Newsletter platform economics

Ghost vs Substack Profit Calculator

Ghost charges a fixed monthly plan. Substack taxes growth with revenue share. This page models the monthly take-home difference, the annual savings gap, and the paid-subscriber count where Ghost starts winning.

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Ghost 0% transaction fee. Fixed-cost publishing stack with plan tiers.
Substack 10% revenue share, plus processor costs and optional recurring billing drag.
Why this matters Processor fees hit both sides. The real decision is fixed cost versus rev-share tax.

Assumptions

Use monthly economics. If part of your base is annual-billed, reduce monthly charge events below paid subscribers to approximate fewer charge events.

Useful when annual billing lowers the number of processor fixed-fee events.
Ghost and Substack comparison will update as you edit the assumptions.
Ghost monthly net
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Substack monthly net
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Annual savings with Ghost
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Break-even paid subscribers
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Ghost

Gross monthly revenue—
Refund loss—
Processor fees—
Ghost plan cost—
Annual net—

Substack

Gross monthly revenueSame as Ghost
Substack platform fee (10%)—
Recurring billing drag—
Processor feesSame as Ghost
Annual net—
Monthly savings with Ghost
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Ghost effective fee rate
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Substack effective fee rate
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Subscribers for target annual savings
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Ghost annual net
See ledger
Substack annual net
See ledger

Ghost plan comparison

Processor assumptions stay fixed. Only the Ghost plan cost changes.

Plan Monthly plan cost Ghost monthly edge Break-even revenue Break-even subscribers

Copy-ready summary

Assumption note: this is an economics model, not a migration recommendation engine. It does not score audience discovery, reader network effects, sponsorships, taxes, or migration labor. Ghost plan pricing and “0% transaction fee” language were taken from Ghost public pages. Substack fee assumptions are exposed as editable inputs because support docs can drift.