Substack has grown immensely over the past year — and so has the creativity, expression, thoughtfulness, and learning happening on the platform. It feels like a respite from our ad-filled social media platforms and cluttered inboxes (and if you don’t have the app, might we recommend?!).
“Substack has grown immensely over the past year — and so has the creativity, expression, thoughtfulness, and learning happening on the platform.”
The Good Trade even launched our own Substack this year; we’ve loved extending our community to a space where we can connect with readers in a new way and share The Weekend Edit, our new Substack newsletter on Saturday mornings.
With its growth, there are so many Substacks out there that it’s hard to know where to even begin. So we compiled a list of 99 that are a pretty great place to start. Many of these offer free subscriptions, others offer paid subscriptions — usually less than the price of one coffee per month — and others a combination of paid and free posts.
All of them are inspiring, thoughtful, unique — and definitely worth a read. 💌
Best Lifestyle and Roundup Substacks
Thoughtful reflections and handpicked recommendations from our founder AmyAnn — or a guest editor — and a weekly roundup of the 10 most-read links of the week from The Daily Good.
Alisha Ramos curates recommendations for the most delightful discoveries worth knowing about in style and culture.
Musings and recs on life and home’s changes and challenges, “be they square footage or otherwise.”
Joanna Goddard and the Cup of Jo team share life advice, gossip, great finds, and more weekly.
The founders of 831 Stories and best friends share their favorite things each week.
Founder of indie print newspaper The Intentional Muse shares muse-worthy recommendations, reflections on life, and more.
“Strictly the good stuff” recs on where to eat, travel, shop, and more.
Cool events, curated guides, and more NYC recommendations shared by two designers based in Brooklyn
Weekly roundups of books, movies, shows, paintings, quotes, and more — plus a short essay.
Best Substacks for Creative Inspiration
Quick, daily notes of encouragement and good things to inspire
A colorful magazine-inspired digital publication that explores joy, whimsy, life, design, and creativity.
An extension of the eponymous podcast, writer Rachel Schwartzmann shares personal reflections on time, creativity, and pace.
Weekly notes on motherhood, artistic process, and creative inspiration worth remembering a year from now
A gentle and thoughtful love letter to not having it all figured out, but still connecting with your creativity anyway.
Making, doing, and making do are the themes of this newsletter dedicated to living creatively and consuming thoughtfully.
LA-based creative director Ali LaBelle explores the ways we can live a “life of creative abundance” in this magazine-inspired newsletter.
The Good Trade’s editorial director Emily McGowan asks how we balance creativity, accountability, and care in her personal Substack newsletter.
Playful and vibrant inspiration, guides, and illustrations to feed your creative spirit.
A newsletter for creativity and inspiration, filled with recommendations and prompts for making every aspect of life beautiful, joyful, colorful, and inspiring.
Find lessons and creative insights from novelists, poets, painters, filmmakers, and more creatives every other Tuesday.
This newsletter “captures the sparks,” the little moments of beauty, curiosity, and whimsy that make us feel inspired.
Join the club to get journal prompts, community events, and handwriting tools.
The ex-tech executive and aspiring creative details her journey finishing her first novel and her creative life.
Cozy anti-rot inspiration for rituals, daily life, and more in thoughtfully curated guides.
A weekly-ish newsletter that explores the intersection of creativity and everyday life, featuring essays, art, and more.
Essays, interviews, and more about finding inspiration outside of the internet and social media.
Designer, creative director, and mom Annie Dabir chronicles her creative endeavors and obsessions.
A newsletter dedicated to the “bright moments of joy in our days,” featuring meditations on creativity, inspiration, interviews with creatives, and more.
UK-based artist and illustrator Helen C Stark’s newsletter features her visual journals, guides, and her monthly “Gazette” roundup.
Best for Essays and Longform Writing
Longform essays and letters on womanhood, writing, community, and more.
Doula, writer, educator, and producer Erica Chidi shares advice and essays to help you “move through life with a little more softness.”
Maybe Baby — one of the top Culture newsletters on Substack — publishes essays, recommendations, and an advice column podcast.
From climate justice to mental health to education, this newsletter is about coping with the “polycrisis” the world is facing right now.
