Best Paid Newsletter Platforms
Written by Casey Botticello
Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, meaning that at no additional cost to you, I will receive a commission if you click through and make a purchase. Read our full affiliate disclosure here.
What is a Paid Newsletter?
A paid newsletter (or a subscription newsletter) is a kind of email publication offered by independent content creators or companies. It involves email campaigns that are sent to the inboxes of paying subscribers on a predetermined schedule.
Every subscription newsletter is based on a specific topic or industry that target subscribers are interested in reading or learning about.
The content can include original stories, articles, poetry, and essays, as well as curated content drawn from other sources. Images, videos, gifs, and other types of content may also be included within the body of a newsletter, and many often contain links to stories published on blogs and other kinds of websites.
Subscription newsletters can be delivered weekly, monthly, annually, or whatever schedule that works best towards the needs of the audience. Payments can be continuously charged per month or year (depending on the pricing plans in use) unless a reader cancels their subscription.
What is the Difference Between Paid Newsletters and Free Newsletters?
The main difference between paid newsletter and a traditional free newsletter, is that a paid newsletter usually offers exclusive content or something with unique value that is not found in other free newsletters or on the Internet. Generally, paid newsletters offer these high value, hard to find, materials in order to generate subscription revenue from readers (although, there are exceptions to this strategy).
Types of exclusive content you can provide in a paid newsletter:
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Learning materials – ebooks, digital downloads, courses
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Case studies
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Interviews, podcasts, audio books, or videos
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Market reports
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Trend forecasts
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Member-only events
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Personalized coaching/advice
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Private online community access
A traditional free newsletter is a marketing effort made by those either through affiliate sales or sales of their own products. And this has been a very successful form of advertising.
Email marketing makes money. For every $1 you spend on email marketing, you can expect an average return of $36. That’s a higher return than you can expect from any other form of marketing — digital or otherwise.
However, this is a form of marketing.
Paid newsletters are a business based on monthly or annual subscription revenue. And the product that a paid newsletter creator is ultimately selling is high value, exclusive content. In contrast, free email newsletters rely on widely available (but often useful) information that is often somewhat entertaining.
With free newsletters, content is mostly just a lead magnet used to get sign ups and keep people reading. Free newsletters generally make money through product placements, selling their own relevant products, or even display advertising.
Best Paid Newsletter Platforms
Substack makes it simple for a writer to start a paid newsletter that makes money from subscriptions. Substack provides web and newsletter publishing tools that are purpose-built for paid subscriptions. Substack is popular with many writers because it’s an all-in-one solution for writers looking to monetize their newsletter. While all of the platforms on this list offer some paid newsletter platform features, Substack is the one of the only sites that was built entirely around the concept. Couple this with the fact that Substack is the most user friendly of the options on this list, and it is easy to see why it’s our top pick.
Publishing Your Newsletter is Free / No Monthly Fees. The Publishing your paid newsletter on Substack is free. Substack takes a cut of subscription revenue (15% + ) but there are no initial fees or monthly fees. You can even choose to not enable monetization and publish your newsletter to an unlimited amount of readers, for free.
Hybrid Newsletter-Blogging Platform. The Substack offers bloggers one of the few hybrid newsletter-blogging options. This means that you can operate a paid newsletter (generating revenue from subscriptions), while simultaneously posting your newsletter to a website associated with your publication.
Simple to Use. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
Limited Customization. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
Relatively High Revenue Cut. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
2. Ghost
Ghost is an open source digital publishing platform for a wide variety of content creators, including paid newsletter creators. What really sets Ghost apart from other blogging platforms is the range of services you can easily offer. This is increasingly important for content creators as their income often comes from a variety of sources. Ghost allows anyone to offer a combination of subscription newsletters, membership sites, gated digital content, courses, and digital products.
Complete Control and Ownership of Content. Ghost offers publishers complete control and ownership of their content since you are essentially building a self hosted website (as opposed to relying upon a third party platform, which is subject to frequent business model changes, algorithms, non-customized displaying of your content, etc.).
