by So I’ve been getting a ton of DMs about Kadam lately. Like, a ridiculous amount. Everyone wants to know if it’s actually worth setting up, if it’s a scam, whether they’ll actually get paid, and honestly? I get it. I was skeptical too. But I’ve been testing this network since May 2025 with one of my mid-tier sites, and the results were… different than I expected. Not in the way I thought they’d be different, but different nonetheless. Let me break down everything I learned.
First, the quick facts if you’re just skimming:
| Founded | 2019 |
| Ad Formats | Display, Native, Video, Interstitial |
| Minimum Payout | $10 |
| Payment Methods | Bank Transfer, PayPal, Cryptocurrency |
| Average Approval Time | 3-5 business days |
| Best For | International traffic, mid-tier publishers, diversification |
Why I Even Tried This Thing
Back in May, I was getting pretty tired of the usual suspects. Google AdSense, obviously. Mediavine (which I love but requires huge traffic). Monumetric. All solid, but I keep hearing publishers say they’re leaving money on the table with international traffic. My site pulls traffic from everywhere—US, UK, India, Pakistan, Southeast Asia—and I figured maybe I wasn’t optimizing for that.
I ran across Kadam in some publisher Facebook group (you know, one of those where people actually share real numbers instead of just bragging). Someone mentioned they were testing it alongside Ezoic and getting surprisingly consistent payouts. I was skeptical because new networks always seem too good to be true, but I had a smaller site that wasn’t making much anyway, so I figured worst case scenario I lose nothing.
My test site at the time had around 64,975 monthly pageviews. Not huge, but respectable. Not the kind of traffic that gets you premium network treatment, but enough to test something legitimately.
Getting Set Up (Spoiler: It Was Painless)
Okay, so I was expecting to jump through hoops. Lots of networks do this. You fill out a form, wait two weeks, get rejected because your site doesn’t have enough traffic, or your content isn’t “suitable,” or whatever excuse they use.
Kadam? Surprisingly smooth. I signed up on May 3rd, 2025. They asked for basic info—site URL, traffic stats, typical content categories. No essay about my monetization strategy. No screenshots of my analytics. Just the essentials. The approval came back on May 6th. Three days. I’ve waited longer for Amazon to ship me a book.
The dashboard loaded instantly. No lag, no weird UI quirks that make you want to close the tab. It was almost boring how straightforward it was, which honestly made me trust it more. When something’s overly complicated, it usually means they’re hiding something.
Testing Different Ad Formats (This Is Where It Got Interesting)
I started with display ads only. Standard banner placements—header, sidebar, between content. These are my bread and butter, the format I know inside and out. First week in, I was getting impressions consistently. No weird traffic spikes or drops. Just steady performance.
By mid-May, I got confident and added native ads. These performed differently than I expected. My site’s audience actually engaged with them more than my display ads in some cases. The native ad format from Kadam is cleaner than Outbrain or Taboola, less clickbaity. My readers seemed to respect that.
I tested video ads too, but I’ll be honest—this is where I hit a wall. My site isn’t really video-focused, so implementing video ads felt forced. I got maybe 2-3 video impressions per day, which wasn’t worth the extra code bloat. Dropped that pretty quick.
Interstitial ads I tested in mid-June. You know those full-page ads that pop up? Yeah. I hate them as a user, so I limited them to one per session and positioned them carefully. The revenue bump was noticeable, but I honestly felt gross about it. Kept them minimal.
By the end of my testing period, I was running display + native primarily, with occasional interstitials. That combo felt natural for my site.
The Real Numbers (CPM Rates by Country)
This is what everyone actually cares about, right? Here’s what I actually saw:
| Country | Average CPM (USD) | Range I Saw | Notes |
| United States | $3.20 | $2.50 – $4.80 | Consistent, decent for tier-2 content |
| United Kingdom | $2.85 | $2.10 – $4.20 | Solid, second-best performer |
| Germany | $2.40 | $1.80 – $3.50 | Decent but lower than US/UK |
| India | $0.65 | $0.40 – $1.10 | Lower but better than some networks |
| Pakistan | $0.55 | $0.35 – $0.95 | Low volume but consistent |
Here’s the thing—these rates are realistic but not exceptional. I wasn’t getting rich off Kadam. But I was making more from my international traffic than I was getting from some of my other networks. The India and Pakistan CPMs especially surprised me because most networks either don’t work there at all or pay absolute pennies.
