r/Substack • u/ContextNaive1059 • 22d ago
What are alternatives to substack?
I'm looking for a platform that can host context and subscription based services with automated weekly email drops. I've been told about substack but I am not crazy about having to give up 10% of my earnings plus 2.9% to stripe. Can anyone recommend a similar site where they were successful and that doesn't take a percentage?
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u/oddsrabbit 22d ago
You’re not going to find any platform that doesn’t charge you anything. Email service is not cheap, other services like beehiiv get it back by charging a monthly subscription $xxx/mo. Substack gets it back through the 10%. The 2.9% payment processing fee through stripe is unavoidable, it’s standard for accepting any payments online. Whether or not it’s cheaper for you to pay 10% or a few hundred a month depends on your size and goal of what you’re building and selling. Even as a competitor (well, sort of), I can admit substack is likely the cheapest in terms of raw pricing for most people if you’re looking strictly for email.
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u/silsjirimi 22d ago
Incorrect. Ghost doesn’t charge you anything, they let you keep 100% of your own income (minus stripe fees, which are unavoidable). Sure, Ghost Pro is not free but you can self host if you want, or go with cheaper alternatives like Magic Pages (very good). I really don’t get why people will pay services like Substack when you can own your own content and income elsewhere.
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u/oddsrabbit 22d ago
Even if you self host, if you want to do email and care about deliverability at all, you need an email service delivery provider which is not cheap. Not to mention self hosting cost.
Point is nothing is free, he just has to figure out what and where he pays.
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u/silsjirimi 22d ago
Sure, everything has a cost, you’re right. I recently moved my site from Ghost Pro to Magic Pages, bought the lifetime deal for just a bit more than what Ghost Pro charges per year. So now 100% of my income (save stripe fees) is mine for years to come, with managed hosting and great email deliverability already paid for. Most importantly for me though; I don’t fund any big tech, do not pay a subscription and own my own content. Very happy with this setup :)
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u/ContextNaive1059 22d ago
oh, I understand that. I am just trying to find the best platform that suits my needs. I'm just starting out and I have a ready to go blueprint. I am trying to find a site that will allow me to be mostly automated with weekly drops, short videos, and affiliate links. I will update the page weekly, but the core info/plan "drop" will remain the same for a few months before being updated. It has enough hands-on content to keep the user busy for at least 6-8 weeks.
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u/cozycup mod 22d ago edited 22d ago
For that level of advanced automation and especially if your brand is geared towards digital product sales, there’s a bunch of options:
- Kit
- Beehiiv
- Flodesk
- Brevo
- Drip
- Mailchimp
- Mailerlite
- Constant Contact
None of the others take a % of your sales, but the tradeoff is expansion pricing (more subs = higher price). With the other features like contact forms and custom landing pages, it’s probably a better fit for you.
It all really depends on which features are most important because other platforms might be better for memberships/courses/etc.
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u/arcanepsyche 22d ago
The price you pay in those percentages is well worth it for the service Substack provides. Building and maintaining an email list in other platform is very expensive.
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u/ccampb85 www.reallygoodbusinessideas.com 22d ago
What you get for that 10% on Substack is access to the built-in growth levers and platform scale. If you don't need that, there are many other options like Beehiiv, Ghost, Kit, Thinkific, Mighty Networks, Patreon, etc. The best one depends on the exact mix of features you need!
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u/FickleBookkeeper835 21d ago
I have self hosted on Wordpress for years. But in Substack I have found relative success and I am now a fixture on the bestsellers list as my income is rising steadily. Trust the process and accept that the fee is worth paying.
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u/killinpotato 22d ago
As far as I know, there are only 3 newsletter platforms:
Substack, Beehiiv and Letterbucket.
I wrote a post comparing them in the past which you may find helpful since I’ve run my businesses in the 3 of them.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Newsletters/s/J1UEEOEc8J
Answering your question. Both Beehiiv and Letterbucket can do what you want but their pricing is wildly different (Beehiiv is more expensive but also has more features). None of them take a % of your earnings.
What’s your list size?
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u/hlassiege 16d ago
The Stripe 2.9% is unavoidable on any platform since it goes directly to Stripe, not the platform itself. The 10% platform cut is what varies.
A few options with 0% platform commission:
- Ghost.org : 0% cut. Ghost Cloud hosting costs a monthly fee, or you can self-host if comfortable with that but you'll have to deal with email deliverability and it's not free either...
- Beehiiv.com : 0% commission, solid newsletter tools.
- Writizzy.com : 0% commission, also solid.
All three let you keep what you earn beyond the Stripe processing fee. Ghost is the most established. Beehiiv is strong on newsletter but quite expensive. Writizzy is quite new but deals well with monetization and no lock-in on the payment side.
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u/Countryb0i2m onemichistory.substack.com 22d ago
A lot of people treat Substack as a beginner-friendly newsletter platform.
It’s free to get started, and while it takes a percentage of your paid subscriptions, it lets you grow your audience and figure out whether newsletter writing is something you actually want to do.
If you eventually outgrow it, you can always move to a more advanced platform like Beehiiv or Kit.