Users Pay Flat Monthly Fee. Ghost is useful, especially once you get a larger amount of paid subscribers, since you pay a flat fee (limited tiers), and beyond this monthly fee you keep 100% of subscription revenue.
Publishers Have Wider Range of Tools. Ghost allows creators to fully customize both their newsletter and website. There is no detail you can’t change, remove, or customize. You can also incorporate other functions into your Ghost website/newsletter, such as a related eCommerce store.
Flat Fee Structure. In the early stages of building a newsletter, paying a flat monthly fee (without necessarily having any paid subscribers can be daunting to many). Although the fees are not insanely high, they definitely become cheaper (and ultimately one of the cheapest options, as you increase your paid subscribers).
More Complex / Technical. If you want to launch a paid newsletter as fast as possible, Ghost is probably not your tool. With the greater range of tools and features, comes a bit more effort required to properly set up your newsletter/site. If you have more technical experience (or are willing to learn), this may not be an issue, though.
3. Patreon
Patreon is a membership based website providing a range of business tools to help creators monetize their products via subscriptions. Through Patreon, creators allow fans to access exclusive content, additional viewership, and other perks in exchange for a monthly fee. Patreon differs from Ghost in that it charges 5%-12% of a creator’s gross revenue (similar model to Substack, but with lower fee taken). While Patreon covers far more products than newsletters, it is definitely a leading player in the world of paid newsletters.
Complete Control and Ownership of Content. Patreon offers publishers complete control and ownership of their content since you are essentially building a self hosted website (as opposed to relying upon a third party platform, which is subject to frequent business model changes, algorithms, non-customized displaying of your content, etc.).
Users Pay (Lower) % of Revenue. Depending on your email list size, plan you choose, and a few other factors, Patreon charges one of the lowest fees on monthly revenue (between 5%-12%).
Publishers Can Pivot or Add Other Verticals with Ease. Because Patreon was built with the original intention of supporting a very wide range of passion economy creators, it is very easy to add other offering to your paid newsletter, such as broader paid memberships, paid podcasts, exclusive video content, etc.
Less User Friendly Than Substack. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
Lacks Reputation as a Newsletter Creation Platform. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
WordPress is one of the world’s most popular open-source platforms. It is commonly used as a content management system (CMS) for websites, as well as for blogging. It can also be used to create a paid newsletter. Although it requires more time and effort than newsletter centered platforms like Substack, it gives newsletter creators true ownership of their content. A WordPress website can be create quickly and for just a few dollars with hosts like Bluehost (making it a low cost and easy to create option). WordPress is similar in this way to Ghost, but given most people’s familiarity with WordPress, this is definitely an option worth considering.
Complete Control and Ownership of Content. WordPress offers publishers complete control and ownership of their content since you are essentially building a self hosted website (as opposed to relying upon a third party platform, which is subject to frequent business model changes, algorithms, non-customized displaying of your content, etc.).
Most Commonly Used Self Hosted CMS. Far more website creators are used to using WordPress than any other self hosted option (i.e. Ghost) and it is generally fairly user friendly as far as self hosted sites go.
Publishers Have Wider Range of Tools. WordPress offers a wide range of plugins which can allow newsletter creators the ability to add virtually any feature without knowledge of coding.
Less User Friendly Than Substack. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter. It will definitely take more effort to create a website/paid newsletter using WordPress than to set up a paid newsletter with something like Substack.
Lacks Reputation as a Newsletter Creation Platform. When people think of WordPress, they tend to think of websites and blogs and not paid newsletters. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use WordPress for a paid newsletter, but it is not the most common use case of the WordPress CMS.
5. Revue
Revue is an email marketing company designed for writers and publishers. Revue makes it easy for anyone to quickly create aesthetically appealing newsletters. The site is unique in that it is possible for users to earn in a variety of ways, including subscription models, advertising, sponsorships, and other digital avenues. Revue was acquired by Twitter in 2021. The possible integration of Twitter and your paid newsletter, make this paid newsletter company worth considering.