Writer Stephanie Fallon asks, “What if finishing my novel was no big deal?” in this newsletter chronicling her experience as a writer trying to cross that finish line.
The Good Trade’s Community Manager, Kate Arceo, pens this personal Substack, which includes personal essays on motherhood, resilience, and wellbeing.
Essays and writings on life, memory, motherhood, longing, and more “for the heartbreakers and the broken-hearted.”
Life lessons, reflections, and explorations of the lived experience for academics, empathizers, and creators alike.
Writer and poet Joy Sullivan takes herself to a new place that intimidates or excites her and writes about it as a way of exploring what it means to be a woman and artist in the world.
Longform essays on attention: “What we do with it, what we do to get it, and what it does to us in return.”
Best for Health, Wellness, and Beauty
Award-winning beauty journalist Jessica DeFino reports on beauty culture, covering what traditional beauty publications “don’t, won’t, or can’t.”
Ashley Neese is a California-based breathwork teacher, foster parent, and land-tender who writes about slow living, presence, and embodiment.
A newsletter dedicated to making wellness and beauty less confusing through commentary, reviews, expert interviews, and more.
Yoga practitioner, writer, and entrepreneur Jessamyn Stanley shares writing on yoga, pleasure, and the pursuit of happiness.
Best for Art
Unexpected stories about the art world that everyone should know about, from women artists you should know to the secret histories of colors.
Artist Edith Zimmerman’s life is told through comics she draws with pen and colored pencil, then puts in her newsletter.
Find illustrated essays, comics, drawings, and more in this semi-regular newsletter by writer, poet, and artist Lena Moses-Schmitt.
Weekly art and writing from Britchida about her paintings and the stories behind them.
Visual journal about everything from loss and loneliness to hope and more, by fashion designer and visual storyteller Emily Fishman.
Best for Identity and Culture
Examining art, power, gender, madness, and more, Mad Woman looks at books and culture through a feminist lens.
The founder of the term “neurcomplexity” — exploring and understanding the intersection of highly masked autism, giftedness, ADHD, and burnout — writes about strategies, innovation, stories, and more.
Essays, interviews, and Q&As that examine cultural trends through the lens of addiction, recovery, and more.
What does it mean to get older? This newsletter “explores what it means to travel through time in a human body, at every phase of life.”
Catherine Newman is an author and writer who discusses everything about being in your 50s, from menopause to insomnia to parenting.
Musings on finding and embracing balance, beauty, and meaning in midlife as a woman.
Journalist Anne Helen Petersen’s Substack shares weekly think pieces on all things culture, from feminism to consumerism.
Self-proclaimed “the media and culture newsletter that everyone in media and culture reads,” you’ll find current takes and links on whatever’s happening online as it’s relevant.
Marine biologist, policy expert, and writer Ayana Elizabeth Johnson writes about climate solutions with a strong focus on culture and forward-thinking ways we can figure it all out together.
Trans writer and poet Summer Dylan shares her poetry and prose and the beautiful elements of trans life in this regular newsletter.
Freelance journalist Whitney Bauck reports on climate change and environmental issues through a solution-oriented lens.
Essayist and writer Gloria Amarew writes about “the state of culture through the prisms that hold [her]: books, media, design, and being Black in a world that can’t hold [her].”
Best for Book Lovers
Recently featured on Forbes 30 Under 30, the Lit Girl team shares “academic validation with a side of pop analysis” through quarterly syllabi, guest lectures, and more.
Writer and author Tembe Denton-Hurst shares the books she’s loving, “book dates” with other writers, and more.
Curated reading lists, how-to guides, and more bookish writing sent every Sunday.
A bi-weekly newsletter about “books, life, and well, life with books,” sharing everything from interviews with authors to book guides.
Best for Fashion and Style
Best-selling twice-weekly Substack publication Long Live is about secondhand fashion, books, and more, from author, writer, and new mom Erika Veruink.
Singh offers a no-nonsense take on all things fashion, style, and wardrobe, all with a humorous twist.
Fashion and culture writer Viv Chen shares style recs, roundups, commentary, and more.
Notes on really good vintage and timeless style from Tess Sullivan, former design director of Buck Mason, Nili Lotan, and Ralph Lauren.
