Affiliate marketing has entered a more mature and competitive phase, raising an important question for growth-focused businesses. Which events are still worth attending, and which ones actually drive partnerships, revenue, and long-term advantage?
As acquisition costs rise and platforms tighten rules around tracking, attribution, and compliance, in-person events are becoming more strategic rather than optional.
A clear pattern is emerging going into 2026. The most valuable affiliate marketing events are no longer generic marketing conferences. They are highly specialized, partnership-driven environments where decision-makers gather with the intent to negotiate, validate, and scale.
Another trend is consolidation. Major hubs such as Las Vegas, Barcelona, Dubai, and New York are becoming annual meeting points for global affiliate ecosystems, combining networking, education, and deal flow into short, high-impact windows.
This guide breaks down the top 10 affiliate marketing events for 2026, explaining where they take place, who attends, and why they continue to matter for businesses navigating an increasingly performance-driven landscape.
Best Affiliate Marketing Events for 2026:
- Best Affiliate Marketing Events for 2026:
- 1. Affiliate Summit West 2026
- 2. ICE Barcelona 2026
- 3. iGB Affiliate Barcelona 2026
- 4. Affiliate World Dubai 2026
- 5. TES 2026 Marbella
- 6. Affiliate Takeover Miami 2026
- 7. MAC Affiliate Conference 2026
- 8. Digital Marketing Europe 2026 7ᵗʰ Edition
- 9. Affiliate World Budapest 2026
- 10. Affiliate Summit East
- List of the Top 10 Affiliate Marketing Events for 2026
- Why Should You Attend Affiliate Marketing Events?
- The Affiliate Event Advantage For 2026 Growth
- Frequently Asked Questions
Date: January 12 to January 14, 2026 Location: Las Vegas, United States Venue: Caesars Forum, Las Vegas Pricing: Multiple pass types are available. Networking passes start at $1,099, VIP passes at $1,399, and Partnership Week passes at $1,999, with early-sale discounts offered ahead of the event. Affiliate Summit West is widely regarded as the largest and most established affiliate marketing conference globally, with a strong focus on partnership-driven growth. The event brings together affiliates, advertisers, ecommerce brands, networks, and technology providers in an environment designed to facilitate deal-making at scale. Affiliate marketing is the core theme throughout the agenda, with dedicated tracks covering ecommerce partnerships, lead generation, tracking and attribution, paid media, and emerging AI-driven strategies. The format emphasizes practical, revenue-focused conversations rather than high-level theory, making it particularly valuable for organizations looking to scale existing affiliate programs or launch new ones. What sets Affiliate Summit West apart is the volume and seniority of attendees. The concentration of decision-makers enables rapid partner discovery, efficient relationship building, and meaningful discussions that translate directly into commercial opportunities beyond the event. Date: January 19 to January 21, 2026 Location: Barcelona, Spain Venue: Fira Barcelona Gran Via Pricing: Multiple pass types are available depending on access level, including standard visitor passes and premium options with extended networking and content access. Pricing varies by pass and registration timing. ICE Barcelona is the world’s largest B2B event for the gaming and iGaming industry, bringing together operators, platforms, suppliers, regulators, and media from across global markets. While broader than a pure affiliate conference, affiliate marketing plays a critical role within the ICE ecosystem due to its importance in player acquisition, retention, and lifetime value. Affiliate-related discussions appear across content tracks focused on marketing, payments, compliance, personalization, and sports betting, reflecting how partnerships operate within highly regulated environments. The co-location with iGB Affiliate creates a unique overlap between product, regulation, and performance marketing conversations. The value of attending lies in scale and context. ICE provides visibility into how affiliate marketing fits into larger commercial, regulatory, and technology decisions, making it particularly useful for businesses operating in or adjacent to iGaming ecosystems where partnerships must balance growth, compliance, and long-term sustainability. Date: January 20 to January 21, 2026 Location: Barcelona, Spain Venue: Fira Barcelona Gran Via, Hall 8.0 and 8.1 (North Access) Pricing: Affiliates can attend for free with a verified status. Networking passes are available for non-affiliates, with early-bird pricing starting at €650. iGB Affiliate Barcelona is the only large-scale event dedicated exclusively to the iGaming affiliate ecosystem. It brings together affiliates, operators, platforms, and technology providers focused on regulated gambling markets, making it highly specialized compared to general affiliate conferences. Affiliate marketing is the foundation of the event, with content and networking centered on traffic acquisition, player conversion, compliance, and multi-jurisdiction growth. The show floor is designed for efficient partner discovery, allowing operators and suppliers to connect with affiliates actively monetizing sportsbook, casino, and emerging iGaming verticals. The value of attending lies in density and relevance. Instead of broad digital marketing