Is Medium Legit or Worth It?

As you'll probably notice from the title alone, this article is meant to answer the people's need for factual and accurate information, so let me keep the BS to a minimum and skip the flowery introduction or the yakety-yak storytelling unsuitable for this type of post.

I've been writing on Medium since 2022. It might not be a long-term veteran like other people I know, but I've experienced many changes during the last few years, written and edited a decent amount of stories, built my own publication, and made tens of thousands of dollars for my hard work and dedication. And since 2024, I've been a small cog in the double-layered curation process on Medium (which I'll tell you all about once we get there).

I'm the right guy to talk about this subject. Even more so since, before 2022, I was just like you: a regular person contemplating earning some cash from an online writing gig and looking for platforms that would provide me with that opportunity.

So, without further ado, here's everything you need to know about Medium, minus the Wikipedia-style BS.

Is Medium legit?

Oh, very much so. There are a few procedural things that have changed over the years, but the most important aspects have remained the same:

1) The best cost-per-read ratio on the whole internet. This month, one single read has generated me $3 due to Medium's complex monetization system. It's not something that happens regularly, but it's possible. Unlike other platforms, where you need thousands of views or reads to slowly accumulate one or two dollars.

2) They always pay on time, usually by the 10th of the next month, for the earnings you made the month prior. Some time ago, they implemented a "10 dollar threshold" that you have to reach before they send you the money, because the taxes they had to pay for sending people even 60 cents (like they used to) were higher than the payment itself. But rest assured, once you reach $10, they will send your money to your account.

3) It's way easier to find inside readers than on any other platform, no matter what you write about. As long as you use the right topics for your story and join a suitable publication, you'll get some eyeballs on your stories. After that, it depends on how well you can retain the readers' attention.

Can anyone write on Medium?

Yes. Anyone can write on Medium and hone their own craft, but not everyone can monetize their articles. The Medium Partner Program uses Stripe (an accounting-like platform) to deliver the earnings to its partner writers. Although the number of countries where Stripe can be accessed has grown over recent years, there are still some countries in the world where Stripe is not supported.

Here's a full list of countries that are supported by Medium's Partner Program, dating back to the late summer of 2024:

Albania, Algeria, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Côte d'Ivoire, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Estonia, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Gabon, Gambia, Germany, Ghana, Gibraltar, Greece, Guatemala, Guyana, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Laos, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macao, Madagascar, Malaysia, Malta, Mauritius, Mexico, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Niger, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

As a Medium staff member put it, "In short, almost all countries supported by Stripe are now supported."

Nonetheless, even without joining the Partner Program and monetizing your content, if you're smart about it, there are plenty of ways to earn a profit through product reviews and free-to-read affiliate marketing stories, due to Medium's high score in Google search engine ranking.

If I'm not mistaken, somewhere around 2024, they also introduced a new rule stating that everyone who wants to join the Partner Program and earn money on Medium has to have an active $5 subscription at the time of their application. Interestingly enough, some folks used to buy a premium membership just for this reason alone and cancel it the next month. Not sure if this still works, though.

How does Medium's monetization work?

Medium is a paywalled platform where people pay $5 for a monthly subscription (or $50 a year) that gives them unlimited access to all the stories found on their site/app. Some stories are free to read without a paid membership, but many authors end up monetizing their content, so unless they buy a premium subscription, a free reader's access on the platform is quite limited.

Why does this matter to you? Because it influences the way you're paid as a writer. Medium currently pays you based on the number of reads your stories get from paid members only. The read you get from the free, non-paying readers will generate you no earnings.

When a user buys a $5 subscription, Medium takes their undisclosed cut from that amount (it can be $1 or even $4; we don't know) and will redistribute the rest to the stories that specific user will read in a month.

Figuratively speaking, every premium member is holding a "reader's purse" with what's left of his/her paid subscription after Medium takes its cut. Every time he/she reads a monetized story, they generate a specific amount of earnings for the author of that story, which is subtracted from the "reader's purse" until the money runs out. So, depending on your luck and your readers' reading habits, you can get no money at all, a few cents, or even several dollars for one single premium read.

