# GHAN vs. CrossPromo > CrossPromo exchanges impressions between App Store apps at a 2-to-1 ratio for no money at all. GHAN pays cash or credits per install that survives 48 hours, for apps distributed as DMG and EXE outside the stores. If your app is on the App Store and you want free reciprocal promotion, CrossPromo is the better fit and GHAN is not competing for it. Source: https://ghan.io/compare/crosspromo/ Published: 2026-09-22 · Updated: 2026-09-22 Publisher: GHAN — the audited cross-promotion network for desktop apps (https://ghan.io) --- ## Side by side | | CrossPromo | GHAN | |---|---|---| | **Distribution covered** | App Store — iPhone, iPad, Mac | Direct download — DMG and EXE, outside the stores | | **Platforms** | Native Swift (iOS 16+, macOS 13+), Flutter and React Native on iOS | Electron, Tauri, Node on macOS and Windows | | **Model** | Barter — 2 impressions shown earns 1 received | Paid — published floor per cleared install, optional bidding above it | | **Cost** | Free. No fee, no ad spend, no card on file | EUR 12–50 per cleared install, or earn credits by serving | | **Can you buy more than you earn** | No, by design | Yes | | **Unit of exchange** | Impressions | Installs still in use at 48 hours | | **Verification** | Server-side against live App Store releases; simulators, debug builds, TestFlight and sandbox excluded | Single-use signed token countersigned by the receiving app, plus device and cohort checks | | **Data stored per event** | Two app names, nothing else | Token, two signatures, coarse fraud signals — no personal data | | **Settlement** | None — nothing is owed | Append-only ledger, escrow, Stripe payouts | ## Where CrossPromo is the better answer Genuinely, and not as a courtesy: - **Your app is on the App Store.** GHAN's gate requires a download URL serving your declared bundle id and a build you notarise yourself. An App Store app is a different distribution problem and CrossPromo is built for it. - **You want it free.** CrossPromo costs nothing and never asks for a card. GHAN has no fee to join or to serve, but buying installs costs money unless you earn credits first. - **You ship native Swift, or iOS via Flutter or React Native.** GHAN v1 does not have a native Swift SDK and the [status page](/status/) says so. - **You do not want a settlement layer at all.** Barter has no ledger, no escrow and no payouts because nothing is owed. That is a real simplification, and if you do not need to buy volume it is a better one. ## Where GHAN is the better answer - **Your app ships outside the stores.** Most Electron and Tauri software, and most Windows desktop software, is downloaded from the developer's own site. That distribution is what GHAN is for. - **You want to buy more than you can earn.** Barter caps your volume at your own traffic, exactly when you most want to exceed it. A rate card does not. - **You want the exchange priced rather than rationed.** A 2-to-1 impression ratio treats every impression as worth the same. A floor plus a market prices a B2B tool install differently from a utility install, and lets contention move the price when a category is genuinely in demand. - **You need to bill or be paid.** If money has to move, someone has to define the unit precisely enough to charge for it, which is what the [cleared install](/reports/desktop-software-cpi-benchmarks/) definition and the signed ledger exist to do. ## The honest structural difference Barter and paid networks fail in different places, and knowing which failure you prefer is most of the decision. **Barter's hard problem is the exchange rate.** Two impressions for one is simple and therefore fair-ish, but an impression in a 50,000-user app is not the same asset as an impression in a 500-user app, and no fixed ratio can express that. The upside is that when no money moves, fraud has almost nothing to steal. **Paid's hard problem is the definition.** The moment an install has a price, someone is motivated to manufacture one. That is why GHAN's design spends most of its complexity on making a billable install expensive to fake — two independent signatures, 48-hour retention, pair caps, an [append-only ledger](/transparency/) — and why a barter network correctly does not need any of it. Neither is the better design. They are answers to different questions. ## What we can and cannot verify The CrossPromo details on this page are taken from promotethatapp.com as of 22 September 2026: the 2-to-1 exchange rate, the free pricing, the platform list, and the verification approach excluding simulators, debug builds, TestFlight and sandbox traffic. GHAN has not tested their network and makes no claim about how it performs in practice. If anything here is out of date or wrong, tell us at `hello@ghan.io` and it will be corrected — a comparison page that quietly ages into inaccuracy is worse than no comparison page. ## Questions people ask about this ### What is CrossPromo? CrossPromo, at promotethatapp.com, is a reciprocal cross-promotion network for independent iPhone, iPad and Mac apps. Apps display recommendation cards for other participating apps and receive promotion in return at a 2-to-1 exchange rate - show two recommendations, earn one. It is free, with no fee and no ad spend, and it verifies activity against live App Store releases while excluding simulators, debug builds, TestFlight and sandbox traffic. It supports native Swift on iOS 16+ and macOS 13+, plus Flutter and React Native on iOS. ### Should I use CrossPromo or GHAN? If your app ships through the App Store, CrossPromo fits and costs nothing, so start there. If your app ships as a DMG or an EXE from your own website - which is most Electron, Tauri and Windows software - CrossPromo does not cover that distribution and GHAN does. If you want to buy volume rather than earn it reciprocally, GHAN prices it; CrossPromo deliberately does not sell installs at all. ### Can I use both? Yes, and if you ship both an App Store build and a direct download there is no reason not to. They cover different distribution channels and neither asks for exclusivity. The integrations are independent. ### What is the difference between barter and paid cross-promotion? In barter you exchange impressions and no money moves, so the value of what you get is tied to the value of what you gave and volume is capped by your own traffic. In a paid network installs have a price, which means you can buy more than you earn, and it means someone has to define what an install is precisely enough to charge for it. Barter needs a fair exchange rate; paid needs an auditable unit.