# Monetization

> The revenue paths open to a PWA — advertising, in-app payments and commerce, subscriptions, and affiliate — and where each is constrained by platform policy.

**In one line:** A PWA can make money four ways — advertising, in-app payments and
commerce, subscriptions, and affiliate — and unlike a native app it is rarely forced
through a store's billing system, which changes the economics.

## The revenue paths

| Path | What it monetizes | Key constraint |
|---|---|---|
| Advertising | Attention / impressions. | Whether the ad network's SDK runs and pays out in a PWA context. See [Ad networks](/ecosystem/ad-networks/). |
| Payments & commerce | One-off purchases, checkout. | Which payment SDKs load and which methods are available. See [Payments](/ecosystem/payments/). |
| Subscriptions | Recurring access. | Billing provider support; no mandatory store cut on the open web. |
| Affiliate / referral | Outbound conversions. | Pure links — works everywhere, lowest ceiling. |

## Why the web's economics differ

A native app distributed through a store typically routes digital-goods purchases through
the store's billing system and its commission. A PWA delivered over the web is generally
**not** subject to a mandatory store cut for web payments — you can use
[Payment Request](/compatibility/payment-request/), Google Pay, Stripe, or a regional
provider directly. When the same PWA is *wrapped for a store* (a TWA on Google Play, a
packaged PWA on the Microsoft Store), the store's commercial policy can re-enter the
picture; those positions are tracked as sourced rows in the
[policy dimension](/compatibility/policy/).

## Advertising

Display and native ads are the most common path. The practical question is not "can I
embed an ad?" but "does this network officially support and pay out on PWA inventory, and
in what context (installed standalone vs. browser tab)?" That is an ecosystem-policy fact,
maintained in the [policy data](/compatibility/policy/) and explained in
[Ad networks](/ecosystem/ad-networks/).

## Payments and commerce

For physical goods and most digital purchases, a PWA can collect payment with the
[Payment Request API](/compatibility/payment-request/) and provider SDKs. Coverage of
payment methods (cards, wallets, regional rails) and SDK availability inside a standalone
PWA is the subject of [Payments](/ecosystem/payments/), with the structured rows in the
[policy data](/compatibility/policy/).

## Subscriptions and affiliate

Subscriptions run on the same web-billing rails as one-off commerce; the differentiator is
the provider's recurring-billing and dunning support, not anything PWA-specific. Affiliate
and referral monetization is just outbound linking — it works in any browser and needs no
special capability, but has the lowest revenue ceiling of the four.

← Back to the [Ecosystem](/ecosystem/) overview.