Some of the most important questions for website owners who use AdSense to generate revenue from ads are about how does Google AdSense pay. So, in this article, I listed the most important questions that users of our Advanced Ads plugin keep asking me regarding AdSense payments.
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Google AdSense Payout Checklist
Before getting your AdSense payment by Google AdSense, you need to set up the payment information:
- the correct postal address (and confirm it)
- provide tax information (not applicable for all countries)
- select a payment method
AdSense will hold your AdSense earnings until you entered all the information. So you can start using AdSense and generate revenues from ads even before finishing the payment setup. You should see notifications in your AdSense backend until the setup process is completed.
Using the free Advanced Ads plugin to integrate AdSense into WordPress is even more convenient. It will display any such account notifications and an overview of your earnings directly in your WordPress backend.
Stay tuned until the end of this article, where I’ll elaborate on the precise steps to seamlessly integrate AdSense earnings into the WordPress backend with Advanced Ads.
When does AdSense pay?
Google calculates your AdSense earnings for an entire month. After the month ends, AdSense takes a few weeks to review your earnings and identify false impressions and clicks before finalizing the payment. This review is normally done by the 20th of the succeeding month. Google sends the AdSense payment in the last week of the following month.
In a nutshell, this is a typical AdSense payment date timeline, which begins the month after you generated your AdSense earnings.
| 3rd of the month | AdSense earnings are finalized, revenue for invalid clicks is reduced. Use click fraud protection to secure your AdSense account for invalid clicks. |
| 20th | Last chance to make changes to your AdSense payment method. |
| 21st – 26th | Google will send the AdSense payment; changes are no longer possible. |
| 27th two months later | You can reissue another Google AdSense payout if you didn’t receive it |
Timelines could shift depending on the timezone you are in or if the day a specific action is taken falls on a weekend or bank holiday.
The AdSense payment itself may take some time, depending on the payout method. Here are some Google AdSense payment methods and the time they take until the money reaches you:
| Checks by mail | 2-4 weeks |
| Wire transfer | 15 days |
| EFT payments/bank transfer | 7 business days |
| Western Union Quick Cash | you have 60 days to pick it up |
What is the AdSense payment threshold?
The AdSense payment threshold is the minimal amount of earnings you need to gather in a row of months before getting paid. As you can see in the sample payment schedule below, you won’t get paid for the month you earned only $40, but when you made $90 in the next month, you earned a total of $130 and are eligible to get paid by AdSense in the succeeding month.
The payment threshold is different by currency. Here are some sample values.
| U.S. Dollar | $100 |
| Euro | €70 |
| British Pound | £60 |
| Yen | ¥8000 |
| Australian Dollar | A$100 |
The AdSense payment threshold is probably the most important for you, but there are three other types of thresholds for earnings connected with actions in AdSense:
- Address verification threshold
- Payment method selection threshold
- Cancellation threshold
You can review the detailed list of thresholds, but as a rough orientation, the threshold for all of them is the equivalent amount of $10 or €10.
Why do my AdSense earnings decrease after the month?
The numbers you see in your performance reports are called estimated earnings. AdSense needs until the 3rd of the following month to finalize your earnings and display the result in your account under Payments > Transactions.
The reason for the difference between both numbers is invalid clicks and impressions. Google doesn’t disclose how they distinguish those clicks, but one of those invalid activities is clicking on ads on your own site. If you violate the AdSense policy too often, you might get banned from the network and lose all outstanding payments.
Get Advanced Ads Pro to secure your AdSense account with the click fraud protection feature. It prevents users from deliberately or accidentally clicking on the same ads multiple times.
What is a payment hold, and how to issue one?
If you want to postpone your AdSense payment release date for any reason, you can increase the AdSense payment threshold or schedule the next payout of your AdSense earnings.
- Sign in to your AdSense account.
- Select Payments > Payments info.
- Go to Manage settings.
- Look for the Payment schedule section.
- Change the Payment schedule options by clicking on the edit icon
- Increase the AdSense payment threshold or change the AdSense payment release date
- Click Save.
You could hold AdSense payments for the current month only if you issued the hold before the 20th of that month.
What can I do if I didn’t receive my payment?
If you completed your payment information, your overall income is above the AdSense payment threshold, is due for more than 60 days, no issue is displayed in your AdSense dashboard, but you haven’t received your payment, you can request a reissue from AdSense.
Sample AdSense payment schedule
In the following payment schedule, I included some basic examples and actions for the payment process.
| Month | Earning | Payment | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | $40 | – | get started with AdSense; the AdSense payment threshold not reached |
| February | $90 | – | threshold reached for the first time |
| March | $200 | $130 | AdSense payment release date for January and February |
| April | $250 | $200 | AdSense payment for March |
Do I get an AdSense payment receipt or invoice?
If you are a business—and in most countries, you are when using Google AdSense on your site—you might want to get an invoice or payment receipt from AdSense for your tax office. You can find it in your payment history under Payments > Payment info > View transactions.
From my own experience, I recommend checking with your accountant or tax office. Ask if they need more information, e.g., some stats from your performance report saying how many impressions or clicks you sold at which price.
How about taxes on AdSense earnings?
If your country collects taxes, they probably won’t make an exception for your AdSense earnings. The amount of taxes you have to pay is, of course, too individual by each country and personal situation, so I cannot cover it here in general.
How can I check the AdSense payments in my WordPress backend?
Use Advanced Ads to connect your site with Google AdSense to check your AdSense revenue for the whole account, website, and individual ads directly from your WordPress site.
- Install Advanced Ads.
- Connect your AdSense account under Advanced Ads > Settings > AdSense.
- Go to Advanced Ads > Advanced Ads to see your overall revenue or any AdSense ad created under Advanced Ads > Ads to see ad-specific AdSense revenue.
Do you have a question regarding AdSense payments? Reach out to our dedicated support team.
FAQ
The Google AdSense payout is sent via the payment method you defined under Payments > Payment info > Manage payment methods. It only becomes visible when you reach the AdSense payment threshold for the first time.
The AdSense payment release date is the 21st of the next month. The arrival of the money depends on the selected payment method.
You usually calculate AdSense earnings per 1000 views (RPM) on a website. It can vary from below $0.10 or go beyond $10, depending on your site’s niche, content, and target group. AdSense pays for clicks, not for views. As a rule of thumb: The more likely an advertiser is to generate money from an ad placed on your website, the higher your AdSense earnings. Find here a detailed post about how much Google AdSense pays.
Google AdSense is a way for publishers to generate money from their websites. You never have to pay Google for it. Sometimes “AdSense” is confused with Google “Ads”, which is a service to advertise products and services in Google search or other websites, in which case, you, as an advertiser, pay for ads.