Difference Between Substack and WordPress (With Table)

Trying to construct a blog or online platform between Substack and WordPress? Or bewildered first of all by the difference between the two platforms? Substack has acquired a lot of traction to develop a blog/newsletters for journalists and authors, yet WordPress is nonetheless the engine that enables more than 40,6 percent of all websites on the web.

With the appropriate configuration, you can make WordPress do almost everything Substack can do. It is a bit more complicated to start with but absolutely effortless once you get used to it.

Substack vs WordPress

The main difference between Substack and WordPress is that Substack is a platform allowing writers to produce newsletters of their own. It’s called a ‘newsletter’ from Substack, but actually, it’s just a blogger with e-mail functionality. WordPress is a complete website developer and content management system. It’s the most common technique to build a website with more than 40,6% of all websites.

Substack is based on subscription. 10% of every transaction between a writer and a reader is charged. They have recently launched a custom domain feature. Substack is also a host tool, which means you don’t have to bother with the hosting of your website as you would other platforms.

WordPress, like in certain cases a free hosting service, is a content management system (CMS). The open-source is WordPress. By placing advertisements or any other manner, you may generate money from a free WordPress blog. With the correct addons to construct a webshop, online training classes, forums, membership communities, etc.

Comparison Table Between Substack and WordPress

Parameters of Comparison

Substack

WordPress

Meaning

Substack is a small publisher e-mail newsletter platform meant to transform its readers into paying clients.

WordPress is an open-source content management system licensed on a somewhat higher technical level.

Invented by

Substack was invented by Hamish McKenzie.

WordPress was invented by Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little.

Year

Substack was founded in 2017.

WordPress was founded in 2001.

Type

E-mal newsletter platform.

Design a website.

Cost

Free

Paid

What is Substack?

Substack is a small publisher e-mail newsletter platform meant to transform its readers into paying clients. Writers receive a Material Management System (CMS), a website that may house free and subscription-only content, to publish e-mail newsletters and integrated payments via Stripe.

Consequently, a writer may launch a paid or free newsletter relatively easily with Substack. Substack delivers all these capabilities by selling subscriptions to dedicated readers, independent of their technology, using an e-mail newsletter platform that enables anybody to monetize their material.

The business plan of Substack is straightforward. It gains money by collecting a 10 percent commission of every paying subscriber in return for the tools it offers to authors. This makes it incredibly easy to start, which appeals to folks who want to focus on writing rather than on technical matters.

Substack can be used for free by writers who have chosen not to commercialize their work. Podcasts’ substack functions in the same way as published material. Creators may either offer everyone, or only their subscribers, access to audio material.

What is WordPress? 

The easiest and popular option to build your website or blog is WordPress. Indeed, more than 40% of all Internet websites may be accessed by WordPress. Yes, WordPress is probably powered by more than one out of four websites you visit. WordPress is an open-source content management system licensed under GPLv2 on a somewhat higher technical level, meaning that anybody can freely use or edit the WordPress software.

A content management system is essentially a tool for managing key components of your website, such as content, without having to know about programming. As a result, WordPress makes it possible for anybody to design a website — even those who are not engineers. WordPress has been a tool for many years to produce a blog, not more conventional websites. However, for a long time, that has not been the case.

Today, you may develop any kind of website with WordPress owing to modifications in your core code and the enormous WordPress ecosystem of plugins and themes. WordPress enables you to accomplish everything Subtack can do in terms of blogging, newsletters, and subscriptions. WordPress can handle anything, literally, and there are many instances of huge businesses and people that use this in various ways.

Main Differences Between Substack and WordPress 

  1. Substack is for free, whereas WordPress gets access to CMS.
  2. Substack might be used by the member company. You have to pay for a plug-in if you want whereas to make your WordPress site an affiliate. Substack provides everything for you to build a lucrative affiliate.
  3. When we’re talking about designing the blog, Substack has very limited freedom, whereas, with WordPress, you got a lot of website designs to pick from with WordPress, an open-source platform.
  4. The costs and safety of utilizing the WordPress CMS are other major worries, whereas, for substack, you should have a strong password, and your contents are shared.
  5. Sustainability and content: Substack is a third-party platform. Your Substack shall be terminated if you breach any of their regulations, whereas your staff will always be there if you have a blog on WordPress.

Conclusion 

In general, Substack versus WordPress is too numerous to suggest one platform for everybody. However, we can reconstruct some aspects to offer recommendations depending on particular conditions. Substack is a non-technical platform for writing whatever you do. Surely it’s simpler than WordPress.

But for this ease, you also give up control. You cannot add or customize your design completely. You also put in the hands of Substack your platform because it is a tool hosted. WordPress is a somewhat more technical platform where your web hosting is hosting the program. Non-technical folks can always handle it, but it’s certainly more complicated than substack. The advantage is that you have far more flexibility and also full platform control.

References

  1. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=8AUaBgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR31&dq=%3DWordPress+&ots=7L7Zxak8A0&sig=J0W7zKxEpVE2-__gwv9iUOPGxnY
  2. http://sk.sagepub.com/cases/substack-and-newsletter-boom-when-does-platform-become-publisher