Where the money comes from.

When you click through a vendor link from this site and place an order, the vendor pays us a commission — typically a percentage of the order. Rates vary by vendor and are not disclosed individually because they're subject to NDAs we don't consider material to your decision.

You pay no more than you would buying directly. Coupon codes published here come from negotiated reader benefits where possible — usually a small discount layered on top of the vendor's normal pricing.

Editorial independence is a hard rule. Specifically:

• Vendors do not see drafts. No vendor reviews their audit before publication.
• Commission rates do not affect ranking. The composite is computed before we look up which vendor pays what.
• We do not accept retainers, sponsored placements, or paid features. Coverage is selected by us based on what readers ask about.
• Negative findings are published. A vendor we earn from can still get a low score and a critical writeup if the data warrants it.

Writers and lab partners are paid by us. They do not have access to which vendors are in the affiliate program or what we earn per click. The person placing test orders is not the person assigning audit scores; the person writing the audit is not the person managing the affiliate relationships.

These are operational separations, not just pinky-promises. We won't publish the org chart for grey-market reasons, but the firewall is structural.

You can use our links or not. Pricing, shipping, and product are identical either way. If you'd rather skip the affiliate flow, type the vendor's URL directly — we're here to help you decide what to buy, not to gate-keep the buying.