If you want to know how to check if a website is monetized, skip the paid lookup tools to begin with. Most of the evidence is public and sits in three places: a text file at the root of the domain, the visible page, and the page source. Each tells you something different, and each misses something. The method below works through them in order of speed, and finishes with what none of them can tell you.
How to check if a website is monetized: start with ads.txt
Publishers that sell display advertising list the companies allowed to sell their ad space in a public file at domain.com/ads.txt. Google’s AdSense ads.txt guide describes the format, and once you know it you can read anyone’s file. An AdSense line looks like this:
The first field is the ad system, the second is the seller’s account ID, and the third is the relationship. DIRECT means the publisher controls that account. RESELLER means another company sells the inventory on the publisher’s behalf. Our post on ads.txt and sellers.json covers every field in detail.
This is the whole of a manual ads.txt check. You do not need an ads.txt checker for a single domain; a browser does the job. Checkers earn their keep when you are working through a long list of sites and want the lines parsed for you.
How to read what you find
The shape of the file usually tells you more than any single line. These are the patterns worth recognising, and how far each one can be trusted.
| What you see | Likely meaning | The caveat |
|---|---|---|
A google.com line marked DIRECT, little else | The site runs its own AdSense account | A listed seller does not prove ads are live today |
| A few DIRECT lines and a long block of RESELLER lines | A managed ad network or ad management company is selling the inventory | RESELLER lists can be long and include networks the site does not directly use |
| A file that has not changed in a long time | Could be stable, could be abandoned | Files go stale; lines often outlive the partnership |
| No ads.txt at all | No programmatic display ads, or a setup that skipped the file | Many sites earn through affiliates, sponsorships or products and never need one |
Treat the file as evidence of permission, not of revenue. The only way to confirm ads are running is to load a few pages and look, ideally on mobile and with any ad blocker switched off.
Step two: look for affiliate and sponsorship signals
The absence of ads.txt is where a lot of checks wrongly stop. Affiliate sites often carry no display ads at all, and an empty ads.txt says nothing about them. Look at the page instead.
- Affiliate link patterns. Hover over product links. Redirect paths on the site’s own domain, tracking parameters, or links that pass through a network’s domain before reaching the retailer are the usual tells.
- Disclosures. A line near the top of a review saying the site earns commission on purchases is the clearest signal there is, and in many markets disclosure is expected.
- “Sponsored” labels. Paid posts and partner content are often labelled as such in the byline, the category or the first paragraph.
- Comparison tables and “best X” roundups with prominent buttons are built for clicks out, whether or not a disclosure is visible.
If the reviews are thorough and the buttons all go to one retailer, you are probably looking at an affiliate site. If the reviews are thin and the buttons are everywhere, you may be looking at the kind of site a spam update eventually removes.
Step three: check the page source
View the source of a typical article and search for script tags. Ad networks and header-bidding wrappers load JavaScript from their own domains, and the file names or hostnames usually give the network away. The same pass will often show analytics tags, affiliate link-management scripts and consent tools, each of which hints at how the site is run.
Source checks catch what ads.txt misses in one direction: a script on the page is closer to proof of live ads than a line in a text file. They miss in the other direction too. Some ad setups load late, only for certain visitors, or only after consent, so a clean source on one page is not proof of no ads. Check two or three page types: an article, the homepage and a category page. Our guide to finding what technology a website uses covers the same source and header checks for the wider stack.
Step four: look for owned products and audiences
The last group is the easiest to see and the easiest to forget. A newsletter sign-up box, a shop page, a course, a paid community or a downloadable template pack are all monetization, and often the most profitable kind. None of them leave a trace in ads.txt.
A site with a prominent newsletter and no ads is often building an audience it sells to directly or through sponsorships. A site with digital products in the menu is running a business that happens to have a blog attached. Sponsored newsletter issues, a “work with us” or advertising page, and a media kit linked in the footer all point the same way. Both matter if you are sizing up a competitor or a site you might buy. Our breakdown of how websites make money covers each model and what it tends to require.
The limitation: you can see the model, not the money
Everything above identifies how a site tries to earn. None of it tells you how much. An ads.txt file does not reveal RPM, affiliate links do not reveal conversion rates, and a shop page does not reveal sales. Any revenue figure you see for someone else’s site is an estimate built on assumptions, and you should treat it that way.
Record what you find in a simple sheet: domain, ads.txt present or not, DIRECT systems, rough count of RESELLER lines, affiliate signals, sponsorship signals, products and the date you checked. The date matters, because every one of these signals changes. A sheet built this way across twenty competitors shows you the dominant model in a niche far better than any single lookup.
If you would rather filter than check by hand, the SERPHeroes explorer records a monetization model and ad network per site, which is one way to shortlist before you verify. The monetization hub explains how those fields are presented. Either way, verify on the live site before you rely on a label.
Frequently asked questions
How do I check a website’s ads.txt?
Add /ads.txt to the root of the domain in your browser, for example example.com/ads.txt. If the site has one, it loads as plain text.
Does an ads.txt file prove a site is running ads?
No. It lists which companies are authorised to sell the inventory. Lines can go stale, so confirm by loading pages and checking for ad scripts.
What does RESELLER mean in ads.txt?
Another company sells the inventory through its own account. Managed ad networks usually add many RESELLER lines, including partners the site does not deal with directly.
Can a site be monetised without ads.txt?
Yes. Affiliate links, sponsorships, newsletters and products need no ads.txt file at all.
The takeaway Read ads.txt for display ads, the page for affiliates and sponsorships, and the source for live scripts. Together they show the model; none of them shows the revenue.