discussions, conversations focus on performance, attribution, and long-term partnership structures within regulated environments. For businesses operating in or adjacent to iGaming, the event offers concentrated access to partners who understand scale, compliance, and lifetime value in highly competitive markets. Date: March 4 to March 5, 2026 Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates Venue: Dubai World Trade Center Pricing: Tickets are sold as 2-day passes. Affiliate passes start at $829 (discounted), while Company passes are priced higher for brands, networks, platforms, and agencies, at $1,183. Affiliate World Dubai is one of the largest and most established performance marketing conferences globally, with affiliate marketing at its core. The event brings together advertisers, affiliate networks, traffic sources, technology providers, and high-volume media buyers in a single marketplace designed for deal-making and knowledge exchange. Affiliate marketing is central to the agenda, with sessions focused on paid traffic strategies, offer optimization, conversion rate optimization, tracking, and scaling profitable campaigns across verticals such as ecommerce, lead generation, and subscriptions. The exhibition floor plays a critical role, enabling direct conversations with affiliate networks, platforms, and traffic sources that are actively seeking partnerships. Beyond education, the value of Affiliate World Dubai lies in its density of decision-makers. Attending creates opportunities to identify new acquisition channels, validate partnership models, and stay aligned with how affiliate marketing is evolving across global markets in 2026. Date: March 9 to March 12, 2026 Location: Marbella, Spain Venue: Hard Rock Hotel Marbella Pricing: Affiliate tickets are heavily subsidized and start at €119. Entrance tickets are available at discounted and last-minute rates, with higher-priced sponsorship and exhibitor packages offered separately. TES 2026 Marbella is a long-running affiliate marketing conference known for its relationship-driven format and tightly connected community. Unlike large-scale expos, TES focuses on meaningful, repeat interactions between affiliates, advertisers, networks, and service providers, making it especially effective for partnership building. Affiliate marketing is central to the event’s structure, with discussions spanning lead generation, e-commerce offers, media buying, tracking, and compliance. The Meet Market and exhibitor areas are designed to facilitate direct conversations, allowing attendees to explore new offers, negotiate terms, and identify scalable traffic partnerships without the noise of oversized trade floors. The event’s multi-day format encourages deeper collaboration through scheduled meetings, informal networking, and social activities. For businesses looking to strengthen existing affiliate relationships or enter new markets with trusted partners, TES Marbella offers a setting optimized for conversion-focused discussions rather than surface-level exposure. Date: March 18 to March 19, 2026 Location: Miami, United States Venue: To be announced Pricing: Multiple ticket tiers are available, with early-access pricing at $659 for the General Pass and $759 for the Company Pass. Prices increase as the event approaches. Affiliate Takeover Miami is a performance-focused affiliate marketing conference built around a strict white-hat philosophy. The event positions itself as a curated environment for serious operators, emphasizing sustainable growth, compliant acquisition strategies, and long-term partnerships rather than short-term tactics. The event hosts practical sessions covering e-commerce, lead generation, pay-per-call, and paid media channels such as Meta, YouTube, native advertising, and TikTok Shop. Speaker content is geared toward real-world execution, with a strong emphasis on funnels, creative testing, automation, and AI-driven optimization. What distinguishes Affiliate Takeover Miami is its deliberate attendee curation. By prioritizing quality over scale, the event creates space for meaningful conversations and deeper collaboration. For businesses looking to build trusted partnerships, validate white-hat growth models, and connect with experienced media buyers and networks, the event offers focused value without the noise of larger expos. Date: May 25 to May 27, 2026 Location: Yerevan, Armenia Venue: Meridian Expo Pricing: Multiple passes are available. Gold passes start at $99 on early pricing, VIP passes at $299, Diamond passes at $599, and Company passes at $349, with prices increasing closer to the event. MAC Affiliate Conference is one of the largest affiliate-focused events in Eastern Europe and CIS markets, attracting affiliates, media buying teams, networks, and direct advertisers from more than 50 countries. The conference is positioned around practical monetization, traffic acquisition, and scaling strategies across performance-driven verticals. Affiliate marketing sessions cover paid social, app monetization, adtech, iGaming, finance, and emerging traffic sources. The agenda emphasizes actionable tactics, making it particularly relevant for teams running high-volume campaigns or testing new acquisition channels. The exhibition floor plays a major role, enabling direct access to networks, advertisers, and technology providers actively seeking partnerships. Beyond content, MAC is known for its structured networking and social