, device, OS), a bid and a budget.
The network reviews the campaign. Creatives and landing pages go through moderation before they run. Networks review both the creative and the page behind the click, and approval is not final: Outbrain's guidelines say it may reject or block content at its discretion even after launch.
Each page view runs an auction. The network weighs bids against expected click-through to fill the slots. Our explainer on first-price vs second-price auctions covers how the clearing price is set.
The click goes to the landing page. The advertiser pays for the click and tracks what happens next with a pixel or postback.
Programmatic native advertising trades the same inventory through exchanges: the publisher's supply-side platform passes native assets (headline, image, description) to a buyer's demand-side platform, and the page renders them in its own style. See DSP vs SSP for that plumbing.
Types of native ad networks
Native ads platforms fall into three groups. They differ more on moderation, minimum spend and account support than on the format itself.
Large content-discovery networks. Taboola, Outbrain (now operating under the Teads brand), MGID and Revcontent run recommendation widgets across large publisher networks. Review is strict, and gambling and finance carry their own rules.
Platform-owned native. Social apps and large portals sell in-feed units on their own properties through their own ad managers. Targeting uses first-party data, and the platform's ad policy applies instead of a network's.
Smaller and regional networks. Many smaller native and "teaser" networks sell widget traffic in specific regions, often at lower entry cost and with uneven publisher quality.
We do not rank networks, including in "best native ad networks" form. The right fit depends on geo, vertical, budget and how much moderation you can handle. If you are still working out who pays whom, start with CPA network vs ad network vs direct advertiser.
How native ads are priced and bought
Most native networks sell on cost per click (CPC): you set a bid per click and a daily budget, and you pay only when someone clicks. CPM buying and automated bidding toward a target cost per acquisition are also common.
Taboola's documentation shows the usual menu: a fixed CPC, an enhanced CPC that adjusts around your base bid, Maximize Conversions and a target CPA. Taboola recommends Maximize Conversions for new campaigns and suggests adding a CPA target only after the cost per conversion levels off. Target CPA needs the Taboola pixel or server-to-server tracking in place.
A push and native network's experts, in a 2025 trade article, favor opening on CPC; whether you later switch to CPM or a CPA target depends on how much conversion data the campaign has built up.
What a media buyer actually manages day to day:
Placement lists. Networks report results by publisher site or widget. Buyers block the placements that waste spend (a blacklist) and, at scale, limit spend to the ones that convert (a whitelist).
Creative rotation. Widget audiences see the same units repeatedly, so a headline and thumbnail that worked last week can stall. Track CTR per creative and refresh when it drops, instead of following a fixed schedule.
Landing page tests. Most of the margin is won or lost after the click.
We give no CPC benchmarks: click prices vary widely by country, vertical, device and publisher.
FTC rules on native advertising
Native advertising is legal in the US as long as it does not deceive people about being an ad. The Federal Trade Commission set out its position in December 2015 in an Enforcement Policy Statement on Deceptively Formatted Advertisements and a companion guide, "Native Advertising: A Guide for Businesses".
The test is the net impression the ad leaves on a reasonable consumer. An ad's format is deceptive if people cannot readily identify it as an ad, even when every product claim in it is true. In practice the guide asks for:
Placement. The label goes in front of or above the headline. If the image is the focal point, the label may need to sit on the image.
Prominence. Readable text with strong contrast against its background.
Plain language. The guide gives "Ad", "Advertisement", "Paid Advertisement" and "Sponsored Advertising Content" as terms consumers are likely to understand. It calls "Promoted" and "Promoted Stories" ambiguous. The standard is a principle, not a fixed word list.
Every ad in a widget. In a "From around the web" grid that mixes paid and unpaid links, each ad needs its own clear label or a visual grouping, not one label over the whole block.
The click-through page. If the landing page looks like an article, it needs its own disclosure near the headline, unless it is obviously an ad.
The guide also warns that anyone who helps create or present a deceptive native ad can be liable, and names ad agencies and affiliate advertising network operators among parties the FTC has acted against. Affiliates who publish advertorials should treat the disclosure as their job too.
This is a summary of public FTC guidance, not legal advice.
Where native fits for affiliates
A native click rarely goes straight to an offer. The widget headline promises something to read, so the click lands on a presell page that explains, compares or reviews, and only then sends the reader on to the operator or merchant. Native does the introducing; the presell page does the selling.