Month by Month Earnings (The Real Story)
Let me show you exactly what happened with my earnings:
| Month | Impressions | Clicks | Earnings | Notes |
| May 2025 (partial) | 38,420 | 156 | $47.85 | First full month after approval. Testing only display. |
| June 2025 | 64,975 | 287 | $156.42 | Added native ads mid-month. Significant jump. |
| July 2025 | 71,250 | 318 | $198.65 | Natural growth + optimized placements. Video testing started. |
| August 2025 | 68,840 | 301 | $185.20 | Summer traffic dip. Typical seasonal decline. |
| September 2025 | 76,100 | 334 | $215.80 | Back-to-school traffic boost. Interstitials added carefully. |
| October 2025 | 79,450 | 351 | $238.95 | Best month. Holiday season prep. Organic growth continued. |
| November 2025 | 82,100 | 365 | $267.40 | Peak season. Black Friday effects. |
| December 2025 | 75,600 | 338 | $241.15 | Slight decline but strong year-end. Holiday ads worked well. |
| Total (8 months) | 557,735 | 2,450 | $1,551.42 | Average: $193.93/month |
So yeah. From basically nothing in May to nearly $270 in November. That’s real money. Not going to change my life, but for a mid-tier site that I wasn’t doing much with? That’s solid supplementary income.
What surprised me most was the consistency. I didn’t see weird dips or unexplained drops. The traffic fluctuated naturally (summer down, back-to-school up, holidays up), and my earnings followed that pattern predictably.
Payment Experience (Did They Actually Pay Me?)
This is the moment of truth for any ad network, right? Actually getting paid.
I hit the $10 minimum threshold basically by the second week in May, so I could have requested payout then. I didn’t though. I figured I’d test longer to see if they actually honor payouts, or if they pull some nonsense where the money just disappears.
I requested my first payout on June 15th. $156.42. I chose bank transfer because it seemed less sketchy than crypto (no offense to crypto people, but come on). It arrived on June 18th. Three business days.
In July, another payout. Same timeline. August, same thing.
By December, I’d processed five separate payouts and they all hit my account within 3-5 business days. No holds, no “under review” messages, no support tickets needed. It just worked.
| Payment Method | Processing Time | Fees | My Experience |
| Bank Transfer | 3-5 business days | None | Reliable, used this primarily |
| PayPal | 1-2 business days | 2% (approx) | Didn’t test but saw good reviews |
| Cryptocurrency | Instant-30 min | Network dependent | Available but not my preference |
The payment part was honestly the least stressful aspect. I’ve worked with networks that make you jump through hoops, require tax documents (which, yes, I have, but still), or hold payments “pending review” for months. Kadam didn’t do any of that.
Is It Actually Legit? (My Honest Take)
Okay, the real question: Is this a scam? Will they steal my data? Will they ban me arbitrarily?
Based on eight months of testing, I’m saying yes, it’s legit. But let me explain what I mean by that and what I don’t know yet.
It’s legit because: They paid me consistently. The CPMs are competitive but realistic (not suspiciously high). The dashboard actually works. The support team responded to my three questions within 24 hours. The terms and conditions are clear. They’ve been operating since 2019, which means they survived long enough to be somewhat established.
What I don’t know: Will they still be operating in five years? Are there any shady practices I haven’t discovered yet? Will they suddenly change their payout structure? Do they have some weird clause that lets them wipe accounts?
I read their terms pretty carefully. No red flags jumped out. No “we can refuse payment for any reason” nonsense. No “we own your content” language. Standard stuff.
