Medium Alternatives: 5 Sites Where You Could Make Money Writing Like Medium

Medium is a powerful website to make money writing but if you are looking for more such platforms where you could make money writing or sites similar to Medium.com or sites that are perfect alternatives for making money writing, this guide will definitely help you out.

Writing online is a privilege. Almost everyone who writes online gets benefits in one way or another. Medium is one of the best writing platforms where anyone could write and make money. When I started blogging back in 2017, I wasn't sure about the money. I need money the most so I started having my own blog hosted on Blogger. It is very difficult to get ranked using a sub-domain but somehow, through writing consistently and publishing articles I made over $1000 writing on a free Blogspot blog.

With that much amount of money, I bought my own domain and hosting and started writing under my own domain. But, later on, back in 2019, I discovered Medium and at that time I knew that I have discovered a platform that could help me make more money in the future. At the very beginning of 2020, I promised myself that I will Join the Medium Partner program and I did.

Medium alternatives: 5 Sites similar to Medium.com:

Following are some of the alternatives or sites similar to Medium.com where you could start making money writing:

1. Vocal Media
2. Papyrus
3. HubPages
4. Make your own Blog
5. Quora
6. Substack
7. Ghost.org

A Site like Medium: Make Money Writing On Vocal Media:

Vocal Media is a powerful website where you can make money writing. In just less than 2 months of writing on this platform, I have made over $150 by getting reads and over $22 through getting tips from Vocal readers. Vocal Media is a fairly new platform just 4-years old. The Vocal wasn't an attractive platform for me later on but now I am making enough money from this platform that could sponsor my hostel accommodation and one month of food. I can easily eat quality food, join a gym, get some paid lessons, and do everything with just the money I generate from Vocal. I am really grateful that a platform like Vocal Media where I could make money writing.

Here is how much money I have made writing on Vocal Media:

If you ask me about a single platform that could be a potential Medium alternative then Vocal Media is the one. I write a guide about this too on my Vocal profile: How to make money writing on Vocal Media? You can learn everything about making money on Vocal Media through this article. Also, I have interviewed Jonathan Sims, you can learn how Jonathan Sims made over $2000/Month writing on Vocal?

Here is why Vocal Media is a very Similar platform to Medium:

• Vocal Media pays you $3.8/1,000 reads if you aren't in Vocal+ membership, if you can spend $9.99 a month then for the very same number of reads, you will make $6/1,000 reads.
• You can also make money by submitting your stories to challenges. The challenge winner makes $500 per challenge. You need to be in Vocal+ in order to participate in Vocal challenges.
• You can also get tips from the readers or people who find your content good enough. If you find this content good enough, a tip will be highly appreciated.

Papyrus: A newsletter creating tool and potential Substack & Medium alternative:

Papyrus is an Online newsletter creating tool where you can write and create a blog as well as collect free emails. By connecting Stripe you can start a subscription-based business the same way as Substack and build a platform like Medium. The good thing about Papyrus is that they only charge you a 5% transaction fee while Substack charges you 10%.

The team behind Papyrus is working on Google so they are making their platform one of the best for you so you get discovered on search engines. You can also connect a custom domain with your Papyrus newsletter (you have to pay a $50 fee which is charged just one time)

Thinking of starting a newsletter where you can connect free emails and start a subscription-based business? Sign-up for Papyrus here.

A Medium Alternative: Make Money Writing On HubPages:

Hubpages is another free writing platform where you could make money writing. You don't need to do anything to set up your HubPages blog. Hubpages is also a good alternative to Medium but you have to write really good, quality, Search engine optimized content to getting ranked. Hubpages is a type of Ad-based alternative to Medium.

Make an account on Hubpages, set up your profile, and attach your Paypal account. That's it. You are ready to get paid. The next and important thing you need to do is to write and publish more articles. The more articles you publish, the more money you will make.

Hubpages pay you based on the readers you get. The more visitors you get, the more the chances that they will somehow engage with the ads. You paid based on the geography of your visitors and the niche of your articles. You will make somewhere between $3 to $6 a 1,000 visitors on your Hubpages. The second monetization way Hubpages use is affiliate marketing. They display affiliate products in your blog post or hubs and you will get some commission based on the price of the product your reader bought.

You can learn more about this powerful Medium alternative called Hubpages in this article: How to make money writing on Hubpages?

Make a site like Medium: Start your own blog:

You can start a website and write and publish content there. With your own blog comes a lot of freedom. You can monetize your blog through any way of your choice; like affiliate marketing, running PPC ads, adding your own videos, selling your own products, or introducing a paywall like Medium and charge readers. You can only introduce a paywall using Ghost CMS.

Medium is a publishing platform where you can create content and get rewarded for that in terms of Medium member read time. The more read time you get the more money you will make. Start writing on your blog and you can monetize your writing. I think building your own empire on your blog as well as writing on Medium is the two combos that would help you to achieve your writing dreams. I have made over $15K just writing on my blog.

A Site similar to Medium: Start writing on Quora:

Quora is a question & answers based website where you could make money writing In two ways; through the Quora Partner program and through the Quora space earning program. Quora partner program is a program in some countries where you just have to ask questions on Quora and based on the number of answers and the views that answers receive aka a impressions, you will make money.

Quora Space earning program is a program for every Quora Space owner like me or you, you will get paid based on the ads-displayed on your Quora space. There are some Quora spaces that are making $100s of dollars writing and publishing content on their Quora space.

Quora is a potential competitor of Medium.

You can learn more about making money through the Quora space earning program in the link given below;

How to make money through running a Quora Space?

Make Money Writing on Substack:

Substack is another potential Medium alternative where you could make money writing on Substack and build your email list. The monetization model and the strategies are different their but the underlying business model is the same. Substack is a revolutionary platform for writers.

You make a publication on Substack and start writing. Writing on Substack helps you build an email list. The more stories you publish and as time passes by, the frequency of getting more email subscribers to increase on daily basis. As your email list grows, you can monetize that list through multiple ways;

1. You can monetize it by introducing a paywall in some of your articles. It is called the subscription business. You get paid subscribers and get paid monthly or end of the 30-days period.
2. You can monetize it by getting sponsors from the companies. One of the writers I follow charges $500 per sponsored inclusion in his weekly newsletter.
3. You can build your own blog or Medium audience and send them your stories on weekly basis.

These are some of the Medium alternatives or sites similar to Medium.com that could help you make money writing besides writing on Medium.

Make Money Writing on Ghost.org:

Ghost.org is one of the best Substack alternatives. When I started my blog, I Ghost(Pro) over WordPress because I could use the power of email marketing (Free with no limit of how many subscribers can you have) and monetize it by writing paywall articles. They have Stripe integration which is a one-click install and payment.

Ghost editor is more like Medium. They have a great number of themes like one theme with the name "Casper" which is more like the next Medium design.

Sign-up for Ghost(Pro) and experience the best blogging platform ever.

You can also read it review on Medium: Ghost Blogging Platform Review 2021: Publishing On Ghost CMS For 3 Months

Disclosure: This blog post contains affiliate links, if you choose to buy anything using these links, I will get a small commission. Also, this will be of no additional cost to you. Thank you!

I write a complete guide about potential Medium alternatives in my newsletter here: Medium Alternatives: 7 Sites Similar To Medium.com Where You Could Write And Make Money

I hope this helps.