events, which facilitate informal deal-making. Attending offers concentrated exposure to regional and international partners operating in fast-moving affiliate ecosystems. Date: April 14 to April 16, 2026 Location: Lisbon, Portugal Venue: Olissippo Oriente, Parque das Nações Pricing: Multiple ticket options are available. Workshop-only tickets start at €415 excl. VAT, 2-day conference tickets at €630 excl. VAT, and full 3-day passes at €950 excl. VAT, with tiered discounts offered earlier in the sales cycle. Digital Marketing Europe is an international conference focused on modern, data-driven marketing disciplines, with affiliate marketing positioned as a core revenue channel within the broader digital ecosystem. Rather than treating affiliates in isolation, the event explores how partnerships intersect with SEO, paid media, content, CRO, AI-powered automation, and attribution. Affiliate marketing is addressed through sessions on performance channels, user intent, conversion optimization, and lifecycle marketing, showing how affiliates contribute across the funnel rather than only at the point of sale. Workshops and talks frequently connect affiliate strategy with paid search, digital PR, and AI-driven personalization, making the content highly applicable to scalable growth models. The value of attending lies in its cross-channel perspective. The event creates space to evaluate affiliate marketing alongside other acquisition levers, helping teams align partnerships with long-term performance, data integrity, and evolving search and media environments in 2026. Date: July 9 to July 10, 2026 Location: Budapest, Hungary Venue: MTK Sportpark Pricing: Two-day passes are available with early-bird pricing. Affiliate passes are discounted compared to Company passes, with prices increasing closer to the event. Affiliate World Budapest, officially part of Affiliate World Europe, is one of the largest performance and affiliate marketing conferences in Europe. The event brings together affiliates, advertisers, networks, traffic sources, and technology providers with a strong focus on scalable acquisition and monetization strategies. The event hosts sessions covering paid media, e-commerce growth, lead generation, tracking, attribution, and emerging traffic channels. The structured tracks make it easier to dive into specific disciplines such as Meta ads, Google Ads, TikTok, AI-driven marketing, and verticals like e-commerce and iGaming. The exhibition floor and networking mixers create direct access to networks and partners actively looking to collaborate. Attending offers an efficient way to explore new offers, validate traffic strategies, and stay aligned with how affiliate marketing is evolving across European and global markets. Dates: July 27 to July 28, 2026 Location: New York City, United States Venue: New York Marriott Marquis, Times Square Affiliate Summit East is the longest-running affiliate marketing conference in the United States and the flagship East Coast counterpart to Affiliate Summit West. Hosted in New York, the global center for media, publishing, and commerce, the event brings together thousands of advertisers, ecommerce brands, publishers, affiliates, and technology providers focused on performance-driven partnerships. The agency covers content monetization, lead generation, e-commerce growth, and partnership strategy. Sessions explore topics such as attribution modeling, AI-driven ecommerce, referral-based lead acquisition, and diversification beyond single traffic sources. The Meet Market and structured networking format make it easy to move from conversation to commercial discussions quickly. Attending creates opportunities to build scalable partner programs, strengthen existing relationships, and stay aligned with shifts in performance marketing, media buying, and commerce monetization across North America.1. Affiliate Summit West 2026
2. ICE Barcelona 2026
3. iGB Affiliate Barcelona 2026
4. Affiliate World Dubai 2026
5. TES 2026 Marbella
6. Affiliate Takeover Miami 2026
7. MAC Affiliate Conference 2026
8. Digital Marketing Europe 2026 7ᵗʰ Edition
9. Affiliate World Budapest 2026
10. Affiliate Summit East
List of the Top 10 Affiliate Marketing Events for 2026
Below is a consolidated overview of the most important affiliate marketing events taking place in 2026.
|
Event name |
Date | Location |
Venue |
| Affiliate Summit West | January 12 to January 14, 2026 | Las Vegas, United States | Caesars Forum, Las Vegas |
| ICE Barcelona | January 19 to January 21, 2026 | Barcelona, Spain | Fira Barcelona Gran Via |
| iGB Affiliate Barcelona | January 20 to January 21, 2026 | Barcelona, Spain | Fira Barcelona Gran Via, Hall 8.0 and 8.1 |
| Affiliate World Dubai | March 4 to March 5, 2026 | Dubai, United Arab Emirates | Dubai World Trade Center |
| TES Marbella | March 9 to March 12, 2026 | Marbella, Spain | Hard Rock Hotel Marbella |
| Affiliate Takeover Miami | March 18 to March 19, 2026 | Miami, United States | To be announced |
| MAC Affiliate Conference | May 25 to May 27, 2026 | Yerevan, Armenia | Meridian Expo |
| Digital Marketing Europe | April 14 to April 16, 2026 | Lisbon, Portugal | Olissippo Oriente, Parque das Nações |
| Affiliate World Budapest | July 9 to July 10, 2026 | Budapest, Hungary | MTK Sportpark |
| Affiliate Summit East | July 27 to July 28, 2026 | New York City, United States | New York Marriott Marquis, Times Square |
Why Should You Attend Affiliate Marketing Events?
