This page answers frequently asked questions about new article/gallery metrics and how ad revenue is calculated under the updated MSN Partner RevShare model, effective September 2025. You'll find definitions of key terms, as well as guidance on where to find this data in the MSN Partner Hub analytics dashboard and how to interpret your earnings.
Note
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For additional questions, contact us at partnerhubsupport@microsoft.com.
In this article
Understanding article/gallery earnings metrics
Understanding the article/gallery RevShare in my Earnings Report and Earnings Statements
Understanding new article/gallery Time Spent metrics
Revenue share model
Understanding article/gallery earnings metrics
What are Display & Native Ad Impressions (Delivered Ad Impressions) in my Earnings Statement?
Total number of monetized Display & Native ad impressions attributed to partner content, including web and applications.
What are Article & Gallery Page Views in my Earnings Statement?
Total number of times an active user viewed/refreshed the page attributed to partner content, including web and applications.
What is Article & Gallery Net Revenue in my Earnings Statement?
Revenue assigned to the partner, less market fees, prior to applying the revenue share percentage for delivered ad impressions on their brand's content page views.
What is Rev Share (% of Net) in my Earnings Statement?
This is the % identified in the partner’s contract that will be applied to the Net Revenue assigned to the partner.
What is Content Partner Revenue Share in my Earnings Statement?
This is the actual Revenue Share to be paid based on contractual RevShare % applied to the allocated Net Revenue.
Will I be able to see the relationship between AdImpressions, PageViews and Time Spent in my Earnings Statement?
As of October 2025, Earnings Statements do not contain Time Spent. Current estimated release for Time Spent in Earnings Statements is Q1 2026.
Why do I see Delivered Ad Impressions in the Art_Gal Brands & Country tab of my Earnings Statement, but blank or zero values in the PageView column?
Delivered Ad Impressions reflect ads served on your content, even if no matching page view is recorded in our systems for the same Market, Vertical, and PageType. Despite rigorous quality checks, this can happen due to differences in how multiple first- and third-party platforms capture data. While these mismatches are rare, Microsoft ensures partners are compensated for user engagement. If an ad was delivered on your content, we treat it as engagement and include it in revenue share calculations.
Understanding the Article & Gallery RevShare in my Earnings Report & Earnings Statements
Where in my Earnings Statements will I see the RevShare earned for Article & Gallery engagement?
There are two locations in your statement where you will find this information:
Summary Tab and Display & Native detailed tab
Summary tab: will show total Page Views, Total Delivered Ad Impressions & RevShare for Article & Gallery content combined:
Display & Native Detailed Tab: will show total Page Views, Total Delivered Ad Impressions & RevShare broken out by Page Type (Articles separate from Galleries) for each Brand, Market & Vertical:
Where can I see my Article & Gallery Earnings on MSPH?
You can see this on the Earning Report Tab on MSPH. In the graph below, you will see two new ad revenue share types (Article Earnings, Gallery Earnings).
You can also select from the <Ad Scenarios> dropdown box on the right side the Analytics section of the Earnings report page and specifically select Article Earnings or Gallery Earnings.
Note
legacy metrics for Article/Gallery Native and Article Gallery Display will be retained for historical reporting purposes.
Understanding the Article/Gallery Time Spent metrics
What is the Time Spent metric on the Content Analytics dashboard in MSPH?
Time Spent is a new user consumption metric for partners available Oct. 30th, 2025. Time Spent is the total amount of time (in seconds) users spend engaging article & gallery content. It is available across existing consumption attributes (Market, Vertical, Content Type, etc.), as well as, by Brand, Headline, or across all Brands.
What is the Time Spent per UU metric on the Content Analytics dashboard in MSPH?
Time Spent per UU is also a new user consumption metric for partners available Oct. 30th, 2025. Time Spent per UU is the average amount of time (in seconds) unique users spend engaging article & gallery content. Please note that this metric is only shown in the Overview Snapcard.
When is the new Time Spent metric on the Content Analytics dashboard available?
Time Spent is a new user consumption metric for partners available Oct. 30th, 2025. The data available will be from Oct. 1st, 2025.
Revenue share model
Is my RevShare for Articles & Galleries based on AdImpressions or PageViews ?
Beginning with September 2025 earnings (published in the October 15th statement), Article and Gallery RevShare is based on delivered ad impressions for both display and native ads. This replaces the previous mix of page views for native ads and ad impressions for display ads.
Will Time Spent affect my Article & Gallery RevShare?
Not explicitly. The basis of RevShare for Articles & Galleries is AdImpressions. However, there is a correlation between users spending time engaging your content and the number of Ad Impressions delivered (i.e., the more time spent engaging with your content, the more ad impressions are delivered, and the more revenue is earned). The new Time Spent metric launching October 30, will provide more insights into user engagement, however, since actual time spent is not a basis of the RevShare calculation, it is an analytics metric only. Over time, it may help partners understand where deeper engagement leads to more Ad Impressions.
Why do Galleries sometimes earn less than Articles?
Articles don’t necessarily earn more than galleries. How deeply a user engages the content determines the revenue earned (i.e., the more time spent engaging with your content, the more ad impressions are delivered, and the more revenue is earned). Generally speaking, an article has more native ads per page than galleries, while at the same time, an engaged gallery generates more display ads than an article as users advance through multiple slides within the gallery. Partners relying solely on gallery content may see lower ad revenue unless engagement depth is high.
Can I republish slideshows as articles or listicles?
Republishing content in a different format may be acceptable, but duplicated headlines or content could trigger ingestion rules. If you plan to republish, ensure the format and headline are clearly differentiated. When in doubt, open a ticket with MSN Partner Hub Support.
How can I improve engagement consistency across content?
Factors such as topic relevance, freshness, and quality affect how content is promoted and engaged. Review the strategies for increasing content engagement for tips on boosting engagement.
Is there a way in the current metrics to know if one has a lot of bouncing users vs more engaged users?
At this time, there is no stable data to show these insights. The team is looking for ways to identify and expose this data so partners can understand user interactions with their content, but no release updates are planned.
Do you envision a vertical scroll for photo galleries to be better than the current horizontal scroll to see each photo?
One is not better than the other. Vertical vs. horizontal scroll is very dependent on user preference, device and quality of content.
If scrolling and dwell time is now more valuable than pageviews from a revenue standpoint, will the content ranking algorithm now rank article and listicle content higher than traditional gallery content?
There is no existing factor or change to content ranking planned to promote one content type over another.
Will Display CPM / IMP and Native CPM / IMP be differentiated in the reporting or is that going to be a blended?
There will be no differentiation at this time.