Substack has been the home of several writers who have gone their own way and cut ties with the legacy organizations they previously worked for after facing censorship and much else.
Related: Refreshingly, Substack says it prefers not to interfere with moderation
The company has now launched a new reader app, allowing users to read newsletters from their favorite writers in one place. For now, the app is only available for iOS users. However, an Android version is coming soon.
The Substack reader app puts all your newsletter subscriptions into an inbox. Video and podcast subscriptions are also available in the app, as well as comment sections and RSS feeds.
“The app helps bring together Substack as an ecosystem, giving you an icon to tap on your home screen that opens up a treasury of quality work by the writers you most trust,” the company,” the company said while making the announcement.
The app also allows users to discover new publications. Alongside the inbox tab is a “Discover” tab, where users can find suggestions classified by categories, such as politics, entertainment, and culture. In the “Discover” tab, there is a featured section called “this week” where users can find newsletters by Bari Weiss, Pati Smith, Glenn Greenwald, and other popular writers.
In the app, you can pause email notifications, and choose to only receive app notifications. The company said that email notifications resume automatically when a user uninstalls the app.
The app is dedicated to readers; writers cannot post using the app. But Substack claims it also benefits writers, by helping them grow their audience, for example.
Readers cannot make payments through the app (likely because Substack wanted to avoid Apple’s 30% cut for in-app purchases). To pay a subscription fee, the app will redirect you to the web through a link on the writer’s page.
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