THE BOARD

A Reddit Ads alternative for a business that cannot fund an auction at $50 a day

Reddit is where the people who buy software argue about it, and Reddit Ads can put a promoted post in exactly those threads. Its floor is $5 a day and its own advice is $50 a day per ad group; if you can fund that for a few weeks and stand the comments, run it.

If you cannot, The Board is not an auction and does not target anybody. It is one page of brands that people come to watch, sorted by what each brand paid, where a dollar buys a listing that holds until somebody pays more and the traffic is counted by Fathom in the open.

Reddit Ads compared with The Board: daily floor, $5/day against $1
Reddit AdsThe Board
Daily floor
$5/dayper Reddit's help centre; $50 is its own advice
$1once, no daily budget
A click
$0.50 to $4third-party ranges for 2026; Reddit prints no rate card
Not soldclicks are counted, not charged for
Position
Auctionedsecond price, every impression
Helduntil somebody pays more
Reach
130.3Mdaily active uniques, Q2 2026, Reddit's own figure
Fathompage views and clicks, in public

The Board is ours, so read this with that in mind. Every listing on it is a paid placement, its position is decided by money and by nothing else, and nothing on it is editorial. The figures for Reddit Ads were read from its own pages on 6 September 2026 and are linked at the foot.

What Reddit Ads is, and what it costs

Reddit Ads is a self-serve auction. You pick an objective, a daily or lifetime budget, a bid and an audience (communities, interests, keywords or your own lists), and a promoted post runs in feeds and comment threads once it has passed review, which the help centre says takes about 24 hours on weekdays and does not happen over a weekend. It is a second-price auction: the winning bid clears at the runner-up plus a cent, and an ad group can spend less than its budget if it loses often enough.

The help centre puts the minimum budget at $5 a day and the minimum bids in the US, UK and Canada at $3.50 per thousand impressions and $0.10 a click, and in the same breath advises at least $50 a day per ad group and more than $100 a day to test, as read on 6 September 2026. Reddit publishes no rate card. Third parties fill the gap: Benly, updated 24 March 2026, puts a click at $0.50 to $3.00 overall and $1.80 on average in developer tools, with CPM at $3 to $12; Recho, 15 January 2026, puts a US click at $0.50 to $4.00 with an average of $3.50.

Reach is Reddit's own, and it is large. The second-quarter 2026 earnings release of 30 July 2026 reports 130.3 million daily active uniques and 514.6 million weekly, 53.2 million of the daily in the United States, and $762 million of ad revenue in the quarter. What any one campaign gets is whatever the auction delivers inside its budget, reported by Reddit.

The price of a place, and the price of the top

Two prices matter: what it costs to be on the page at all, and what it costs to be the one everybody sees first. Drawn to scale, with The Board’s top spot read live from the board.

A log scale: every gridline is ten times the last, which is the only way a dollar and a five-figure sum fit on one line. Prices on the left are Reddit Ads’s as read on 6 September 2026; the top spot on The Board is $101 as this page was built and changes as the board does.

Reddit Ads and The Board, side by side

QuestionReddit AdsThe Board
To be listedNothing up front; a budget of at least $5 a day, and every ad is reviewed first, about 24 hours on weekdays$1, once, for a listing: a logo, a line and a link
What you payBy auction, per click, per thousand impressions or per video view. Bids from $0.10 a click and $3.50 CPM in the US; third parties put a click at $0.50 to $4.00 in 2026$1 once for the listing; more only if you choose a higher position
What decides your positionA second-price auction on bid, budget and how the ad performs, every impression; there is no slotWhat the listing has paid. Nothing else, and nobody decides
A guaranteed top positionNone in self-serve. Reach is whatever the auction delivers, and an ad group can spend less than its budget$1 more than whoever holds rank 01 has paid
What a month runs$150 at the $5 floor; Reddit's own advice is $50 a day per ad group, about $1,500, and $100 a day to testWhatever you paid once. There is no monthly charge and nothing bills again
Reach you can verifyReddit's own reporting. The company reported 130.3 million daily active uniques for the second quarter of 2026Page views and outbound clicks counted by Fathom on a public dashboard; every listing shows its own impressions and clicks
What you getPromoted posts in the feeds and threads of communities you chose, in front of people who did not come for youA place on a page people watch, and a click from somebody who chose your brand off it
Best forA business whose buyers gather in subreddits it can name and that can fund an ad group at $50 a dayA brand with a few dollars that wants a position it holds rather than an auction it re-enters

Eight things to know before you pay either

QuestionReddit AdsThe Board
Terms with a date on them✓ Reddit's advertising services agreement✓ Dated 25 August 2026
A named operator✓ Reddit, Inc., San Francisco, listed on the NYSE✓ Dustin W. Stout, with a city and a Stripe profile
The price of the top spot published✕ Auctioned each impression; no fixed slot in self-serve✓ On the board, live, to the dollar
Reach counted by a third party✕ Reddit's own reporting✓ Fathom, on a public dashboard
Position lasts past a day✕ While the daily budget runs✓ Until somebody pays more; seasons end it
A refund path✕ None if you stop it; pro-rata only if Reddit cancels✕ None. Every payment is final
No curator between you and the page✓ Ad review only, about 24 hours on weekdays✓ None. Money decides, nobody else
On the page for a dollar✕ $5 a day minimum✓ $1, once

How The Board works, for somebody leaving Reddit Ads

There is no auction on The Board and nothing to bid. A dollar lists a brand, a logo, a line and a link, and the page sorts every brand by what it has paid; the listing stays where the dollar put it until somebody pays more, with no daily budget to keep, no review queue and no subreddit rules to read. If you have posted in r/SideProject, the difference is that here the promotion is the point and the page says so.

