Which is better, Medium or Substack?
If you’ve also been wondering that, I understand. But also, it’s the wrong question because it’s like comparing apples and oranges.
For me, it’s not an either-or, it is an and. I’m writing on Medium and Substack. Both can be in one ecosystem. The two platforms fit together very well. They complement each other.
As I always say:
They fit together like peanut butter and jelly or peanut butter and cookies, whatever you prefer.
Who am I to tell you anything about Medium and Substack?
I’m a top writer on Medium with 12,000 followers and a Substack bestseller with 11,000 subscribers and 300+ paid subscribers.
In our 1:1 sessions, (part-time) writers often tell me:
Kristina, I don’t have the time, attention, the bandwidth to write on both sides.
But is this true?
I write on both sides. I’m a part-time creator, spending only about two to three hours daily on my online writing business.
I have to agree that if I put more focus on Substack, I often don’t manage to write on Medium as much as I’d love to but the reason isn’t Substack alone. I’m also creating videos on YouTube which I share via my newsletter, and often I need to prioritize this to publish one video per week, which is my goal.
In addition, I now amplified my interviews with inspiring voices that have gone before us via my new Substack podcast — a podcast that is native to Substack.
However, if you’re thinking about Medium and Substack, it doesn’t have to feel the way it feels for me in this content triangle.
Of course, you build and feed another platform, but the two go together perfectly like peanut butter and jelly.
Here’s what you can do to create, as I call it, a Substack-Medium hybrid
#1 The first thing you can do is to link to your email list on Substack via Medium.
#2 You can link to your best-performing or trending stories on Medium via Substack.
#3 You can also collect data points on Substack Notes (or Medium) and then write an original in-depth piece for your newsletter audience.
I shared this one here…
and it got 80 likes, 16 replies, and 12 restacks.
This is a data point for me that I could use and then say:
Hey, I should write a long-form piece about this!
#4 You can also take parts that people highlighted on Medium and create a story around it for your Substack audience. You can grab some pieces of a successful post and share them on Substack Notes as a short-form post or create a long-form post newsletter.
These are just a few of the many recommendations I have to help you start this hybrid.
So what you can do is you can use Medium at the top of the funnel where you gain followers, because, of course, Medium wants to help you gain more followers — at least if you’re writing about the topics that the platform prefers and gets paid members for.
From there, I have, for instance, my YouTube tutorials and interviews and the new Substack podcast where I amplify my interviews with top voices.
Medium would be at the top of the funnel and Substack at the bottom. However, it could also be the other way around, with Substack at the top and Medium at the bottom, depending on what you want.
As a marketing and brand manager, I believe that your email list is your most valuable asset in your business. And that’s why it’s so important and should take center stage.
I see Medium as my blog and Substack as my newsletter
Your Substack is a publication on the internet. It can also be your website and newsletter, whose posts I can republish on Medium if I wish.
Often people ask me:
Kristina, can I republish my writing on multiple platforms?
Of course, you can. You own your content on both Medium and Substack. It’s your original piece, so you can share it. You could tweak it and then put it on Medium or vice versa. Also, you can set a canonical link.
But keep in mind:
There’s no such thing as duplicate content on the web, so you don’t have to set a canonical link.
You’re ill-advised if you put all your eggs in one basket
In my opinion, it’s crucial to be on multiple platforms because you never know what might happen — the algorithm or rules could change, or the platform could shut down.
In 2022, when I started my Substack, I didn’t want to put all my eggs in one basket. So, despite being a top writer on Medium with badges of honor in multiple categories and earning about $800 to $1,000+, I didn’t want to rely solely on Medium.
My marketing and branding background taught me that an email list is the most valuable asset in any business, so I wanted to focus on building that.
On Medium, you can also gain subscribers, but the focus is less on that. For me, with 12,300 followers, I have about 550+ subscribers.
On Substack, my goal is to gain more subscribers than followers on Medium because I know the follower metric is somewhat dead. With 11,000 subscribers, I am well on the way to achieving this goal in the first quarter of 2025.
Oh, and here’s my annual recurring revenue (ARR). This is $2666/month recurring revenue.

Also I’m a TOP20 #Education publication on Substack.
I want to invest in Substack’s subscriber model, where you get paid to be yourself. If people vote with their wallets, the money goes directly to you.
On Medium, it’s different — you never know exactly how much you’ll earn. There’s also the option for boosts, where people can nominate your stories for a big boost, and you might earn $100 instead of $10. That’s fine, but if you have a family to feed and work as a part-time writer, a regular income is always better and healthier for your mental well-being. However, you can earn money on both.
Turning on the paid button on Substack changed my life — forever
I was flailing around in 2023 because I gave birth to my baby. But then in January 2024, I decided to go paid and offer a premium newsletter with paid perks such as my membership experience, live workshops, and courses.
After 15 months of occasionally writing on Substack, I wanted to be strategic about it. So I knew exactly what I wanted to offer as paid perks. I knew my audience would be Medium writers, Substack noobs, and people who would want to start, grow, and monetize their online writing business.
