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OWNERDOMAIN and MANAGERDOMAIN in app-ads.txt

By Stoqlab team · Updated · 5 min read

OWNERDOMAIN and MANAGERDOMAIN are two variables that ads.txt 1.1 added and app-ads.txt inherits. OWNERDOMAIN names the business domain of the company that owns the apps; MANAGERDOMAIN names a primary or exclusive monetization partner. Neither authorises a seller. They tell buyers who is behind the inventory, so the accounts in sellers.json and the SupplyChain object can be tied back to a company.

OWNERDOMAIN

Write the registrable domain the owning company uses as domain in its PUBLISHER entries in the networks' sellers.json: no https://, no path, no www.. 

OWNERDOMAIN=examplegames.example

It is worth adding even when it equals the domain the file sits on, because it removes the guesswork; without it, verifiers assume the owner is that domain. Only the first OWNERDOMAIN line counts. It earns its keep when the developer website is a product domain and the company's sellers.json entries carry a different corporate domain.

In a complete SupplyChain object, the first node's seller should have a sellers.json domain equal to the OWNERDOMAIN. That match is what Stoqlab reports as "confirmed both ways" on DIRECT lines.

MANAGERDOMAIN

Use it when the owner does not sell its own inventory, globally or in one market, and a single company does it instead. An optional ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country code limits a line to one market: 

OWNERDOMAIN=examplegames.example
MANAGERDOMAIN=salesagency.example
MANAGERDOMAIN=jpsales.example, JP

A line without a country is the global default and country lines override it, one value per country. A mediation SDK or an ordinary reseller is not a manager. Where the manager does monetize the inventory, the specification expects its domain on the first node of a complete schain.

Common mistakes

  • A URL instead of a domain (OWNERDOMAIN=https://www.example.com/).
  • An OWNERDOMAIN that matches none of the publisher's sellers.json entries, so the both-ways check fails everywhere.
  • MANAGERDOMAIN set to every partner in the file. It means one primary seller, not a list of resellers.
  • A country code that is not two letters, or two lines for the same country.

To see what a given domain declares, run it through the app-ads.txt checker, which lists both variables alongside the seller lines.

Related guides

Basics sellers.json explained: fields, seller types and how to read one Basics What is app-ads.txt? The file, the format and where it goes Buyers How buyers verify mobile app supply