Ghost vs Substack: Full Platform Comparison for 2026

The 10% Question

Substack takes 10% of every paid subscription. Add Stripe’s ~2.9% processing fee and $0.30 per transaction, and roughly 13% of your gross revenue goes to platform fees before you see a dollar.

Ghost takes 0%. You connect your own Stripe account. If a reader pays $10/month, you get $10 minus Stripe’s ~2.9%.

On a $10/month subscriber, that’s $8.41/month on Substack vs. $9.71/month on Ghost — a $1.30 difference per subscriber per month. At 1,000 paying subscribers, that’s $1,300/month ($15,600/year) you keep on Ghost that Substack would take.

Then there’s the Apple problem. In August 2025, Substack adopted Apple’s in-app purchase requirement for iOS subscriptions. Apple takes up to 30% in year one, and subscribers who pay through Apple don’t appear in your Stripe account. If you leave Substack, those Apple subscribers can’t come with you.

Revenue Comparison at Scale

At $5/month per paying subscriber, comparing Substack’s 13% combined fees vs. Ghost Publisher at $29/month:

Paying Subscribers	Monthly Revenue	Substack Fees (13%)	Ghost Cost	Ghost Advantage
50	$250	$32.50	$29	~Even
100	$500	$65	$29	+$36/mo
250	$1,250	$162	$29	+$133/mo
500	$2,500	$325	$29	+$296/mo
1,000	$5,000	$650	$29	+$621/mo
5,000	$25,000	$3,250	$199	+$3,051/mo

The break-even point is roughly 50-60 paying subscribers at $5/month. Below that, Substack’s “free until you monetize” model costs less. Above it, every new subscriber widens Ghost’s advantage.

Newsletter Features

Both platforms have strong native newsletter capabilities. The differences are in the details.

Ghost Newsletters

• Multiple newsletters per site, each with independent subscriptions and templates
• Segmentation by newsletter subscription, membership tier, or custom label
• Publish-only, email-only, or publish-and-email modes
• Post-send link editing (update links in already-delivered emails)
• Custom sending domain on Publisher plan+ (e.g., newsletter@yourdomain.com)
• Custom email design: background colors, fonts, heading styles, button styles, header images
• Open rate and click rate analytics per post, benchmarked against your last 20 sends

Substack Newsletters

• One newsletter per publication (straightforward)
• A/B testing for subject lines (launched May 2025, boosts open rates by ~12% on average)
• Content delivered via email and the Substack app
• Platform-reported averages: 45%+ open rates, 20%+ click rates
• Minimal design customization

Ghost gives you more control and segmentation. Substack gives you a simpler setup and subject line A/B testing.

Membership and Monetization

Ghost Memberships

• Free tier, paid monthly, paid annual, and multiple premium tiers with custom pricing
• Labels for further segmentation (e.g., “founding members,” “workshop attendees”)
• Per-post content access rules: free, paid, specific tier, or email-only
• Revenue metrics: MRR, churn tracking, customer lifetime value
• Per-post conversion analytics (which posts drive free-to-paid upgrades)
• Ghost 6.0 additions (August 2025): one-time payments (tips/donations), Stripe Tax for VAT/GST, new payment methods (CashApp, iDEAL, WeChat)

Substack Memberships

• Maximum 3 tiers: Free, Paid (monthly + annual required), and Founding Member (optional premium)
• Default pricing recommendation: $5/month or $50/year
• Founding tier typically $100-500/year, same content access as paid
• Subscriber referral program with customizable rewards
• Ability to pause all paid subscriptions

Ghost offers more pricing flexibility and per-post monetization controls. Substack keeps it simple with a three-tier structure.

Design and Branding

This is where the platforms diverge most sharply.

Every Substack looks like every other Substack. Same layout, same header structure, same fonts with minor variations. You can change your accent color and upload a logo. Using a custom domain costs a one-time $50 fee and removes your publication from Substack’s Discover tab.

Ghost’s theme system is entirely different. You install a professionally designed theme and customize every visual element of your publication. Custom homepage layouts, unique typography, dark mode, reading progress bars, photo galleries — all controlled through your theme.

Our Luno theme demonstrates the gap: 6 hero layouts, a table of contents for long-form posts, custom membership sign-up pages, and light/dark mode — configured without code.

See Luno live demo →

For writers whose brand identity matters — and if you’re building a business around your writing, it should — the design gap alone justifies considering Ghost.

SEO Capabilities

Ghost SEO

• Custom meta titles and descriptions per post
• Auto-generated XML sitemap (linked from robots.txt)
• Canonical URLs (auto-set, overridable per post)
• Schema.org structured data on every page
• Open Graph and Twitter Card tags
• Clean semantic HTML with optimized permalinks
• Redirect management and noindex controls

Substack SEO

• Basic meta descriptions
• XML sitemaps and basic schema markup
• No canonical URL customization
• No redirect management
• No noindex controls
• Without a custom domain ($50), all SEO value accrues to substack.com

For newsletter-only publications, SEO matters less. But for writers producing evergreen content — guides, tutorials, comparison articles — Ghost’s SEO tools drive compounding organic traffic over months and years. Substack posts mostly rely on email distribution and the internal network.

