Last updated: 13 September 2026
This site is free and full of things you never have to pay for: routes, budgets, hostel tips and honest accounts of what to expect where. Making it still costs time and money. We do not pay for that with ads and we do not pay for it with sponsored articles. We pay for it with affiliate links.
Here is exactly how that works. Not because the law says we have to (it does, by the way), but because you should be able to see where our money comes from before you take our advice.
How we make money
In a lot of places on this site there is a button or a booking block that sends you on to someone else: a booking platform, a provider, a local business. That link carries a code showing you came from us. Book something there and they pay us a small part of what they earn on it, after the fact.
That is the whole thing. We sell nothing ourselves. We have no rooms, no boats and no stock. You buy from the partner, not from us.
What it costs you
Nothing extra. You pay the partner the same price as someone who typed their address in directly. Our fee comes out of their own margin or their own marketing budget, not off the top of your bill.
Nowhere on this site is a price higher because a link points at it. If it were, that provider would not be here.
Where you are actually better off
With some local partners we agreed the opposite: a discount code for our readers. You will find it on that activity’s own page, with a line on how to use it. Usually you just mention it when you send a message or book on the spot.
Do use it. It is the one place on this site where coming through us costs you less than going direct.
The kinds of partners we work with
We deliberately name no brands here, because that list changes faster than we update a legal page. The button itself always shows you where you are going. These are the kinds of companies involved:
- booking platforms for tours, tickets and day trips
- hostels and accommodation
- transport: buses, trains, ferries, transfers and flights
- travel insurance
- eSIMs and mobile data
- international bank cards and money
- practical travel documents, such as an onward ticket
- retreats and multi day programmes
- local businesses in Asia itself: dive schools, homestays, boat trips and guides
That last group matters most to us. Those are not platforms but people we know, and with them the money lands in the country you are standing in.
What a commission does not change
A fee has no influence on what we write. The order of our tips, our verdicts and our warnings are not for sale, and nobody here pays for a good review.
That is why you regularly read something on this site that you will not find elsewhere: where half a day is plenty, which tour you may as well arrange when you get there, where it is busier than it looks. Even with a link sitting right next to it that we could earn from. A tip you stop trusting afterwards costs us more in the long run than a missed commission does.
How our pages get written
We do the research ourselves. Prices, journey times, distances and opening hours come from the party that knows, and for things that move (a visa length, a vaccination recommendation) we put the source next to it so you can check whether it still holds.
We use AI as a tool while writing. What ends up on the page is our call, and nothing goes live without us having read it. The experiences, the verdicts and the choices are ours.
How to spot one
Every outgoing link opens the partner’s own site, and that is the exact moment we are out of the picture. You book there, you pay there and your details go there. So questions about your booking, changes, cancellations and refunds are between you and them, not us. There is more about that in our terms and conditions.
All we see is whether something was booked through us. Not who you are, not your name and not where you are sleeping. What happens to your data after that, and what a partner’s cookie actually does, is in our privacy statement.
What we do with it
The commission pays for the site, the photos, the software and the research. And for the travelling, because everything here was written by two people who took the buses, the hostels and the boats first. Book through one of our links and you help pay for that without it costing you a cent. Thanks for that.
Questions about any of this? Email us, we are happy to explain.
Do I pay more if I book through a Rebels on the Road link?
No. You pay the partner exactly what you would have paid if you had typed their address in yourself. Our fee comes out of their margin, not off the top of your bill.
With some local partners it is the other way round: there we arranged a discount code for our readers, so going through us is cheaper.
Do you earn from everything on this site?
No. By far the most of what is here is plain information: routes, journey times, budgets, neighbourhoods, safety and where your days are best spent. No link, so no fee.
Only the things you have to book somewhere (a tour, a bed, a bus, insurance) carry a button to whoever sells it.
Can I book without using your link?
Of course. Nothing obliges you, and you can look up any provider directly. You get the same price and the same conditions.
Use our link and it costs you nothing extra and keeps this site running. That is the whole deal.