Dedicated Paid Newsletter Platform. Like Substack, Revue is focused primarily on being a paid newsletter platform, so much of the new development that occurs centers around newsletter specific features (as opposed to incorporating new verticals).
Integration with Twitter. If you have a large Twitter following or are driving many of your current newsletter leads from Twitter, the fact that Revue is owned by Twitter and increasingly integrated into your Twitter profile is a tremendous selling point.
Easy to Use. Like Substack, Revue is among the easier of the paid newsletter platforms to use. I would still say Substack is slightly more user-friendly, but it is definitely easier for the average user than most of the other options in this list.
Relatively High Revenue Cut. Substack handles the logistical and technical issues typically associated with operating a paid newsletter.
6. ConvertKit
ConverKit started as a more traditional email marketing system, but has recently evolved into the go to platforms for creators looking to monetize their content. ConvertKit allows creators to easily set up automated funnels to pitch your paid newsletter to your super fans with their world-class audience growth and email tools. Unlike many of the other paid newsletter platforms in this article, ConvertKit allows publishers to create their own paid newsletter referal program, which is a powerful feature!
Better Email Marketing Features. Since ConvertKit is basically a modern, user-friendly version of the traditional email marketing software, it not surprising that one of the features is that it has superior email marketing features compared to platforms built specifically for subscription newsletters (i.e. Substack or Revue).
Publishers Have Wider Range of Tools. ConvertKit allows creators to operate a fully function email marketing system, as well as offer other popular passion economy features. For example, you can sell products directly, create custom landing pages, or create a membership based business with ConvertKit.
Relatively User Friendly. Among the email marketing systems I’ve tried, ConvertKit is definitely the easiest to use, although there is still a learning curve (but it is vastly more user-friendly than something like Mailchimp, in my own experience).
Not Originally Created as a Paid Newsletter Platform. Although not a deal breaker for everyone, ConvertKit has added paid newsletters as a feature fairly recently (and it offers a wide range of services, so this can make it trickier for inexperienced users). That said, ConvertKit is among the most user friendly of the email marketing systems, so this may not be an issue.
Variable Fees. With ConvertKit, newsletter creators do pay one of several monthly fees, although the factors that determine which fee you pay is more nuanced and complicated than some of the other options on here. In keeping with its roots as a traditional email marketing system, you can be charged based on the total number of emails sent (as opposed to revenue or number of paid subscribers).
7. MailerLite
Like ConvertKit, MailerLite was orignally a fairly typical email marketing system. However, more recently, it has become a suite of creator economy platforms bundled together. MailerLite allows newsletter creators to quickly create a landing page (or entire website) using the drag & drop editor. They can then customize their site to match their brand, embed a newsletter archive to show value, and accept payments directly on the site.
Better Email Marketing Features. Since MailerLite is basically a modern, user-friendly version of the traditional email marketing software, it not surprising that one of the features is that it has superior email marketing features compared to platforms built specifically for subscription newsletters (i.e. Substack or Revue).
Not Originally Created as a Paid Newsletter Platform. Although not a deal breaker for everyone, MailerLite has added paid newsletters as a feature fairly recently (and it offers a wide range of services, so this can make it trickier for inexperienced users). It is still primarily utilized by email marketers to build free email lists.
Variable Fees. With MailerLite, newsletter creators do pay one of several monthly fees, although the factors that determine which fee you pay is more nuanced and complicated than some of the other options on here. In keeping with its roots as a traditional email marketing system, you can be charged based on the total number of emails sent (as opposed to revenue or number of paid subscribers).
Conclusion
Generating income from your own paid newsletter platform has never been easier. By adding a paid newsletter to your offerings, you can create a new channel of valuable content your audience is excited to invest in. While creators in the past needed to either spend huge amounts of money or build custom technical infrastructure themselves in order to operate a paid newsletter, the paid newsletter platforms of today are generally cheap and easy to use.
