Writing and content
Substack alternatives
1 open-source project that already does this job. Free to use - not free to run, which is what the numbers on the right are for.
The projects
What you give up either way
- Substack Network built-in discovery and cross-publication recommendations
- Scale and infrastructure for large media hosting, streaming, and podcast distribution
- Built-in audience/referral mechanics (leaderboards, referral rewards)
- Integrated native features such as AI text-to-speech, live streaming, and clipping tools
- Polished analytics and subscriber lifecycle automations at Substack scale
An open-source project doing the core job proves a replacement is possible. It does not prove it matches Substack, and it does not prove anyone has run it for a month. How we decide.