Substack website screenshot

Substack

Substack is an independent newsletter and media platform that lets writers, podcasters, video creators, and other culture makers publish directly to readers and monetize through paid subscriptions. Founded in 2017 by Chris Best (CEO), Jairaj Sethi (CTO), and Hamish McKenzie (CWO) and headquartered in San Francisco with a New York City office, Substack provides built-in subscription billing, paid posts, podcasting, chat, video, Notes, and a cross-publication recommendations network. Creators keep 90 percent of subscription revenue (less credit card fees) and own their mailing lists and content. The platform reports more than five million paid subscriptions and tens of millions of weekly active readers. Substack does not offer a general-purpose public REST API for managing publications, posts, or subscribers. It does publish a narrowly scoped official Developer API (released April 2026) that allows token-authenticated lookup of public Substack profiles by LinkedIn handle, gated by an application and Terms-of-Use process. Read access to public content is otherwise available via per-publication RSS feeds, and the broader integration ecosystem relies on reverse-engineered, unofficial JSON endpoints used by the Substack web application.

Substack publishes 2 APIs on the APIs.io network. Tagged areas include Newsletters, Publishing, Creator Economy, Subscriptions, and Email.

Substack’s developer surface includes engineering blog, pricing, and 13 more developer resources.

14.3/100 emerging ▬ flat Agent 0/100 human only Full breakdown ↓
scored 2026-08-05 · rubric v0.9.1
2 APIs
NewslettersPublishingCreator EconomySubscriptionsEmailPodcastingNotesMediaIndependent MediaPaid Content

Kin Score

Kin Score Kin Score How this is scored →
scored 2026-08-05 · rubric v0.9.1
Composite quality — 14.3/100 · emerging
Contract Quality 0.0 / 25
Developer Ergonomics 0.4 / 20
Commercial Clarity 6.3 / 20
Operational Transparency 0.7 / 13
Governance 0.0 / 12
Discoverability 6.9 / 10
Agent readiness — 0/100 · human only
Machine-Readable Contract 0 / 18
Agentic Access Contract 0 / 10
MCP Server 0 / 12
Machine-Readable Auth 0 / 10
Idempotency 0 / 9
Stable Error Semantics 0 / 8
Request/Response Examples 0 / 7
Rate-Limit Signaling 0 / 7
Typed Event Surface 0 / 6
Agent Skills 0 / 5
Well-Known Catalog 0 / 4
Consent & Bot Identity 0 / 3
A2A Agent Card 0 / 8
Dry-Run / Simulate Mode 0 / 4
Improve this rating by publishing the missing artifacts — every area above can be raised, and the full rubric is at apis.io/rating/. This rating is computed from github.com/api-evangelist/substack: open an issue to ask a question, or submit a pull request to add artifacts. Want it done for you? Prioritized profiling — $2,500 →

APIs 2

Individual APIs this provider publishes, each with its own machine-readable definition.

Substack Developer API

Narrowly scoped official API that returns public Substack profile data for a given LinkedIn handle. Access requires accepting the Developer API Terms of Use, applying via form, ...

Substack RSS Feeds

Per-publication public RSS feeds available at https://{publication}.substack.com/feed for syndication and read-only access to posts.

Security Posture 2

Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals.

Substack Domain Security

TLSv1.3 · HSTS · DMARC

SECURITY

Substack Vulnerability Disclosure

disclosure policy published

SECURITY

Resources

Build 1

SDKs, sample code, and the tooling you integrate with

Access & Security 3

Authentication, authorization, and security posture

Operate 2

Status, limits, changes, and where to get help

Commercial 3

Pricing, plans, and the legal terms of use

Company 6

The organization behind the API

Source (apis.yml)

apis.yml Raw ↑
aid: substack
name: Substack
description: Substack is an independent newsletter and media platform that lets writers, podcasters, video creators, and other
  culture makers publish directly to readers and monetize through paid subscriptions. Founded in 2017 by Chris Best (CEO),
  Jairaj Sethi (CTO), and Hamish McKenzie (CWO) and headquartered in San Francisco with a New York City office, Substack provides
  built-in subscription billing, paid posts, podcasting, chat, video, Notes, and a cross-publication recommendations network.
  Creators keep 90 percent of subscription revenue (less credit card fees) and own their mailing lists and content. The platform
  reports more than five million paid subscriptions and tens of millions of weekly active readers. Substack does not offer
  a general-purpose public REST API for managing publications, posts, or subscribers. It does publish a narrowly scoped official
  Developer API (released April 2026) that allows token-authenticated lookup of public Substack profiles by LinkedIn handle,
  gated by an application and Terms-of-Use process. Read access to public content is otherwise available via per-publication
  RSS feeds, and the broader integration ecosystem relies on reverse-engineered, unofficial JSON endpoints used by the Substack
  web application.
type: Index
accessModel:
  pricing: unknown
  onboarding: unknown
  trial: false
  try_now: false
  public: false
  label: Unknown
  confidence: low
  source: []
  generated: '2026-07-22'
  method: derived
position: Provider
access: 3rd-Party
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/substack.png
tags:
- Newsletters
- Publishing
- Creator Economy
- Subscriptions
- Email
- Podcasting
- Notes
- Media
- Independent Media
- Paid Content
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/substack/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
created: '2026-05-08'
modified: '2026-05-25'
specificationVersion: '0.20'
apis:
- name: Substack Developer API
  description: Narrowly scoped official API that returns public Substack profile data for a given LinkedIn handle. Access
    requires accepting the Developer API Terms of Use, applying via form, and generating a token from the Developer API section
    of account settings. Only profiles meeting Substack's authenticity thresholds are returned.
  humanURL: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/45099095296916-Substack-Developer-API
  baseURL: https://substack.com
  tags:
  - Profile
  - LinkedIn
  - Read-Only
  - Gated
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/45099095296916-Substack-Developer-API
- name: Substack RSS Feeds
  description: Per-publication public RSS feeds available at https://{publication}.substack.com/feed for syndication and read-only
    access to posts.
  humanURL: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/360037466012
  baseURL: https://{publication}.substack.com
  tags:
  - RSS
  - Read-Only
  - Syndication
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/360037466012
common:
- type: VulnerabilityDisclosure
  url: security/substack-vulnerability-disclosure.yml
- type: DomainSecurity
  url: security/substack-domain-security.yml
- type: Website
  url: https://substack.com/
- type: About
  url: https://substack.com/about
- type: Help
  url: https://support.substack.com/
- type: Blog
  url: https://on.substack.com/
- type: Pricing
  url: https://substack.com/pricing
- type: Jobs
  url: https://substack.com/jobs
- type: Contact
  url: https://substack.com/contact
- type: TermsOfService
  url: https://substack.com/tos
- type: PrivacyPolicy
  url: https://substack.com/privacy
- type: VulnerabilityDisclosure
  url: https://substack.com/vulnerability-disclosure
- type: GitHubOrganization
  url: https://github.com/substackinc
- type: LinkedIn
  url: https://www.linkedin.com/company/substack
- type: Twitter
  url: https://twitter.com/SubstackInc
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com