{"slug": "substack", "name": "Substack", "category": "communication", "category_name": "Email and chat", "description": "Newsletter and blogging platform for publishing posts and sending them to email subscribers.", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 11, "warners": 4, "score": 2.058, "rising": -1.96, "first": "2026-01-15", "latest": "2026-08-25", "why": "HN commenters like Substack for growing a subscriber base and as free email distribution for large lists that would otherwise cost hundreds of dollars a month, often paired with their own blog.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 7, "neutral": 2, "compare": 0, "warn": 4}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 1, 4, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Audience growth", "Free email delivery"], "caveat": "Platform dependence", "short_quote": "The experience was so good that we haven't moved off.", "icon": false, "domain": "substack.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://substack.com", "pricing": "free", "aliases": ["Substack"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like Substack for growing a subscriber base", "cites": [{"id": 785429168, "item_id": 49089323, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089323", "by": "jmmv", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the audience growth is real. I'm approaching 2000 subscribers", "excerpt": "I've been blogging for 22 years now. At the beginning I could tell I had a relatively steady audience based on frequent comments (when comments on blogs were a thing). These died off over the years. Then, in 2020, I implemented my own unobtrusive subscription mechanism and email distribution to try to regain such an audience. And... it's pretty disappointing. I've gotten less than 200 subscribers that way; conversion", "context": "blogger for 22 years", "use_case": "newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785433648, "item_id": 49089603, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089603", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "The experience was so good that we haven't moved off.", "excerpt": "I started using it to run a conference 4 years ago with the intent that it was supposed to be a temporary solution until we built a \"real\" site. The experience was so good that we haven't moved off. Even if we did build a more formal conference site, we'd still keep the substack blog. The mailing list has grown from nothing to right at 1000 subs which isn't bad for something I do in my spare time. By far the most eff", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference blog and mailing list", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 775227856, "item_id": 48451741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451741", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's by far the best way to reach people", "excerpt": "I use a Substack site for the conference that I run. The popup and subscribe buttons everywhere used to annoy me...but they work. Went from 0 to almost 1,000 subscribers on an otherwise low traffic site and it's by far the best way to reach people. https://carolina.codes", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference site subscriptions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes"}]}, {"text": " and as free email distribution for large lists that would otherwise cost hundreds of dollars a month, often paired with their own blog.", "cites": [{"id": 785398592, "item_id": 49087412, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49087412", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now)", "excerpt": "I'm pretty happy with the way I've resolved this. I publish everything to my personal blog first, then once a week I copy and paste it all into a Substack newsletter. I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now) but my own blog stays the original point of truth. Here's the tool I use for the copy-pasting: https", "context": "66,000 subscribers, personal blog", "use_case": "email newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 746257600, "item_id": 46641100, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46641100", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-01-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog", "excerpt": "I don't publish on Substack, I publish on my own site: https://simonwillison.net I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog - which saves me hundreds of dollars a month in email fees.", "context": "blog author with own site", "use_case": "email newsletter delivery", "switched_from": "", "story": "First impressions of Claude Cowork, Anthropic's general agent"}, {"id": 785523905, "item_id": 49095244, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095244", "by": "paraschopra", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me", "excerpt": "I used to pay Mailchimp $100+/month and would write 3-4 articles per month. It seemed illogical to me how much mailchimp would charge. I now have a substack + a wordpress website. An article goes to both places, and substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me.", "context": "writes 3-4 articles per month", "use_case": "subscriber growth and email distribution", "switched_from": "Mailchimp", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}]}, {"text": " The most common caveat is relying on a proprietary platform they don't control", "cites": [{"id": 781626753, "item_id": 48851672, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48851672", "by": "DamnInteresting", "date": "2026-07-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket", "excerpt": "> I think moving to Substack (retain domain) would be a much stronger way to build in the long term Hmm, the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket. In the early days of Facebook we had a page with 20k+ followers, and we got a lot of engagement there, people followed us to be informed of when we published anything new. Then one day Facebook introduced 'boosting,' and overnight ou", "context": "runs a publication that had a Facebook page with 20k+ followers", "use_case": "publishing platform", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Possible Future for Damn