How ranking works
Aisle orders products by one public formula. Nobody can buy a better organic rank, and sponsored placements always say so.
The formula
rank = 0.4 × quality + 0.3 × engagement + 0.2 × freshness + 0.1 × referred traffic
Products sold through Aisle checkout get a small bonus of 0.03, because their reviews come from verified purchases.
What each part means
- Quality (40 %)
- Ratings (averaged so a few reviews don't swing it), how rarely buyers ask for refunds, uptime for hosted apps and how quickly the developer answers reviews.
- Engagement (30 %)
- How often people open the product from a card, how often a product page leads to a purchase or a visit to the developer's site, and whether visitors come back.
- Freshness (20 %)
- How recently the product shipped a new version or changelog entry, and how recently it launched. Both fade gradually.
- Referred traffic (10 %)
- Purchases and sign-ups that come through the developer's own Aisle link in the last 30 days.
Sponsored placements
Developers can pay for boosts and featured slots. These are always labelled "Sponsored", appear only in marked places and never change the formula above. A sponsored product is paid for by its developer, named on the card: boosts are paid per click from Aisle Credits and show up next to search results, in categories and among similar products; featured slots are booked by the week. Aisle Match never shows sponsored products.
Trending and new
Trending counts views in the last 7 days plus purchases in the same week (a purchase counts like 20 views). "New today" shows products that went live in the last 24 hours.
Badges
Badges are earned, not bought: Top rated needs at least 10 ratings averaging 4.5 or more; the 14-day guarantee comes with Aisle checkout from developers who accepted the refund mandate; Open source needs a public repository.