Substack launches sponsorships programme to help creators earn beyond subscriptions

Substack has launched a sponsorships programme that will connect creators directly with brand partners, giving publishers a new way to earn beyond paid subscriptions.

The programme pairs Substack creators with brands including Balenciaga, Uber, T-Mobile, Yahoo Scout, Whatnot, Granola and Polymarket, which the company said are collectively investing millions of dollars. Creators retain editorial independence and control over which partnerships they take on, with Substack handling the matchmaking and logistics.

To participate, eligible creators can publish a Creator Kit – a media kit tool launched alongside the programme that signals interest in brand collaborations and will serve as an entry point to a forthcoming partnership platform.

"The audiences being built on Substack are deeply engaged and already paying for what they value – exactly the kind of trust brands want to be part of," said Rosie Gee, Head of Entertainment at Substack UK, in a LinkedIn post announcing the launch.

Subscriptions remain the core of Substack's model. More than 100,000 publishers now make money through the platform, with the top 10 collectively generating more than $100 million a year. The company has positioned sponsorships as complementary to that model rather than a replacement for it.

"The most successful creators have shown us that, done right, sponsorships can be additive to that trust - not competing with it," Gee wrote.

The launch is the latest sign of newsletter platforms expanding the ways creators can make money. 

Competitor Beehiiv has made a series of similar moves this year, adding podcast hosting in April, followed by webinars, metered paywalls and paid trials later that month. In January, it hired a senior advertising executive to scale its ad network, which matches creators with brand partners across the platform.

Both companies are competing to offer creators more ways to build sustainable businesses as the newsletter market grows and creators look beyond subscriptions alone. Increasingly, creators are combining subscriptions with sponsorships, events, products and other revenue streams rather than relying on a single source of income.