Interesting"}, {"id": 780244960, "item_id": 48765310, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48765310", "by": "manuelz", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "excerpt": "Very good! Thank you!! Meta: - Sad to see how well thought out + well written stuff like this only makes it to the HN front page by a fluke. (Below: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48758048#48759391) - @davidbessis: maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "context": "", "use_case": "publishing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Fall of the Theorem Economy"}]}, {"text": ", with others complaining about click-optimized content and little value without an existing audience.", "cites": [{"id": 791074162, "item_id": 49442135, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49442135", "by": "starlightttt", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Substack feels flooded by content optimized for clicks, newsletters, and even AI slop.", "excerpt": "Hi all, I built this app for myself first, but thought other people might enjoy it. Thank you for any feedback and for testing! 1. What does it do? - It lets you browse hundreds of topics and thousands of high-quality writings and read them within the app - You can also add your own articles from the internet - You can post reading in feed, practice vocabulary, or curate your reading collections 2. But why is it need", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "New social app: Strava for reading"}, {"id": 785440896, "item_id": 49090056, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49090056", "by": "ciefa", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "excerpt": "Earlier I got an email from Substack telling me to check out my stats for my bewest blog post. It has 2 views, lol. I just post it all to blog.ciefas.cafe now, I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "context": "", "use_case": "blogging", "switched_from": "Substack", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Audience growth", "summary": "Bloggers and organizers report subscriber growth they could not get through their own sites or social media.", "quotes": [{"id": 785429168, "item_id": 49089323, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089323", "by": "jmmv", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the audience growth is real. I'm approaching 2000 subscribers", "excerpt": "I've been blogging for 22 years now. At the beginning I could tell I had a relatively steady audience based on frequent comments (when comments on blogs were a thing). These died off over the years. Then, in 2020, I implemented my own unobtrusive subscription mechanism and email distribution to try to regain such an audience. And... it's pretty disappointing. I've gotten less than 200 subscribers that way; conversion", "context": "blogger for 22 years", "use_case": "newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785433648, "item_id": 49089603, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089603", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "The experience was so good that we haven't moved off.", "excerpt": "I started using it to run a conference 4 years ago with the intent that it was supposed to be a temporary solution until we built a \"real\" site. The experience was so good that we haven't moved off. Even if we did build a more formal conference site, we'd still keep the substack blog. The mailing list has grown from nothing to right at 1000 subs which isn't bad for something I do in my spare time. By far the most eff", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference blog and mailing list", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 775227856, "item_id": 48451741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451741", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's by far the best way to reach people", "excerpt": "I use a Substack site for the conference that I run. The popup and subscribe buttons everywhere used to annoy me...but they work. Went from 0 to almost 1,000 subscribers on an otherwise low traffic site and it's by far the best way to reach people. https://carolina.codes", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference site subscriptions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes"}]}, {"label": "Free email delivery", "summary": "Used as a no-cost replacement for paid email services, even with tens of thousands of subscribers.", "quotes": [{"id": 785398592, "item_id": 49087412, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49087412", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now)", "excerpt": "I'm pretty happy with the way I've resolved this. I publish everything to my personal blog first, then once a week I copy and paste it all into a Substack newsletter. I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now) but my own blog stays the original point of truth. Here's the tool I use for the copy-pasting: https", "context": "66,000 subscribers, personal blog", "use_case": "email newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 746257600, "item_id": 46641100, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46641100", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-01-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog", "excerpt": "I don't publish on Substack, I publish on my own site: https://simonwillison.net I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog - which saves me hundreds of dollars a month in email fees.", "context": "blog author with own site", "use_case": "email newsletter delivery", "switched_from": "", "story": "First impressions of Claude Cowork, Anthropic's general agent"}, {"id": 785523905, "item_id": 49095244, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095244", "by": "paraschopra", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me", "excerpt": "I used to pay Mailchimp $100+/month and would write 3-4 articles per month. It seemed illogical to me how much mailchimp would charge. I now have a substack + a wordpress website. An article goes to both places, and substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me.", "context": "writes 3-4 articles per month", "use_case": "subscriber growth and email