This feature is only available on Business plans and above .

Link-based discounts provide better attribution accuracy since you get visibility into the customer’s geolocation, device info, referrer details, and UTM data.

The trade-off here is that it requires some engineering work to set up.

First, navigate to the partner group that you want to create a discount for. Under the Discount tab, you’ll be able to create a discount for the group

If you already have a discount set up for your default group, you can just duplicate it. If not, click Create to create your first group discount:

New Stripe coupon

If you don’t have a coupon set up on Stripe yet, you can use the New Stripe coupon option to create a new coupon based on the discount type (percentage vs flat), amount, and duration set in Dub.

Use Stripe coupon ID

If you already have an existing coupon on Stripe, you can enter the Stripe coupon ID (should be an 8 alphanumeric code) under the Use Stripe coupon ID option.

The key to implementing link-based discounts is to check if a customer is eligible for a discount using Dub’s Customers API, then automatically apply the appropriate Stripe coupon to their checkout session.

Here’s how the flow works:

1. When a user clicks a partner referral link, Dub tracks them as a potential customer
2. During checkout, you query the Dub Customers API using the user’s ID
3. If they’re eligible for a discount, you apply the coupon to their Stripe checkout session
4. If not, you allow them to enter promotion codes manually

import { dub } from "@/lib/dub.ts";
import Stripe from "stripe";
 
const stripe = new Stripe(process.env.STRIPE_SECRET_KEY!);
 
// Get customer discount eligibility from Dub
const customers = await dub.customers.list({
  externalId: userId, // their user ID within your app
  includeExpandedFields: true,
});
 
const customerDiscount = customers.length > 0 ? customers[0].discount : null;
 
// Create Stripe checkout session with conditional discount
const stripeSession = await stripe.checkout.sessions.create({
  success_url: "https://app.domain.com/upgraded",
  cancel_url: "https://app.domain.com/pricing",
  line_items: [
    {
      price: "price_1MotwRLkdIwHu7ixYcPLm5uZ",
      quantity: 1,
    },
  ],
  mode: "subscription", // or "payment" for one-time purchases
  ...(customerDiscount
    ? {
        // Apply discount automatically if customer is eligible
        discounts: [
          {
            coupon:
              process.env.NODE_ENV !== "production" &&
              customerDiscount.couponTestId
                ? customerDiscount.couponTestId
                : customerDiscount.couponId,
          },
        ],
      }
    : {
        // Allow manual promo code entry if no automatic discount
        allow_promotion_codes: true,
      }),
  customer_email: userEmail,
  metadata: {
    userId: userId,
    ...(customerDiscount && { dubDiscountId: customerDiscount.id }),
  },
});

Once this is set up, eligible customers will automatically see the coupon code applied at checkout:

Stripe promo-code-based discounts is much easier to set up (no code required).

However, you do sacrifice on attribution accuracy since you won’t have any insights into the customer’s geolocation, device info, referrer details, and UTM data. Our Stripe integration will try to derive the customer’s location based on their Stripe billing address, but it can sometimes be inaccurate.

First, navigate to the partner group that you want to create a discount for. Under the Discount tab, you’ll be able to create a discount for the group

If you already have a discount set up for your default group, you can just duplicate it. If not, click Create to create your first group discount:

New Stripe coupon

If you don’t have a coupon set up on Stripe yet, you can use the New Stripe coupon option to create a new coupon based on the discount type (percentage vs flat), amount, and duration set in Dub.

Use Stripe coupon ID

If you already have an existing coupon on Stripe, you can enter the Stripe coupon ID (should be an 8 alphanumeric code) under the Use Stripe coupon ID option.

Auto-provision discount codes

When enabled, discount codes will be automatically created for all existing partners in this group and future partners when they join this group.

Open the partner profile that you’d like to create a discount code for, then click Create Code in the “Discount codes” section.

Here you can select which referral link you’d like to associate the code with. Then you can create the discount code.

After the code has been created, you’ll see its value populated in the Discount Code section, and it is ready for use. In the Partner Dashboard, they’ll also see the associated discount code within their partner links.