Affiliate marketing events are not just calendar fillers or networking rituals. For businesses operating in performance-driven ecosystems, they function as accelerators for revenue, partnerships, and strategic clarity.
Below are the core reasons why attending these events has become a non-negotiable growth lever.
Direct Access To Decision-Makers
Affiliate marketing remains a relationship-led channel. Events concentrate advertisers, networks, platforms, and high-performing affiliates in one place, dramatically reducing the time required to identify and qualify partners.
Instead of months of outbound outreach, meaningful conversations happen face-to-face, often with founders, heads of partnerships, or senior growth leaders who can approve deals quickly.
Faster Partner Discovery And Validation
Online outreach rarely provides full visibility into how a partner actually operates. Live events allow real-time validation. Conversations reveal traffic sources, compliance maturity, scaling capabilities, and alignment on incentives.
This reduces the risk of low-quality partnerships and helps businesses prioritize partners who can drive sustainable growth rather than short-term volume.
Market Intelligence You Cannot Get Online
Affiliate ecosystems shift fast. Offer structures change, traffic sources fluctuate, and platform policies evolve. Conferences surface this information early through panels, workshops, and informal discussions.
Listening to how others are adapting provides practical insight into what is working now, not what worked last quarter. This intelligence helps businesses recalibrate strategy before inefficiencies show up in performance data.
Stronger Negotiation Leverage
In-person interactions create leverage that email and calls cannot replicate. When multiple potential partners are present in the same environment, negotiations move faster and become more transparent. Businesses gain clearer benchmarks on commission structures, hybrid deals, exclusivity terms, and volume incentives, leading to stronger commercial outcomes.
Strategic Alignment Across Teams
Affiliate events help align internal teams around shared priorities. Exposure to how peers structure programs, measure performance, and manage compliance creates a common language between marketing, partnerships, and growth teams. That alignment shortens execution cycles once back home.
In short, affiliate marketing events compress months of learning, outreach, and negotiation into a few days, delivering outsized returns for businesses focused on scalable performance growth.
The Affiliate Event Advantage For 2026 Growth
Affiliate marketing events in 2026 are less about attendance and more about acceleration. Across these conferences, the common thread is concentration. Concentration of partners, decision-makers, data, and deal flow that would otherwise take months to access remotely.
For businesses, these events offer a clearer view of how affiliate marketing is actually evolving. From stricter compliance standards and more sophisticated attribution models to the growing influence of AI, paid media, and creator-led commerce, the conversations happening on the floor often precede visible market shifts.
The real value lies in compression. Strategy, validation, and partnership discovery happen in days, not quarters. Attending the right events creates leverage, shortens learning curves, and strengthens commercial relationships in ways digital communication cannot fully replace.
In an increasingly competitive performance landscape, affiliate marketing events remain one of the few environments where growth decisions can be informed, negotiated, and activated at scale.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a way for influencers, content creators, bloggers, and the like to make money by recommending products. Many companies offer an affiliate program—either through an affiliate platform or on their own accord—that allows customers to sign up to receive a percentage of purchases made via their link.
How do affiliate marketing events help brands choose the right programs?
These events make it easier to compare partners side by side, especially when evaluating different affiliate marketing programs with varying commission models, approval processes, and compliance standards.
Are certain affiliate niches better represented at major conferences?
Yes, large events tend to surface trends around profitable verticals, helping brands identify which affiliate marketing niches are gaining traction across ecommerce, SaaS, finance, and content-driven partnerships.
What platform is best for affiliate marketing?
There are so many great affiliate marketing platforms out there for brands to use to set up their affiliate programs. Some of the ones we recommend are:
- Refersion
- Impact.com
- Post Affiliate Pro
- Tapfiliate
What strategies are brands refining most at affiliate conferences?
Many sessions and closed-door conversations focus on refining affiliate marketing strategies around attribution, hybrid payouts, content partnerships, and paid media integrations.
Do affiliate events influence the tech stacks brands use?
Absolutely. Exposure to platforms and demos often reshapes how teams select affiliate marketing tools for tracking, fraud prevention, partner discovery, and performance optimization.
Is it useful to attend events before launching an affiliate program?
Attending early can help brands avoid common pitfalls when they create an affiliate marketing program by learning directly from operators who have scaled and iterated successfully.
How do conferences help brands identify premium partners?
In-person discussions make it easier to assess fit and scale potential, especially when evaluating relationships tied to high-paying affiliate programs that require tighter alignment and vetting.
Are Amazon-focused affiliates active at these events?
Many conferences feature creators and partners who rely on advanced Amazon affiliate marketing tools to optimize storefronts, content, and attribution beyond basic link placement.
How is AI changing conversations at affiliate marketing events?
AI-driven optimization, automation, and predictive insights are increasingly central, with many sessions exploring how AI affiliate for performance marketing reshapes scaling and partner management.