distribution", "switched_from": "Mailchimp", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}]}, {"label": "Reader engagement", "summary": "Described as reaching readers far more effectively than social media channels.", "quotes": [{"id": 785433648, "item_id": 49089603, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089603", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "The experience was so good that we haven't moved off.", "excerpt": "I started using it to run a conference 4 years ago with the intent that it was supposed to be a temporary solution until we built a \"real\" site. The experience was so good that we haven't moved off. Even if we did build a more formal conference site, we'd still keep the substack blog. The mailing list has grown from nothing to right at 1000 subs which isn't bad for something I do in my spare time. By far the most eff", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference blog and mailing list", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 775227856, "item_id": 48451741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451741", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's by far the best way to reach people", "excerpt": "I use a Substack site for the conference that I run. The popup and subscribe buttons everywhere used to annoy me...but they work. Went from 0 to almost 1,000 subscribers on an otherwise low traffic site and it's by far the best way to reach people. https://carolina.codes", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference site subscriptions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes"}]}, {"label": "Low friction", "summary": "One developer says switching from building a custom site to Substack finally got them writing.", "quotes": [{"id": 759799584, "item_id": 47487474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47487474", "by": "MrOrelliOReilly", "date": "2026-03-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Recently I switched to a Substack hosted on my own subdomain, and now I'm finally writing.", "excerpt": "I like the principle, but I also find that we software folk commonly mistake the creation of a website as the goal, rather than the production of \"content\" (e.g. blog posts). I spent years trying to publish a blog and continually getting derailed building the ultimate static website. Recently I switched to a Substack hosted on my own subdomain, and now I'm finally writing. At least I still own the subdomain.", "context": "software developer", "use_case": "blogging", "switched_from": "custom static website", "story": "POSSE \u2013 Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Platform dependence", "summary": "Commenters warn against relying on a proprietary, gated platform that could change its rules.", "quotes": [{"id": 781626753, "item_id": 48851672, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48851672", "by": "DamnInteresting", "date": "2026-07-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket", "excerpt": "> I think moving to Substack (retain domain) would be a much stronger way to build in the long term Hmm, the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket. In the early days of Facebook we had a page with 20k+ followers, and we got a lot of engagement there, people followed us to be informed of when we published anything new. Then one day Facebook introduced 'boosting,' and overnight ou", "context": "runs a publication that had a Facebook page with 20k+ followers", "use_case": "publishing platform", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Possible Future for Damn Interesting"}, {"id": 780244960, "item_id": 48765310, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48765310", "by": "manuelz", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "excerpt": "Very good! Thank you!! Meta: - Sad to see how well thought out + well written stuff like this only makes it to the HN front page by a fluke. (Below: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48758048#48759391) - @davidbessis: maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "context": "", "use_case": "publishing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Fall of the Theorem Economy"}]}, {"label": "Content quality", "summary": "One commenter feels Substack is flooded with click-optimized content and AI slop.", "quotes": [{"id": 791074162, "item_id": 49442135, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49442135", "by": "starlightttt", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Substack feels flooded by content optimized for clicks, newsletters, and even AI slop.", "excerpt": "Hi all, I built this app for myself first, but thought other people might enjoy it. Thank you for any feedback and for testing! 1. What does it do? - It lets you browse hundreds of topics and thousands of high-quality writings and read them within the app - You can also add your own articles from the internet - You can post reading in feed, practice vocabulary, or curate your reading collections 2. But why is it need", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "New social app: Strava for reading"}]}, {"label": "Needs an audience", "summary": "A writer with no audience found Substack useless for their posts.", "quotes": [{"id": 785440896, "item_id": 49090056, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49090056", "by": "ciefa", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "excerpt": "Earlier I got an email from Substack telling me to check out my stats for my bewest blog post. It has 2 views, lol. I just post it all to blog.ciefas.cafe now, I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "context": "", "use_case": "blogging", "switched_from": "Substack", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}]}, {"label": "No composing API", "summary": "There is no API for composing newsletters, so cross-posting relies on copy-paste.", "quotes": [{"id": 785398592, "item_id": 49087412, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49087412", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now)", "excerpt": "I'm pretty happy with the way I've resolved this. I publish everything to my personal blog first, then once a week I copy and paste it all into a Substack