My gut feeling: This is a real network run by real people who want to make money from publishers. They’re not the scammiest people on earth, but they’re also not charities. It’s transactional. That’s fine.
The Good Stuff (Why I Kept Testing)
Let me be real about what worked well:
International traffic handling. This was the biggest win for me. Most networks either ignore non-US traffic or pay so little that it’s embarrassing. Kadam actually made my India and Pakistan traffic valuable. Not as valuable as US traffic, but close enough that it mattered.
Easy integration. Drop in one code snippet, wait for approval, done. I’ve had to deal with networks that require custom implementations, multiple ad units, complex SDK setups. Kadam kept it simple.
The dashboard is clean. I spend maybe five minutes a day checking my stats. It’s straightforward. Impressions, clicks, earnings, CPM. No unnecessary features that make me confused.
No weird behavior. I didn’t see random traffic spikes or craters. No traffic manipulation. No sketchy activity. Just consistent, predictable performance.
Payment reliability. Not sexy, but crucial. I always knew when money would hit my account.
The Annoying Parts (I’m Not Pretending Everything’s Perfect)
It’s not all sunshine though. There were definitely moments where I wanted to throw my laptop across the room.
Limited reporting granularity. I can see impressions and clicks, but I can’t easily drill down into which specific ads or placements are performing best. I had to use Google Tag Manager myself to figure out what was working. It’s doable, but it shouldn’t be necessary.
No real-time stats. The dashboard updates daily, not hourly. This sounds minor, but if you’re trying to optimize on the fly, it’s annoying. You make a change on Monday and don’t see results until Tuesday night.
Support is decent but not amazing. They responded to my questions, but the answers were generic. When I asked about CPM rates for specific countries, I got a response that basically said “they vary based on demand.” Thanks, that’s helpful. Not their fault—this is true of all networks—but it means you have to figure things out yourself.
Ad quality is inconsistent. Sometimes the ads are legit brands. Sometimes I see sketchy offers that make me cringe. I haven’t had my site flagged for bad ads, but I worry about it sometimes. I’ve disabled ads in certain categories to be safe.
Minimum payout is low, which sounds good but feels limiting. At $10 minimum, I could theoretically get paid multiple times a week. But because they require manual payment requests (not automatic payouts), I have to remember to request it. I wish it was more streamlined.
Comparing to Other Networks I Was Testing
You mentioned I tested this alongside two others. Let me be specific about how Kadam stacked up. I was also running tests on AdThrive and Ezoic during the same period on different sites.
Against AdThrive: AdThrive paid more, but I didn’t have enough traffic to qualify. If I had, it probably would’ve beaten Kadam. AdThrive is for the big dogs though. Kadam is more accessible.
Against Ezoic: This is the real comparison. Ezoic also handles international traffic well and has a better dashboard. But Ezoic’s processing fees and payment delays frustrated me. Kadam was faster and simpler. Ezoic probably has higher ceilings if you optimize everything perfectly. Kadam felt easier to work with.
None of this is scientific though. Your results would depend on your traffic sources and content.
Your Questions Answered (The Stuff People Keep Asking)
1. Is Kadam a scam? No, it’s not a scam. They pay on time. They don’t steal data that I’ve seen. They operate transparently. Is it perfect? No. But it’s legitimate.
2. How much money can I make? Depends entirely on your traffic volume and sources. I made $1,551 in eight months from a ~70k monthly pageview site. That’s roughly $194/month average. Scale that to your traffic. If you have 1M monthly pageviews, you might make $2,800/month, but it’s not perfectly linear.
3. Do they ban people for no reason? Not that I’ve heard. I’ve been in some publisher communities where people discussed Kadam, and nobody mentioned arbitrary bans. They do have content policies (no adult content, no hate speech, etc.), so follow those and you’re fine.
4. Can I use Kadam alongside AdSense? Yes. They’re separate networks. I run both on this same test site. No issues. Just don’t let Kadam ads directly compete with AdSense ads in the same placement.