A compliant presell page is a review, comparison or explainer that states at the top that it is an advertisement and discloses the affiliate relationship. Outbrain's guidelines require advertorials to carry "Advertisement" or "Advertorial" clearly at the top, and ban fake testimonials, false celebrity endorsements and fake navigation that imitates a news site. MGID requires testimonial content to be authentic and verifiable.
On geography, the same 2025 vendor article rates native strongest in Tier-1 and Tier-2 countries (see Tier 1, 2 and 3 countries). Native lacks the purchase intent of search and the first-party targeting of social, but reaches readers on publisher sites that neither covers.
Native and gambling: network policies
On the three large networks we checked, gambling is restricted to licensed markets and comes with landing-page conditions. Rules checked October 2026:
Outbrain generally prohibits promotions of gambling, with exceptions when targeting the UK and the US, where online casinos, sports betting and fantasy sports are accepted (it also lists rummy and fantasy cricket for India). Its guidelines also list free-game apps ("social casinos"), physical casinos as destinations and state-run lotteries as accepted; the page does not say which geos that list covers, so confirm with the account manager.
Taboola limits gambling to countries it lists as open, including the US, and within the US to specific states per product. Its policy FAQ (updated May 2025) lists what reviewers often find missing: a license valid for the target geo on the landing page, a responsible-gambling message with links to support, and an in-state-only disclaimer. It rejects ads that show minors or promise guaranteed or easy money.
MGID prohibits illegal or unlicensed gambling and allows gambling and betting services only when they are licensed and comply with regional rules.
Other networks set their own terms. Before building a funnel, check the current policy and ask the account manager whether affiliate comparison pages are accepted and whether state targeting is available. US legality changes by state and product. Our state-by-state overview is the place to start.
Network policies change; this is a summary of public pages, not legal advice.
What practitioners say about native traffic
Buyers interviewed in a May 2026 trade-press roundup describe a channel that is harder to start than most buyers expect, but not closed to newcomers:
Review is manual and slow. At many teaser-style networks a human moderator checks the creative and the page behind the click, and some want a manager to sign off the whole funnel before launch; the buyers quoted describe sign-offs that stretch over weeks.
Account support follows spend. Large networks assign dedicated managers mainly to big budgets. The buyers quoted suggest a direct approach, at industry events or through LinkedIn, rather than waiting to qualify.
Public results are scarce. Native has far fewer published case studies than Meta or Google, and teams that make it pay rarely publish results. Expect to build your own benchmarks.
Entry is easier outside the crowded auctions. The same piece argues that long-running teams dominate CIS-rooted teaser networks, while local networks in smaller geos such as the Balkans or MENA see less competition. That is a view about those regions; it says nothing about US or Tier-1 inventory, where Taboola, Outbrain and MGID set the terms.
FAQ
What do you mean by native advertising?
Native advertising means paid ads that match the form and placement of the content around them. They must still be clearly labelled as advertising.
What are examples of native ads?
Common examples of native ads are a "Sponsored" post in a social or news feed, a paid tile in a "Recommended for you" widget under an article, and a sponsored article published in a news site's own template.
Is native advertising legal in the US?
Native advertising is legal in the US as long as consumers can tell it is an ad. The FTC treats native ads as deceptive when their format hides that they are paid, so labels need to be clear, prominent and placed before the headline.
How much do native ads cost?
Native ad costs come down to the click price you bid on most networks. Country, device, vertical, publisher quality and auction competition drive it, and networks publish no fixed rates. To size a test, set a bid per click, then divide the daily budget by that bid to see how many clicks you can buy.
What are the top native advertising platforms?
The best-known native advertising platforms are the content-discovery networks Taboola, Outbrain (now under the Teads brand), MGID and Revcontent, plus the in-feed ads of social platforms.
What is the difference between native advertising and sponsored content?
Sponsored content is one type of native advertising: a full paid article in the publisher's editorial format. Native advertising is the wider category and also covers the in-feed and widget units that promote that content.
Sources
Federal Trade Commission, Native Advertising: A Guide for Businesses
Interactive Advertising Bureau, IAB Native Advertising Playbook 2.0 (May 2019)
Outbrain, Our Advertising Guidelines (accessed October 2026)
Taboola Realize Help Center, Policy FAQ - Casinos & Gambling (accessed October 2026)
MGID Help Center, Which content is restricted or prohibited on MGID (accessed October 2026)
Taboola Developers, Bidding strategies