Often these are also people who are part-time writers, as I am. The last thing they want is to feel overwhelmed, confused and stop writing. They have to manage a lot of things and keep all the balls in the air. So the idea was to help them “make it easy” and learn from the writers I interviewed in live workshops inside the membership experience.
Back then, I didn’t know turning on the paid button would change my part-time writing life — forever.
🚨1 Ticket Left - Substack Flywheel Bootcamp
Just a quick heads up…
Registration closes in 24 hours.
And... there’s 1 ticket left for our 'Substack Flywheel Bootcamp' 5-Day Intensive taking place Monday Jan 27th - 31th.
So that means today is your last chance to secure your access to this virtual and interactive 5-day event.
I promise this is something you won’t want to miss out on.
Especially since we’ll be having a community of MORE THAN 50 bootcampers, amazing SURPRISE GUESTS, RESOURCES and CHALLENGES
How cool is that?
So if you haven’t already… get the last ticket.
We love Medium. We love Substack. Let’s use them together and crush it!
Oh and if you’re only interested in Substack… this course is 90% about Substack! :)
Any Qs about Substack? AMA in the comments!
I love to support you.
Thank you
, , , , , and many others for tuning into my live video with ! We talk about the new Fund for new Substackers bringing in a paid audience, The Bootcamp and of course Medium and the flywheel. Join me for my next live video in the app.P.S. Not sure where to put all my LIVE videos here… so I thought I share both: my post and the video. Do you like this? Let me know. I don’t wan to bombard you with newsletters.
Hey so what is a best practice for cross-posting? Where is it best to post first actually? Some people say first on your own website and then the other platforms.. I’m getting confused
Hi Gabriela, guess the Bootcamp covered it ;)
Kristina--I am on both platforms, but realized today that I must pay for every subscriber I want to follow in depth on Substack (unlike Medium)--which is rather costly if I have more than two such people in mind on Substack, which I do! Also, I am a writer with 34 Indie books in genre fields, but do not have courses or a podcast. (I do have my own email list on MailChimp I send to once a month that gets minimal engagement.) So what on earth could I offer on Substack for a newsletter that would make a paid subscription to my Substack newsletter seem worthwhile to readers? However, given Medium now pays only pennies per article as of January 7th, it makes being on Medium questionable--but you seem to be thriving there--have you not noticed the drop in the Partner program revenue like so many of us have??
Hi Regina, The key is building a "flywheel" (as I shared in the story) to make these platforms work together. I love the recurring income from Substack, and I also vote with my wallet for my favorite writers. Instead of paying hundreds of thousands for traditional publishing routes, I get to support amazing indie writers like Walter Rhein or
You’re in a unique position with 34 indie books—there’s so much you could offer on Substack! Consider pairing paid and free content, just like your favorite writers do. For example:
- Free tier: Share behind-the-scenes stories, your writing process, or reflections on your books and the indie publishing journey.
- Paid tier: Offer exclusive serialized content (new books, bonus chapters, or short stories), writing tips, or even host a monthly live Q&A or AMA with your readers.
As for Medium, while the Partner Program revenue has dropped for many, I’ve seen success by focusing on creating valuable content and using Medium as a top-of-funnel platform to bring readers to my Substack or email list. Think of Medium as a discovery tool: readers find your work there, and then you invite them to join your Substack for more direct, deeper engagement.
It sounds like you already have a foundation with your MailChimp list. The next step could be showing your readers why it’s valuable to subscribe to your Substack. Share a mix of free and premium content to build trust, and over time, they’ll see the value in becoming paid subscribers.
I hope this helps clarify things! Your writing has so much potential to build a community that’s excited to support you on Substack. Trust me. All you need to do is take action and get on Substack and start writing :) Hugs, Kristina
Sent you a DM!
Has Medium changed so that people are only getting pennies for their articles? I wanted to try Medium as well as Substack, but when I read that, I thought I had missed the boat.
Hi Rose, you can absolutely still earn money on Medium! I see it firsthand with my tribe members—generating meaningful income there is very much possible. The key is creating high-quality content and understanding how to leverage Medium’s Partner Program. For this we have masterminds inside the Club or the Medium Bootcamp. Inside the Club as an annual member, you also get access to Medium School. A course about how to start on Substack.
What I love about Substack is the recurring income potential from paid subscriptions, which provides more stability over time. That’s why I always recommend writing on both platforms. Medium is great for gaining exposure, reaching a broader audience, and earning based on reads, while Substack is perfect for building a loyal community and earning predictable, recurring revenue.
You haven’t missed the boat—both platforms are thriving, but success depends on consistent effort and finding your unique voice. Hope this helps.
"There’s no such thing as duplicate content on the web, so you don’t have to set a canonical link." - It is called plagiarism, yes you can even plagiarize your own content and it will hurt your SEO on search engines and social media. Quite a few writers cross-post between these two platforms verbatim and it is a bad habit.
Over and above that, changing your domain also hurts your SEO as you start with a DA of 1 which is nothing compared to having a subdomain on an already established domain like substack.com which already has a DA of around 92.
