Affiliate disclosure

The short version

SoftwarePivot earns money from some of the links on this site. When you click one of them and then buy, subscribe, start a trial or complete another action on the vendor's website, the vendor may pay us a commission, either directly or through an affiliate network such as MaxBounty or Perform[cb]. It doesn't add anything to the price you pay.

Commissions pay for the site. They don't decide what we recommend, what verdict we give or where it appears in a list.

How affiliate links work here

An affiliate link is an ordinary link with a tracking code that tells the vendor the visit came from us. If you complete a qualifying action, the vendor credits us with a commission. Depending on the program, the qualifying action may be:

• a purchase or a paid subscription;
• signing up for a free trial or a free account;
• installing an app;
• filling in a form on the vendor's site, such as a request for a quote.

Commissions are usually a fixed amount or a percentage of the sale, and the rates vary from vendor to vendor. We don't see your name, your email address or your payment details; the vendor or network only tells us that a qualifying action happened. The privacy policy has the details.

How you can tell

We mark our commercial relationships where you'll see them before you click:

• At the top of a guide. Any guide that contains affiliate links says so directly under the title: "This article may contain affiliate links."
• Next to the button. Boxes that link to a vendor through an affiliate link carry a note underneath: "Affiliate link: if you buy through it we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you."
• In the code. Affiliate links are tagged rel="sponsored", the standard label that tells search engines a link is commercial.
• At the bottom of every page. The site footer reminds you that some links are affiliate links and links back here.

If a guide contains no affiliate links, it carries no note, and nobody paid for any link in it. This page explains the notes; it doesn't replace them. Each page that needs a disclosure carries its own, next to the links it applies to.

Partner offers and promotional pages

Alongside our independent guides, some pages on SoftwarePivot may promote a specific offer from a partner. On those pages the promotion is the point, and we are paid when readers take the action the page describes. Every such page carries the label "Advertisement" at the top, above the headline and before any link to the offer, so you know you're reading promotional material and not one of our comparisons.

Partner pages follow the same honesty rules as the rest of the site: no invented facts, no fake reviews or testimonials, no countdown timers or false scarcity, and no promises of results. Any claim about the product must be one the partner can back up and that we have checked against the partner's own published information.

What commissions don't change

• Our verdicts. Every product is judged against the same evidence, using the method on the about page, whether or not it has an affiliate program.
• Which products we cover. We write about products that pay no commission at all, including free tools and the ones built into Windows, macOS, Android and iOS, and we'll tell you when one of them is all you need.
• The order of our lists. Where a guide names a top pick or puts one product ahead of another, the text explains why. Nobody can pay to move up.
• Reviews for sale. We don't accept payment, free licenses or gifts in exchange for a review or a better verdict.

We'd rather lose a commission than recommend a product the evidence doesn't support.

Results

Software works differently on different devices, networks and accounts. Nothing on SoftwarePivot, on our guides or on partner pages, is a promise that a product will deliver a particular result for you. Check the vendor's own terms, trial period and refund policy before you pay.

Questions

If you're not sure whether a link is an affiliate link, or you think a page isn't labeled clearly enough, tell us at info@softwarepivot.com. SoftwarePivot is operated by CTAWeb Srls, Falciano del Massico, Italy.