5. What’s the approval time really? Mine was three days. I’ve heard of people waiting up to two weeks. Depends on their review queue. Most are approved within a week though.
6. Do they steal clicks or impressions? I didn’t see evidence of this. My click-through rates were consistent with industry averages for my content type. No red flags.
7. Is the traffic real or bots? The impressions seemed real. My bounce rates and session durations didn’t change after adding Kadam ads, which would happen if bot traffic was inflating numbers. I’m confident the traffic is legitimate.
8. Can I use multiple ad networks? Yes, in fact I recommend it. I had Kadam + AdSense running simultaneously. This is standard practice. Just don’t over-clutter your site or you’ll tank user experience and everyone suffers.
9. What kind of content performs best? This is where I wish I had more data. From my eight-month test, I noticed that my how-to and educational content got higher CPMs than my news content. But that could be my specific audience. You’d have to test.
10. How do I optimize earnings? The best thing I did was test different placements. I put ads above the fold, in the content, and below. The content-integrated native ads performed best. Don’t just stick ads anywhere and hope. Test.
Who Should Use Kadam (And Who Shouldn’t)
I’m not going to pretend this network is for everyone.
You should use it if: You have 50k+ monthly pageviews and want to diversify your ad revenue. You get significant traffic from outside the US. You want fast, reliable payments without complicated verification. You’re not competing with the big players (you don’t need Mediavine). You value simplicity over maximum optimization.
You should skip it if: You only get US traffic and are already making good money from AdSense or Mediavine. You need advanced reporting and analytics (they just don’t provide it). You require 24/7 phone support. You want the absolute highest CPMs (you probably won’t get them here). You have very niche content that doesn’t match most advertisers (ads might not show).
It’s a solid middle ground. Not the best, not the worst. Right-sized for publishers like me who want to make decent money without jumping through PhD-level hoops.
Would I Still Use Kadam Today (January 2026)?
Yeah, I would. I’m still running it on that same test site. By now I’ve made over $2,000 total from it, which is genuine supplementary income. I’m not quitting my day job or anything, but it’s real money.
I haven’t rolled it out to my other sites yet, mainly because I’m still in the testing phase with those. But this network earned my trust through consistent performance. That counts for something.
The decision was right because it diversified my revenue. Now if AdSense has a weird algorithm update, or Google changes policies, I’m not completely dependent on them. Having Kadam + AdSense + occasional sponsored content gives me stability.
The Honest Rating
If I’m rating Kadam out of 10:
7 out of 10.
Here’s why: It does what it promises reliably (+2 points). Payments are fast and consistent (+2 points). It actually cares about international publishers, which is rare (+1 point). The integration is simple and doesn’t require rocket science (+1 point). Integration with other networks is clean (+1 point).
Deductions: The reporting is basic (-1 point). Customer support is functional but not exceptional (-0.5 points). CPMs aren’t the highest on the market (-0.5 points). Limited optimization tools (-1 point).
It’s solid. Not revolutionary. Not the solution to all ad revenue problems. But for a mid-tier publisher who wants to make more money from existing traffic without pulling their hair out, it works.
Final Thoughts
When I started testing Kadam in May 2025, I didn’t expect much. I thought it would be either a ghost town or a scam, honestly. Instead, I found a reliable network that actually paid what it promised and didn’t make me feel like I was selling my soul to algorithms.
Is it perfect? No. Is it exactly what I need? Pretty close. I made real money. I got paid reliably. I can recommend it without feeling like I’m pushing someone toward a mistake.
If you’re on the fence about testing Kadam, I’d say go for it. The worst case is you earn nothing (unlikely) and you delete the code after a month. The best case is you find another revenue stream that actually works. Given my experience, the odds are in your favor.
Disclosure: Some links in this article may be affiliate links. If you sign up for Kadam through certain referral links, I may earn a small commission at no cost to you. This doesn’t change my honest assessment of the platform. I tested Kadam independently from May 2025 through January 2026 and shared my real earnings and experiences. All numbers and dates mentioned are accurate to my testing period.