This is a quick guide to sustainable fashion news, culture, and consumer behavior for anyone working or interested in sustainable fashion.
How to get dressed by wearing and loving the clothes you already have, written by Leandra Medine Cohen, formerly Man Repeller.
Thrift finds, clean beauty, and personal style, curated by self-proclaimed Disabled Fashion Girlie April Lockhart.
Advice, recs, and curated edits for shopping smarter, aka shopping more selectively with a focus on secondhand, vintage, and natural fibers.
Best for Home and Decor
NYC-based writer and strategist Sandy Sanchez curates recommendations and inspiration for interiors, objects, home decor, and more, with a focus on joy and leisure.
Author and small space designer Whitney Leigh Morris writes about multigenerational living in a smaller footprint, with a focus on environmental stewardship.
A home and garden newsletter rooted in small space living, sustainable living, and living with less.
Etsy’s art and home editor, Lindsay O’Brien, regularly shares unique objects, home decor, vintage finds, and other treasures.
Best for Career
Freelance expert and multi-hyphenate creative Grace Abbott writes about how she quit her traditional job to go full-time freelance — and shares advice for how you can do the same.
Find jobs, gigs, and side hustles in creative fields in biweekly roundups.
Part job board, part community, part group chat, Saloon is a space to network, find opportunities, and promote your work.
Do you like networking? Regardless of your answer, this newsletter shares curated job listings, open calls, funding opportunities, and more in the UK creative industry.
Best for Writers
Self-declared “the leading cause of well-published writers,” this newsletter features submission calls, details on top agents from indie presses, and more.
From freelance writing gigs to remote travel jobs, and everything in between, this Substack frequently shares opportunities for writers, with a lean toward travel writing.
Brooklyn-based writer Celeste Scott tackles interpersonal dynamics, evangelicalism, desire, and adolescence in her writing — and writes a lot about writing too.
For any writer looking to learn more about the book publishing process, author and publishing expert Courtney Maum shares the ins and outs, advice, and more on her Substack.
Roxane Gay’s newsletter features her writing, as well as pieces from emerging writers and her answers to questions related to writing or otherwise.
Best for Parents
The Good Trade’s Kayti Christian writes moving essays on her Substack, often about her experiences with motherhood after IVF and infertility.
This weekly newsletter is a space for open and honest conversations about modern fatherhood, written by Kevin Maguire, featuring other contributing editors from across the spectrum of fatherhood.
A celebration of motherhood and parenting, Annaliese Godderz writes honestly about the highs, lows, and everything in between.
Mom blogger Ilana Wiles shares her thoughts and musings on parenting, creating a community for people in a similar parenting stage and phase of life.
Best for Food and Cooking
Twice a week, get seasonal and plant-centric recipes, weekly meal plans, garden inspiration, and more to your inbox.
Holistic health and wellness expert Ella Henry shares seasonal recipes, wellness deep dives, Q&As, and more.
The iconic cookbook author and host publishes recipes and hosting ideas twice a month.
Monthly illustrated journal with recipes, food history, guides, and more.
From cookbook author Anne-Marie Bonneau, a newsletter for zero-waste tips and kitchen hacks.
Baking meets mindfulness in this newsletter that features comforting recipes and reflections on self-growth and care.
This is the newsletter for its eponymous print magazine, which explores society, culture, history, and literature through sweets.
The name says it all: find recipes for a “complete meal” delivered to your inbox every Saturday.
TikToker @babytamago shares her recipes, curated menus, and more.
Writer and author Jenny Rosentrach writes about the “family meal,” in all of its meanings, sharing recipes, travel itineraries, menus, and more.
Brianna Schubert is a writer and editor based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She is a Contributing Editor at The Good Trade, an editorial assistant at Motley Bloom, and a freelance writer. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Since 2023, Brianna has combined her expertise and investigative skills to deliver thoughtful reviews of sustainable products and home goods, helping readers make informed, eco-conscious choices. Brianna is also the writer behind The Mood Board, a Substack newsletter for creativity and inspiration. When she’s not writing, you can find her cooking up a new recipe, reading and recommending books, cuddling with her cat, or yapping with her friends at a café. Say hi on Instagram!
