SubstackReviews of substack.com

Bait & switch is insulting. Read part of article & pay to finish? Come on. Cheesy. Not credible.

The Substack platform provides very good content and is advertisement free. There are many very good content makers and a very good selection of people to subscribe and follow. You can sign up as a free subscriber and follow those who make comments on related topics. I signed up as a free subscriber and became active in engaging with others making comments but never created an account or posted content to the platform. I simply surfed the platform and added my comments to issues posted by content providers. I enjoyed the interaction with followers and content providers and learned an immense amount from experts in many subjects. However, this comes at a huge cost if you use phone data. From February this year to now Substact has chewed up all my accumulated data of 2000GB. The same activity before joining Substact would have used around 10GB - 15GB maximum if I surfed YouTube everyday. To give you an idea of how much data Substack will use, today it used 500mb just by scrolling through content, making six likes and restacting them. I used no other app, viewed no video or read any articles. I can watch 90 minutes of YouTube and use 100mbs. Watch 3 minute video on Substact and you will use 500mb. The other problem is that Substact also collects a huge amount of data for content providers. Another issue is that subscribers cannot become paid subscribers to support all those they follow. My other concerns are that the founder of Substact is a Heritage Foundation Billionaire a supporter of Project 2025 and Trump may take control of this platform as it becomes very popular for independent content makers particularly with those who have been forced to resign from major news networks he has attacked.

Paid for a month subscription to a writer. Substack still didn’t allow me to read the articles produced by the writer. Told by Substack’s Bot to send details of name, email address, bank card last four digits but it doesn’t offer a support email and the “Live” chat never put me in touch with an actual human. Dreadful organisation and some of the better known writers would be better off holding back because the appalling service reflects badly on them especially as they punt its services! In the end my bank got my money back and I deleted my account. Don’t even be tempted!

Unfortunately, my account was suddenly suspended without any warning or clear explanation. I reviewed the content guidelines and didn’t find any violations. I also contacted support but received no meaningful response. This lack of transparency and poor customer service is disappointing. I hope they improve their communication and treat users more fairly in the future.

I tried to subscribe to an author I follow on Substack. I started putting in payment details on the Substack website as indicated. After my postcode, it cut out. I got no communication re bank approval or completion of transaction. It was impossible for me to contact Substack to clarify. Motivated by a Reddit user who reported same problem, I cancelled my bank card to prevent fraudulent use of details I had entered. Extreme inconvenience, including having to cancel a travel ticket I can no longer collect without my card. Bad marks Substack for this unclear admin and absence of customer support. Updating review two days later: from bad to worse. Although I didn't finish putting in my details for the transaction via Substack app, and got no confirmation from them or sign that my bank authorised it, the payment to Substack went through. Also meanwhile, the bona fide author I follow was suspended from Substack, reported as "spam" (now reinstated after a complaint). I wanted to stop my payment but my bank said this was not possible. I would prefer to have nothing further to do with Substack.

Absolutely TERRIBLE platform & customer service! The platform is not at all intuitive - I'm on several other platforms and had zero issues setting them up. However, I've spent hours on Substack with several different setup issues. Customer service is a chat bot that can't get very far with troubleshooting. When I hit a roadblock with the chat, I was notified that someone would get back to me but "due to the high volume of requests, they can't tell me when." This is not a reliable option for me to reach my audience. No thanks, going to stick with Kit after all.

DISASTER!! In Substack's official YouTube tutorial video, "Masterclass: Everything Bloggers and Creators Need to Know to Get Started with Substack," the instructor coughs, sniffs, and apologizes throughout. It seems that they don't know the basics of how to create instructional videos that meet customer needs. Customer support doesn't work. I don't recommend it!

gave up on logging in. after putting in correct email and password, I get a captcha challenge which I have to go through three iterations of only to be prompted to enter an email OTP as well. Enter the OTP code which was emailed to me only to get told the code was invalid. I may as well waste more time telling how much substack sucks here as opposed to trying to login again.