newsletter. I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now) but my own blog stays the original point of truth. Here's the tool I use for the copy-pasting: https", "context": "66,000 subscribers, personal blog", "use_case": "email newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}]}, {"label": "Pushy popups", "summary": "Subscribe popups and buttons can be annoying, though they reportedly work.", "quotes": [{"id": 775227856, "item_id": 48451741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451741", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's by far the best way to reach people", "excerpt": "I use a Substack site for the conference that I run. The popup and subscribe buttons everywhere used to annoy me...but they work. Went from 0 to almost 1,000 subscribers on an otherwise low traffic site and it's by far the best way to reach people. https://carolina.codes", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference site subscriptions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes"}]}], "who": [{"by": "paraschopra", "context": "writes 3-4 articles per month", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095244", "date": "2026-07-29"}, {"by": "brightball", "context": "runs a conference", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089603", "date": "2026-07-28"}, {"by": "jmmv", "context": "blogger for 22 years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089323", "date": "2026-07-28"}, {"by": "simonw", "context": "66,000 subscribers, personal blog", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49087412", "date": "2026-07-28"}, {"by": "MrOrelliOReilly", "context": "software developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47487474", "date": "2026-03-23"}], "tags": ["for newsletter writers", "alongside a self-hosted blog", "for event organizers", "custom subdomain"], "use_cases": ["email newsletter distribution", "blogging", "subscriber growth and email distribution", "conference blog and mailing list", "newsletter distribution", "publishing platform"], "compared": [{"slug": "medium", "name": "Medium", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "leaflet", "name": "Leaflet", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ghost", "name": "Ghost", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49086788", "title": "Substack writers, you need a website", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49441912", "title": "New social app: Strava for reading", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48847511", "title": "A Possible Future for Damn Interesting", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48758048", "title": "The Fall of the Theorem Economy", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48445554", "title": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48092181", "title": "Writers are fleeing the Substack Tax", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-07": {"warn": 3, "recommend": 4, "neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {"warn": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 791074162, "item_id": 49442135, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49442135", "by": "starlightttt", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Substack feels flooded by content optimized for clicks, newsletters, and even AI slop.", "excerpt": "Hi all, I built this app for myself first, but thought other people might enjoy it. Thank you for any feedback and for testing! 1. What does it do? - It lets you browse hundreds of topics and thousands of high-quality writings and read them within the app - You can also add your own articles from the internet - You can post reading in feed, practice vocabulary, or curate your reading collections 2. But why is it need", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "New social app: Strava for reading"}, {"id": 785527841, "item_id": 49095490, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095490", "by": "theowenyoung", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Substack for email distribution too.", "excerpt": "I really like this approach. I make similar distinctions between posts meant for email, posts that should appear in RSS, posts that belong on the homepage, and posts that should live under /archive without appearing on the homepage. I use Substack for email distribution too. For the website side, I built an open-source blogging platform called Jant (https://jant.me) around these needs: posts appear on the homepage by", "context": "", "use_case": "email newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785523905, "item_id": 49095244, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095244", "by": "paraschopra", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me", "excerpt": "I used to pay Mailchimp $100+/month and would write 3-4 articles per month. It seemed illogical to me how much mailchimp would charge. I now have a substack + a wordpress website. An article goes to both places, and substack acts as a subscriber growth + email distribution tool for me.", "context": "writes 3-4 articles per month", "use_case": "subscriber growth and email distribution", "switched_from": "Mailchimp", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785440896, "item_id": 49090056, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49090056", "by": "ciefa", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "excerpt": "Earlier I got an email from Substack telling me to check out my stats for my bewest blog post. It has 2 views, lol. I just post it all to blog.ciefas.cafe now, I have no audience so I feel like Substack is useless to me.", "context": "", "use_case": "blogging", "switched_from": "Substack", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785433648, "item_id": 49089603, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089603", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "The experience was so good that we haven't moved off.", "excerpt": "I started using it to run a conference 4 years ago with the intent that it was supposed to be a temporary solution until we built a \"real\" site. The experience was so good that we haven't moved off. Even if we did build a more formal conference site, we'd still keep the substack blog. The mailing list has