Hi Hein, and everyone reading this, please check out my interview with a Google knowledge panel. We talk about this and he supported my opinion on this. I work with digital consultants etc. and they all say the same. The biggest Medium writers first share their stories on their website and then on Substack or Medium :) So they are ALL doing it. Many are afraid. Do something different. You'll see results.
I am talking about your newsletter's custom domain, it is only 17% compared to using it as is and taking advantage of Substack's domain with a DA of 92% which will get you a helluva lot bigger traffic load from search engines. On top of that, you have way too many super-low-quality backlinks to this domain. See the link: https://ahrefs.com/website-authority-checker/?input=www.onlinewritingclub.com
Hello Hein, we all start at 1. At least it's 17 haha ^^ Are you a SEO expert? Maybe you could write a guest post about this! You have 92.
Hmmm one reasin AGAINST a custom domain, But the idea was to build something on my own. Would love to chat.
Hello Kristina. I help entrepreneurs thrive in business... From idea, niche(s), business plan, social media profiles/ business pages, building a website and a blog (both are important), setting up domains, hosting, organic growth (SEO, content, engagement, etc.), paid advertising, the AIDA model, building different levels of monetization, profit, retention, etc.
Remember, having a subdomain like my three newsletters have, is virtually the same as having a unique main domain, the difference is they are subdomains on the main domain Substack.com (already well-established with a very high DA) so as long as you do your SEO well, you will rank high in search engines and this will drive a lot more traffic to your newsletters instead of just relying on your content and engagement within Substack itself. You should leverage SEO for exponential publicity outside of this platform, it can potentially grow your following and subscribers much faster.
I haven't started on Substack yet, even though my banners, logos, and most related things and the publications' settings have been set up mostly. I still have some minor tweaks to make and I am in the planning phase with my bundle offer, content, etc. I already have a list of drafts practically ready.
Sorry, what's a DA?
Hi Rose, please see my reply above :)
Hey Rose, DA is domain authority.
I know about the high DA of both. Still not sure what you want to say. That's the beauty of writing on both. That's why we get seen. THat's why it's smart to be on both. Hope this helps.
Here is my newsletter's DA, it is exactly the same as substack.com because it is on a subdomain. The biggest mistake you can make is to create a custom unknown domain, it will take years to get to 92% DA like mine is now. The best part is, I only have four backlinks but my articles will rank 50 times quicker than a custom domain's DA will ever do without any effort.
Here is the link to my newsletter: https://ahrefs.com/website-authority-checker/?input=profitcatalystsynergy.substack.com
Similar to Medium, you're right... hm... on the other side if I don't do it now,.... but you#re right. I need to be smarter about it. Any tips on how to educate Google that my custom domain is a trustworthy source (besides organic backlinks or buying backlinks)
Don't ever buy backlinks, that is black-hat SEO and will hurt your rankings terribly. There is no quick fix to let Google know your custom domain is trustworthy.
I would change your publication domain from onlinewritingclub.com to onlinewritingclub.substack.com and you don't have to pay for a domain as it is a subdomain situated on Substack's domain.
You're welcome to chat with me via PM. SEO is only one very important part of your business. Multiple facets play strong roles in growing your business.
Talked with my hubby about it. Since I want to build my OWN site, I'll go with my custom domain. However, if I share my video on how to do this, I'll include this! You're absolutely right about the DA. 17 is better than 1 ^^ With your Medium stories you always get found as long as the platform exists. Once it's gone your stories will also be gone. So I want to build something I own. Love both platforms though. But you never know. I'll talk with a Google expert this week and ask him. Thanks again!
You still need to use proper SEO on Medium and Substack if you want to rank on page one with all your articles. The native SEO tool is not adequate for this. There is a lot more to it than just a title and subtitle.
I am a Google expert too. Here are two of our website links below (my fiancee and I are the co-owners and I am the founder), feel free to use the live chat if you have any questions. Alternatively, I can assist you via PM here for absolutely free! Besides, we are fully booked with projects and may not be able to take on new clients right now.
https://provirbuserv.com/
https://nanosoftedit.com/
Sounds like you've had an amazing journey & you are still going.
Best of luck with the boot camp...
I cannot afford.
Thanks. I always try to make it super affordable. You can DM me if you want.
You are amazing
Hello Karen! Thanks :)
I can't find you on the list for the Bootcamp, Karen. So I guess it didn't work. Will send you a DM and will send you the invite later.
Sent you the replay and invite to the hub and everything yesterday. Did you see it and can get in?
You are the substack angle. i am looking forward to the boot camp
Do you mean angle? ^^ Or angle?
YAY! Gonna be amazing. I'll send you a DM re the Bootcamp, Karen
My pleasure. And thanks for the mention. And cool article…
Great that you tuned in, Jeff! Where are you on your Substack journey? Just checked your Substack. Maybe you have a guest post you'd like to write for the Club?
I’m working on a couple new things now so I’ll send one of those posts when complete - thank you :-)
Super!
Awesome