Running dating, VPN, or sweepstakes offers? Learn why experienced media buyers still rely on popunders in 2025 to scale traffic, test GEOs, and drive conversions at speed.
Popunders may not be the newest format on the market, but in 2025 they remain one of the most practical tools in a performance marketer’s arsenal. If you’re working with short funnels, testing GEOs, or scaling predictable flows, there are solid reasons this format is still in play — and, in many cases, outperforming more expensive options.
Let’s break down how popunders work today, what kind of numbers you can expect, and how to launch, optimize, and scale campaigns using OnClickA.
What makes popunders still relevant today
The first reason is simple: performance. In verticals like dating, VPN, sweepstakes, and utilities, the kind of verticals where user intent is often spontaneous, popunders continue to deliver strong and stable results.
Let’s look at the key benefits:
- Fast to launch — landing page + basic settings and you’re live.
- Guaranteed visibility — the page is shown regardless of clicks.
- Adblock-resistant — reaches users other formats miss.
- Test-and-scale friendly — low initial cost, easy validation, predictable scaling.
More advertisers are returning to popunder as a stable testing format in 2025, especially as push, native, and social traffic becomes more expensive and more dependent on complex creative funnels.
Popunders also don’t require creatives. They don’t rely on clickthrough curiosity. And they’re fully visible from the first second. That’s what makes them so effective at the early stages of a campaign lifecycle — or for aggressive, fast-optimizing flows.
Why experienced advertisers still rely on this format
There’s a reason this format hasn’t disappeared — it solves some fundamental challenges performance marketers face:
- It doesn’t rely on a click. The landing page loads automatically, giving you full-screen visibility from the start.
- It works well with AdBlock users. Unlike banners or push, popunders are less affected by filters and browser extensions.
- It’s compatible with short, mobile-first flows. For SOI/DOI offers, sweepstakes, utilities, app installs — it delivers clean, direct exposure.
- It pairs well with prelanders. You control the user’s entry point without creative dependencies.
- It’s easy to segment, test, and iterate. The behavior data is consistent, so you can optimize with confidence.
Popunders also perform well in terms of engagement. Users often interact with the page after they finish their initial session, which means you’re not interrupting their intent — you’re catching them in a pause. That small behavioral nuance is why average time-on-page can exceed 8 seconds even on generic traffic.
For campaigns where volume, control, and predictability matter, popunders offer a performance layer that other formats often can't.
Optimization tools that matter: what OnClickA offers
Running popunder campaigns successfully requires more than just buying traffic — you need the ability to control, test, and improve results in real time. OnClickA gives performance-focused advertisers the tools to do exactly that.
Here’s what you can use to optimize performance from day one:
Blacklist / Whitelist targeting
Manage sources directly: add individual spots to a whitelist to lock them in, or let Rules auto-blacklist underperforming sites/spots. Whitelists take priority — if a target is whitelisted, Rules won’t remove it. Rules use a chosen data window and only become active after the campaign has collected stats (typically ~24h).
Microbidding
Instead of bidding the same across the board, OnClickA allows bid-level control per site ID. That means you can raise bids where CR is high and drop bids where performance dips — even if the source is still acceptable.
Tracker and postback integrations
Full compatibility with tools like RedTrack, Keitaro, Peerclick, Voluum. Postback data feeds directly into your Rules and reporting — so you're always optimizing based on results, not impressions.
P.S: campaigns with postback configured are eligible for a 5% cashback — just contact your account manager to apply.
Multi-GEO and multi-flow campaigns
Test several GEOs and flows in a single campaign structure. This lets you centralize data and make faster scaling decisions without duplicating work.
OnClickA gives experienced media buyers what they need: clean traffic, transparent source controls, and the ability to act on real data — fast.
Automation Rules
Create up to 3 Rules per campaign (each Rule can have up to 3 conditions). Rules evaluate metrics (cost, impressions, clicks, conversions) over your chosen period and then automatically blacklist matching sources. Use realistic, non-conflicting conditions to avoid over-blocking; Rules run after an initial data-collection period.
How to launch and optimize a popunder campaign
Let’s walk through a working setup — not in theory, but based on current campaign practices on OnClickA and other platforms.
Step 1: initial launch
Goal: test spots and collect baseline data in 1–3 days
Budget: ~$150
Format: Popunder
Flow: Popunder → prelander → SOI offer
GEOs to start: BR, ID, PH, EG, TH, RO
Device focus: Android first
Model: CPM
At this stage, run with broad zone targeting. Use default frequency cap (e.g., 1/24h) and keep postback tracking connected from the start.
Step 2: early optimization (after 24–48h)
Once you have 1,000–2,000 impressions per zone, it’s time to filter:
- Pause any source with 0 conversions and time-on-page <5 seconds
- Remove spots with bounce rate >85% or scroll depth below 10%
- Keep only spots with CR above 2%, LP time 6–10 seconds, and engaged users
Segment traffic by OS, browser, device type — look for patterns in where conversions cluster. Apply microbidding on high-CR sources, or shift them to a dedicated whitelist campaign.
Step 3: scale and refine
After the first optimization pass:
- Increase daily spend on your best spots
- Launch 2–3 prelander variations to A/B test messaging
- Expand into adjacent GEOs with similar user behavior
- Maintain separate campaigns for whitelist traffic
- Adjust frequency cap if you want to control impression burn
You’re now working with tested data — so the traffic you scale is predictable. This reduces waste and protects ROI.
Best practices from active campaigns
- Localize your prelanders — native language and visual cues boost time-on-page
- Avoid judging by CTR alone — always pair with CR and engagement
- Track scroll depth to understand prelander performance
- Use frequency caps to reduce fatigue — 1 impression per 24h per user is a good starting point
- Always A/B test prelanders before scaling budgets
What kind of traffic you get with OnClickA
When running popunder campaigns, clean sources matter as much as the format. OnClickA delivers volume, but more importantly — control and quality. Here’s what that means in practice:
- High-volume inventory across Tier-2 and Tier-3 GEOs
You get access to millions of daily impressions in key popunder-friendly markets.
- Verified and owned publisher base
OnClickA works with a closed network of trusted publishers. This ensures consistent quality — no open exchanges, no unpredictable sources.
- Real-time fraud protection and active monitoring
OnClickA uses a mix of automated filters and human moderation to block bots, datacenter traffic, proxy users, and other non-converting traffic types.
- Fast and flexible campaign launch
Popunder campaigns can be launched in minutes — no creative approval needed.
- Flexible pricing and campaign management
OnClickA supports both CPM and CPC pricing models, with bids starting at $0.10. You can run campaigns via the self-serve interface or request managed support from the OnClickA team, depending on your needs.
Explore popunder today
Popunders can be powerful — but only when the traffic is clean and well-targeted.
We work only with trusted publishers from around the world, ensuring that the inventory you access is high-quality, brand-safe (when needed), and consistently monitored. With strong anti-fraud filters, manual reviews, and real-time optimization tools, you don’t have to worry about low-quality sources, click fraud, or bots.
And here’s the best part:
Popunders are one of the cheapest and fastest formats to launch. You don’t need creatives. You don’t need big budgets. You don’t need approvals.
With just a few clicks, you can start testing — and in many cases, that quick test ends up doubling your conversion volume.
Try launching a popunder campaign on OnClickA today — it might just be the simplest decision you make for better ROI this quarter.
Explore popunder now