grown from nothing to right at 1000 subs which isn't bad for something I do in my spare time. By far the most eff", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference blog and mailing list", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785429168, "item_id": 49089323, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089323", "by": "jmmv", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the audience growth is real. I'm approaching 2000 subscribers", "excerpt": "I've been blogging for 22 years now. At the beginning I could tell I had a relatively steady audience based on frequent comments (when comments on blogs were a thing). These died off over the years. Then, in 2020, I implemented my own unobtrusive subscription mechanism and email distribution to try to regain such an audience. And... it's pretty disappointing. I've gotten less than 200 subscribers that way; conversion", "context": "blogger for 22 years", "use_case": "newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 785398592, "item_id": 49087412, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49087412", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now)", "excerpt": "I'm pretty happy with the way I've resolved this. I publish everything to my personal blog first, then once a week I copy and paste it all into a Substack newsletter. I get to use Substack for email distribution (which would cost me hundreds of dollars a month using most other solutions, I have 66,000 subscribers now) but my own blog stays the original point of truth. Here's the tool I use for the copy-pasting: https", "context": "66,000 subscribers, personal blog", "use_case": "email newsletter distribution", "switched_from": "", "story": "Substack writers, you need a website"}, {"id": 781626753, "item_id": 48851672, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48851672", "by": "DamnInteresting", "date": "2026-07-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket", "excerpt": "> I think moving to Substack (retain domain) would be a much stronger way to build in the long term Hmm, the danger there is that one is putting a lot of one's eggs into a fickle basket. In the early days of Facebook we had a page with 20k+ followers, and we got a lot of engagement there, people followed us to be informed of when we published anything new. Then one day Facebook introduced 'boosting,' and overnight ou", "context": "runs a publication that had a Facebook page with 20k+ followers", "use_case": "publishing platform", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Possible Future for Damn Interesting"}, {"id": 780244960, "item_id": 48765310, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48765310", "by": "manuelz", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "excerpt": "Very good! Thank you!! Meta: - Sad to see how well thought out + well written stuff like this only makes it to the HN front page by a fluke. (Below: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48758048#48759391) - @davidbessis: maybe look for an open alternative to Substack? (avoid bullshit, proprietary, gated access for quality content by humans).", "context": "", "use_case": "publishing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Fall of the Theorem Economy"}, {"id": 775227856, "item_id": 48451741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451741", "by": "brightball", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's by far the best way to reach people", "excerpt": "I use a Substack site for the conference that I run. The popup and subscribe buttons everywhere used to annoy me...but they work. Went from 0 to almost 1,000 subscribers on an otherwise low traffic site and it's by far the best way to reach people. https://carolina.codes", "context": "runs a conference", "use_case": "conference site subscriptions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Performative-UI \u2013 a react component library of design tropes"}, {"id": 769481504, "item_id": 48092594, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48092594", "by": "michalu", "date": "2026-05-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Writers are not \"fleeing Substack\"", "excerpt": "Writers are not \"fleeing Substack\" that's just legacy media trying to insinuate ways to hurt Substack's revenue by creating a false perception of \"hm maybe I should consider switching\" in classic divide and conquer. A quick google search \"substack site:theverge.com\" will reveal that theverge hasn't written a single positive article about substack. Most posts are implying you should avoid substack. The whole article i", "context": "", "use_case": "newsletter publishing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Writers are fleeing the Substack Tax"}, {"id": 759799584, "item_id": 47487474, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47487474", "by": "MrOrelliOReilly", "date": "2026-03-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Recently I switched to a Substack hosted on my own subdomain, and now I'm finally writing.", "excerpt": "I like the principle, but I also find that we software folk commonly mistake the creation of a website as the goal, rather than the production of \"content\" (e.g. blog posts). I spent years trying to publish a blog and continually getting derailed building the ultimate static website. Recently I switched to a Substack hosted on my own subdomain, and now I'm finally writing. At least I still own the subdomain.", "context": "software developer", "use_case": "blogging", "switched_from": "custom static website", "story": "POSSE \u2013 Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere"}, {"id": 746257600, "item_id": 46641100, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46641100", "by": "simonw", "date": "2026-01-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog", "excerpt": "I don't publish on Substack, I publish on my own site: https://simonwillison.net I use Substack as a free email provider for the email newsletter copy of my blog - which saves me hundreds of dollars a month in email fees.", "context": "blog author with own site", "use_case": "email newsletter delivery", "switched_from": "", "story": "First impressions of Claude Cowork, Anthropic's general agent"}]}