Social Features

Substack Notes

Substack built a Twitter/X-like short-form feed within its ecosystem. Native comments, likes, replies. A mobile app (iOS + Android) with full functionality. An internal discovery loop where Substack’s recommendation engine surfaces your work to other readers.

The numbers are significant: 50+ million active subscriptions, 34 publications with 500K+ subscribers, 7 with 1M+ subscribers.

Ghost ActivityPub (v6.0)

Ghost 6.0 (August 2025) shipped full ActivityPub integration. Ghost publications can be followed, replied to, and shared from Mastodon, Threads, Flipboard, WordPress (with ActivityPub plugin), and other fediverse platforms.

Ghost also added “Notes” — short-form posts to the fediverse without publishing on your main site — and an “Inbox” for following other Ghost or WordPress publications.

The difference: Substack’s network is closed (Notes only exists within Substack). Ghost’s is open (connects to the broader fediverse). Substack’s is larger. Ghost’s is more open.

Data Ownership

Ghost

• You own everything: site, content, subscriber list, payment relationships
• Direct Stripe connection — the customer relationship is between you and your reader
• Full data export at any time
• Open-source — can self-host on your own infrastructure
• Free migration from Substack included with annual Ghost(Pro) plans (Ghost team handles it)

Substack

• Subscriber CSV export available
• Post export available
• Paid subscriber migration requires Stripe work (more complex)
• Without a custom domain, all search rankings belong to substack.com
• You can leave, but it’s harder than Ghost’s open-source portability

Analytics

Ghost (v6.0)

• Built-in web analytics (no Google Analytics needed for basic metrics)
• Per-post analytics: free signups and paid conversions from each post
• Conversion attribution: where on the web each new member came from
• Audience feedback: reader reactions from the bottom of emails
• Revenue dashboard: MRR, churn, customer LTV
• Growth sources tab showing subscriber origins

Substack

• Growth sources timeline (launched September 2025)
• Email metrics: open rate, views, clicks, delivery rate, 30-day rolling open rate
• Post-level table with send date, audience, and subscription conversions
• Stats categories: Network, Audience, Retention, Sharing, Notes, Email, Surveys, Traffic
• Platform-wide benchmarks: 45%+ open rates, 20%+ click rates

Both offer solid analytics. Ghost’s are more focused on conversion (which posts drive paid members). Substack’s are broader across its social features.

Pricing

Substack

Free to use. Free to publish free newsletters. When you enable paid subscriptions: 10% of gross revenue + Stripe fees (~3%). Apple in-app purchases: up to 30% additional on iOS subscriptions.

Ghost(Pro) (as of February 2026)

Plan	Monthly (billed annually)	Members	Staff	Paid Memberships
Starter	$15/mo	1,000	1	No
Publisher	$29/mo	1,000	3	Yes
Business	$199/mo	10,000	15	Yes

All plans include unlimited email sends, SSL, CDN, backups, and a free custom domain.

Self-Hosted Ghost

Open-source under MIT license. Run on a VPS from $6-12/month. Full control, zero platform fees.

Who Should Choose Substack

Substack is the right choice if:

• You’re starting from zero and need built-in discovery to find your first readers
• Substack Notes and the recommendation network are important for your growth
• You don’t plan to charge for subscriptions (Substack is genuinely free for free newsletters)
• You want zero setup friction — sign up, write, publish
• The social layer (Notes, comments, subscriber chat) fits your engagement model

Who Should Choose Ghost

Ghost is the better platform if:

• You have (or will have) paying subscribers and want to keep 100% of revenue
• Your brand identity matters — you want a publication that looks uniquely yours
• You write evergreen content that should rank in search engines
• You want multiple membership tiers with flexible pricing
• Full data ownership and the ability to self-host matter to you
• The Apple in-app purchase issue concerns you
• You want to connect to the open web via ActivityPub rather than a closed network

The Verdict

Substack is the easier starting point. Ghost is the better long-term platform.

If you’re a new writer with no audience and no plan to charge, Substack’s zero-cost, zero-friction model is hard to beat. The built-in discovery features help you get your first 100-1,000 subscribers faster than anywhere else.

If you’re building a publishing business — one where you charge for subscriptions, care about your brand, want SEO traffic, and plan to grow revenue over years — Ghost’s 0% fee structure, full design control, and open-source foundation make it the stronger choice.

The writers who’ve already switched (Alison Roman, FreeCodeCamp, and many more) tend to share the same reason: they outgrew what Substack offered and wanted to own their platform.

Making Your Ghost Site Stand Out

The theme you choose determines your reader’s first impression. A premium Ghost theme transforms a default installation into a professional publication.

Our themes are designed for publishers who take their brand seriously. Every theme includes dark mode, 46 language translations, and multiple post layouts, starting at $69.

Browse Ghost themes →

For the full “alternative to Substack” perspective, including migration steps, see our Substack alternative guide.