One Substack refugee saved $21k switching platforms
The afternoon post arrives in Kreuzberg just after two, and somewhere between the coffee bar receipts and the property tax reminder sits a Stripe deposit notification—same time every week, 22% larger than it used to be, no extra work required.
Why newsletter operators are walking away from Substack’s 10 per cent forever
Beehiiv reported its best quarter ever in Q1 2026 as creators flee percentage-based fees.
One creator saw a 78.4 per cent increase in net income worth $21,325 annually after migrating from Substack to Beehiiv. Beehiiv expects to nearly double annual revenue to $50 million this year, with its ad network generating up to $3 million per month, up from $1 million monthly in 2025. The maths is simple: you keep 100 per cent of revenue instead of losing 10 per cent to Substack. When you’re running 5,000 paid subscribers at $8 monthly, that 10 per cent compounds to real money—money that could cover your VA, your hosting, or six months of runway.
Q1 was Beehiiv’s best quarter ever at $28 million ARR, 50,000 active users, 10 billion emails sent. The platform’s pitch is operator-friendly: free until creators surpass 2,500 subscribers, then tiered pricing that doesn’t scale with revenue. One newsletter founder estimated revenue for his publication had increased roughly 20 to 25 per cent year over year since he left Substack in January 2024. The migration wave isn’t about features—it’s about margin. When Substack takes 10 per cent of every subscription forever, you could be paying $10,000 or even $100,000 a year to host your blog. Beehiiv charges flat fees regardless of how much you earn, and layers in an ad network and cross-promotion revenue on top. For operators between 5,000 and 50,000 subscribers, the unit economics flip hard.
TACTIC
The hybrid revenue model replacing subscription-only newsletters
The highest-performing newsletter businesses have moved beyond single-stream revenue, as relying solely on sponsorships creates volatility while relying solely on subscriptions can cap growth—the 2026 default model is a strategic blend of sponsorships for premium brand demand, programmatic for automated backfill, and subscriptions for predictable recurring revenue. Programmatic ad platforms have CPMs that are 30-50 per cent higher than they were two years ago. The operators running profitable newsletters aren’t choosing between ads and paid tiers—they’re running both, plus affiliate, plus referral incentives. Revenue diversity beats purity every time.
NUMBERS
What newsletter sponsorships actually pay in 2026
B2B newsletters in specialized industries often command CPMs of $50-$100+, while broader consumer newsletters sit closer to $15-$35. Mid-sized newsletters typically charge between $500 and $3,000 per placement, with most hovering around $1,000-$1,500, and CPMs at this stage might be $20-$50 depending on niche and engagement. The Publish Press with 60,000 subscribers generates $7,000 per primary ad slot and $2,000 per listed ad, while The Rundown generates $2,000 for a main ad and $1,000 for a trending ad. If your list is above 10,000 and your open rate holds above 35 per cent, you should be charging four figures per placement—anything less leaves money on the table.
WORTH READING
Why open rates are now the least reliable metric you track
Before 2021, email marketing saw a 20-25 per cent open rate, but with Apple’s iOS 15 update, Mail Privacy Protection started auto-loading email images, artificially counting emails as opened even if they weren’t read. Aim for 15-25 per cent open rates across most industries, but remember Apple’s privacy changes make these numbers less reliable than before. The operators who still optimize for opens alone are measuring noise. Click-to-Open Rate measures the percentage of recipients who opened your email and then clicked, giving you a clearer signal of how your email content, layout, and call-to-action performed. Track CTOR, track conversions, track revenue per send—open rate is a vanity metric in 2026.
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