Furthermore, views and reads are different metrics. There is a specific number of seconds (nothing too unreasonable) for which a visitor has to stay on and scroll down your article's page for the site to count it either as a view or a read. Basically, if someone stays too little on the page, the system will only record their visit as a view at best, and views are not rewarded with earnings.

Reads from staff members would usually generate nothing. From what I have observed, they receive premium access at no cost (a perk of their job), and since their accounts hold no "reader's purse," their reads don't generate earnings.

What should I write on Medium?

Well, that depends on your writing skills and personal and professional experience.

Gone are the days when people could just churn out daily articles and make hundreds or even thousands of dollars a month. Medium was bleeding money, especially after AI programs like ChatGPT came around, and their platform was infested with AI-generated garbage. So, they took some measures to limit and redirect the cash flow from the type of stories that seem disingenuous and very low quality (broken English, content mills, spammy, etc.).

Nowadays, the focus is on human experience, on writing reasonably (less if needed), and only when you have something interesting to say, rather than writing some low-quality "10 Things About Cats" article each day.

Medium's Boosting Program, a human-based review system that costs them a lot and has the role of selecting, promoting, and directing most of the money to the best stories that meet Medium's Quality Guidelines (a king-sanctioned hack, if you wish to call it that), seems to place enough stress on the distribution algorithm to render any "I'll write more to make more reads and money" strategy rather unsuccessful.

Sadly, there are not many options for the average writer. Especially those who don't have any interesting life stories to tell or any professional knowledge (like a doctor or a lawyer) to write about some inside secrets in a non-content creation listicle way (i.e., through an eye-opening, educational personal essay) or an expertise-based review/analysis of a real-life event/trend.

But even so, if you write catchy titles and know how to retain the attention of your readers with a short 2- or 3-minute article on a green niche (IDK, like dating and relationships), you can probably enjoy some moderate success. Although that has become a lot harder lately, it's still worth a try.

The latest impression is that Medium is trying to switch to a more professional business model now that they have accumulated a decent number of writers and a paying member base. So they're looking to promote those types of writers that people would be willing to read out of genuine interest rather than boredom or due to their "doom scrolling" habits.

Hence, simple content writing is no longer enough for most writers to stay on top.

Medium tips & tricks

Here are a few things you can do to increase your chance of success on Medium:

1) State your credentials in your bio if you plan to write articles about a specialized field (medicine, science, law, etc.) that you work in. Both the readers themselves and Medium as a platform would rather have a real medical professional, a scientist, or someone with a PhD talking about these specialized fields than a regular content writer doing a Google research on the subject. Professional expertise is something that Medium holds in high regard.

2) Focusing on a dedicated nerdish or DIY hobby can also bring you a lot of success. I know a guy who's a massive LEGO fan, writing LEGO reviews in which he's documenting his own process of building various LEGO sets. Most of his stories are eventually curated and selected by Medium for increased distribution and earnings through the Boosting Program. So, IDK, if you're a painter or a sculptor, picking up some interesting project for your next art piece and documenting your work might lead to an interesting and educational Medium article.

3) Choose two or three niches that you're passionate about and stick with them. Being all over the place and writing just about anything won't bring you more exposure or money.

4) Less is better. Like everywhere on the internet, consistency helps, but as I mentioned earlier, on Medium, it's not advisable to put too much pressure on the distribution algorithm by publishing every day. I'd say that two, three, or even four stories a week is the Goldilocks zone - just enough for both the algorithm and readers to not forget about you and keep up with your work.

5) Choose your topics properly from the Explore topic page, which you'll easily find on the site when you type something in the upper search box. Every story can have up to 5 topics, and choosing a combination of relevant topics (one or two main topics + 3 subtopics) with a considerable number of subscribers will bring you enough exposure inside the platform to the point where you won't need any self-promotion at all.

6) Seek me out on Medium, and if my time allows, I might provide you with some guidance. I have the same username as here, only that the acronym ends with a "w" instead of a "y."

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