--- title: "Highest-Earning Independent Writers: The Public Record" slug: highest-earning-bloggers-writers description: "What is publicly known about how much independent writers earn on Substack and similar platforms, which figures hold up, and which are guesses." date: 2026-10-24 last_reviewed: 2026-11-02 status: published type: knowledge-base author: [liyam-flexer] image: highest-earning-bloggers-writers image_alt: "Cover graphic: Highest-Earning Independent Writers: The Public Record, over a dark blue network of connected points." tags: [creator economy, publishing economics, Substack revenue, newsletter business models, media economics] --- # Highest-Earning Independent Writers: What the Public Record Shows **In short:** Substack does not publish what any writer earns, so every "top 10 earners" list is an estimate. The best-documented cases are Heather Cox Richardson (hundreds of thousands of paid subscribers at $50 a year, so at least $5M gross, per Press Gazette) and Lenny Rachitsky and Gergely Orosz, each estimated by Press Gazette in January 2025 at no less than $1.2M a year. ## Key facts: what is documented and what is estimated | Writer / publication | Platform | What the sources say | Who says it | Standing | | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | | Heather Cox Richardson, *Letters from an American* | Substack | "Hundreds of thousands" of paid subscribers; $50/year, so at least $5M gross | Press Gazette, Jan 2025 (from Substack's leaderboard) | Inference from a disclosed band; gross, before Substack's 10% fee | | Lenny Rachitsky, *Lenny's Newsletter* | Substack | At least $1.2M a year on Substack's metrics; paid tier $15/month or $150/year since April 2020 | Press Gazette, Jan 2025; Latka | Estimate; he has never published a revenue total | | Gergely Orosz, *The Pragmatic Engineer* | Substack | At least $1.2M a year on Substack's metrics; "more than 1 million readers" (free and paid); $150/year | Press Gazette, Jan 2025; the publication's about page | Estimate; paid count not published | | Ben Thompson, *Stratechery* | Own site | Writing it since 2013, full-time since 2014; subscriptions are "a significant portion" of his income | Stratechery about page | No revenue or subscriber figure published | Other names that appear on popular lists (Packy McCormick, Matt Taibbi, Mario Gabriele, Judd Legum, John Lee Dumas, Sahil Bloom) were removed from this post because no revenue or paid-subscriber figure could be confirmed from a publication or a credible outlet. Dumas's income reports are the one case of self-published numbers; the one page opened shows March 2019 only, with no audit stated. --- ## The documented cases ### Heather Cox Richardson, *Letters from an American* - **Platform:** Substack. **Topic:** US political history set against current events. - **What is known:** Press Gazette reported in January 2025 that she remained the only Substack account to disclose "hundreds of thousands" of paying subscribers. At the $50 annual price that implies at least $5M a year, before Substack's 10% fee. An earlier Press Gazette estimate (February 2023) also put it at least $5M. Treat "$5M or more" as a floor derived from a band, not a reported income. ### Lenny Rachitsky, *Lenny's Newsletter* - **Platform:** Substack, plus a podcast. **Topic:** product management and growth. - **What is known:** The paid tier launched on 7 April 2020 at $15/month or $150/year. Latka reconstructs roughly 480 paid subscribers in the first weeks, about 3,300 by the end of 2020 and 18,000+ in 2023-24, citing Substack, Growth In Reverse and CNBC (January 2024). Its own estimate is $2.7M gross if all paid annually, mid-$2M net. These are estimates built on disclosed inputs, not a disclosed total. ### Gergely Orosz, *The Pragmatic Engineer* - **Platform:** Substack. **Topic:** Big Tech engineering practice and engineering management. - **What is known:** The about page says "more than 1 million readers" without a paid split, prices the paid tier at $150/year, and calls it the "#1 technology newsletter on Substack", a claim the publisher makes about itself. Press Gazette's January 2025 estimate is at least $1.2M a year. ### Ben Thompson, *Stratechery* - **Platform:** self-hosted. **Topic:** technology strategy. - **What is known:** He has written it since 2013 and full-time since 2014, and says subscriptions are a significant part of his income. No subscriber or revenue number is published. --- ## Three shifts behind reader-funded publishing ### 1. Ad-funded traffic is less dependable Publishers have reported falling search referrals as search engines answer more questions directly. Programmatic revenue per thousand impressions is low and outside the writer's control. ### 2. Owning the reader relationship Paid newsletters hold an email list directly. The arithmetic is simple: 20,000 paying subscribers at $100 a year is $2M gross, a hypothetical, not a documented case. ### 3. Professional readers can expense subscriptions Newsletters aimed at engineers and product managers often sell at $150 a year or more and offer group and enterprise plans (the Pragmatic Engineer lists plans from 50 seats). How much that lowers churn has not been published for these titles. --- ## Frequently asked questions **Who is the highest-earning independent writer in the world?** No one can say precisely, because Substack does not publish earnings. Press Gazette reported in January 2025 that Heather Cox Richardson is the only Substack writer to disclose "hundreds of thousands" of paid subscribers, which at $50 a year implies at least $5M gross. That is a floor derived from a band, not a verified income. **Where do revenue figures for newsletters come from?** Mostly from Substack's leaderboard, which shows only broad subscriber bands such as "thousands" or "tens of thousands", multiplied by the listed price. Press Gazette and independent analysts such as Alexey Guzey use bounds reasoning on those bands. The results are gross, before Substack's 10% fee, and ranges can be wide. **What are typical profit margins for newsletters?** There is no verified industry figure. Costs are mainly Substack's 10% fee on paid subscriptions and card processing, plus any staff or contractors. A writer with no staff can keep most of the remainder, but margins depend on each business, and none of the writers above has published one. **Is Lenny Rachitsky's newsletter really a multimillion-dollar business?** Probably, but it is an estimate. Press Gazette put it at least $1.2M a year in January 2025. Latka's reconstruction from 18,000+ paid subscribers at $150 a year gives $2.7M gross, and says Rachitsky has never published a revenue total. Treat both as outside estimates. **Why were some well-known writers dropped from this ranking?** Earlier drafts listed ten writers with revenue ranges. For several, including Packy McCormick, Matt Taibbi and Judd Legum, no publication or credible outlet stated a revenue or paid-subscriber figure that could be opened and checked. Under the site's source policy, unverifiable figures are removed rather than estimated. --- ## Sources - Press Gazette. [Biggest Substack newsletters 2025](https://pressgazette.co.uk/newsletters/biggest-substack-newsletters-2025/) (published 23 Jan 2025, updated 6 Feb 2025). - Press Gazette. [Highest-earning Substacks](https://pressgazette.co.uk/newsletters/highest-earning-substacks/) (9 Feb 2023). - Guzey, A. [The most we can say about earnings of Substack's top writers](https://guzey.com/substack-earnings/) (Nov 2020). - Latka. [Lenny's Newsletter ARR](https://getlatka.com/blog/lennys-newsletter-arr). - The Pragmatic Engineer. [About](https://newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/about). - Stratechery. [About](https://stratechery.com/about/). - Entrepreneurs on Fire. [Income reports](https://www.eofire.com/income).