Rank 01 costs a dollar over the holder and every amount is public, so the price of any position is a number rather than a bid. An amount never goes down. Hold the top for thirty days and the season is yours: the standings freeze on a permanent page and every amount resets. Every listing shows its own impressions and clicks, and the page's traffic is on a Fathom dashboard the site cannot edit, which is the counter Reddit's reporting does not give you.

Where Reddit Ads falls short, and where it wins

Falls short
  • The floor that keeps a campaign alive is $5 a day; the floor Reddit itself recommends is $50 a day per ad group, and the two are on the same help page.
  • Nothing is held. Every impression is an auction, delivery can fall short of the budget, and the moment the budget stops so does everything else.
  • There is no rate card and no third party counting. The click ranges are estimates by people who sell Reddit campaigns, and the reporting is Reddit's.
Wins
  • Community targeting. A promoted post can run in front of the people who joined the ten subreddits where your buyers already are, which no leaderboard can do.
  • Reach. Half a billion weekly active uniques, in the company's own second-quarter release.
  • A free door beside the paid one: r/SideProject exists to show what you built, and a good post there costs nothing but the writing.

Which to pick

Pick Reddit Ads if
  • You can fund an ad group at $50 a day for a few weeks and read the results.
  • Your buyers gather in subreddits you can name.
  • You have a post that reads like a redditor wrote it, because the comments will say if it does not.
Pick The Board if
  • The budget is a few dollars once, not five a day for a month.
  • You want a position that holds until somebody pays more, not an auction every impression.
  • You want the count kept by somebody who is not also the seller.

Claim a spot from $1

A listing is a logo, a line and a link. Rank 01 costs $1 more than whoever holds it, every amount on the page is public, and the traffic is on a Fathom dashboard anyone can open.

Questions people ask about a Reddit Ads alternative

Is there a free Reddit Ads alternative?
Reddit itself. r/SideProject exists for showing what you built and why, with a working product rather than a landing page gate, and not the same project twice in a short window; r/startups bans standalone promotion of any kind and allows it only in its Share Your Startup thread. Both are free and both are moderated by volunteers whose rules are their own. The Board is a dollar, and the promotion is allowed because it is the product.
How much do Reddit Ads cost in 2026?
Reddit publishes minimums and no rate card: $5 a day, and bids from $3.50 CPM and $0.10 a click in the US, UK and Canada, per its help centre on 6 September 2026. Third-party ranges put a click at $0.50 to $3.00 (Benly, updated 24 March 2026) or $0.50 to $4.00 with a US average of $3.50 (Recho, 15 January 2026), and a thousand impressions at $3 to $15 between them.
What is the minimum budget for Reddit Ads?
$5 a day per ad group is the floor Reddit enforces, per its help centre on 6 September 2026. The same help centre recommends at least $50 a day per ad group and more than $100 a day for testing. A campaign at the floor runs; how much of the budget it spends is up to the auction, and an ad group can under-deliver.
Is The Board a Reddit Ads alternative?
For a small budget, an alternative use of the money rather than a replacement. Reddit Ads sells targeted impressions at auction inside communities; The Board sells a position on a public leaderboard of brands for a dollar, ranked by what each listing paid, with the page's traffic counted by Fathom. One reaches people where they already are; the other is a page they come to.
What does The Board cost compared to Reddit Ads?
Reddit Ads takes a budget of at least $5 a day, which is $150 a month at the floor and about $1,500 at the $50 a day Reddit recommends per ad group. A listing on The Board is $1, once; rank 01 costs $1 more than the holder paid, every amount is public, and nothing bills again.
How long does Reddit ad review take?
About 24 hours for most ads, per the help centre, longer in some cases, and an ad submitted over a weekend waits until Monday; Reddit recommends submitting 48 hours before the campaign should start. A rejected ad has its payment authorisation voided within 24 to 48 business hours. A listing on The Board is on the page when it is paid for, subject only to the terms.
What happens when somebody outbids me?
Your listing drops one place and stays; the amount you paid never goes down. You are told once who passed you and what taking the place back costs, and you can raise by any whole-dollar amount or wait. Waiting is free, and there is no budget running while you decide.
Can other brands damage my listing?
Yes. Anyone can pay for one of four kinds of sabotage against a listing, which changes how it looks or whether its link works for a few hours, and never what it paid or its real rank. It wears off on its own, it can be cleared early or protected against ahead of time, and nobody is told who attacked whom. It is the one thing on the page that behaves like a comment thread.
Do I get a backlink from The Board?
Not one to buy the listing for. Outbound links on the board go through a counted redirect and the embeddable badge carries rel=sponsored, which is what an honest paid placement has to do. Buy the position for the people who see it and click it; both are counted and shown on the listing.

Sources

Read on 6 September 2026. Prices on these sites move, and a figure here that no longer matches its source is a figure to tell us about: hello@toptheboard.com.

Also compared: Google Ads, Facebook Ads, LinkedIn Ads, X Ads, Carbon Ads, BuySellAds, Paved. Every listing site worth submitting to is in the directory list.