How the Substack app helps our readers grow
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Notes: Short Form Content
While Notes may look like familiar social media feeds, the key difference is in what you don’t see. The Substack network runs on paid subscriptions, not ads. This changes everything.
The lifeblood of an ad-based social media feed is attention. In legacy social networks, people get rewarded for creating content that goes viral within the context of the feed, regardless of whether or not people value it, locking readers in a perpetual scroll. Almost all the attendant financial rewards then go to the owner of the platform.
Things to note about Substack notes:
If you'd prefer to hide your post likes, edit your Substack profile and toggle off next to "Your likes".
Inbox
The Inbox tab brings together all of your subscriptions in one place which can be sorted by media, saved, and paid posts.
New posts are shown in chronological order and you can swipe right to save, or left to archive.
To see posts that you've saved from your Home feed or Inbox, select the "Saved" tab. To listen to podcast episodes, select the "Audio" tab.
Saved is designed to send posts to your Inbox that you might discover in the Home feed through a note or recommendations or to help prioritize the unread posts already in your Inbox. When you save a post from the feed, it goes to your Inbox and bumps it to the top of the reading queue. When you archive a post, it removes it from both places.
Tip: Head to your app Settings to choose between the classic inbox design or a more compact dense version.
Chat
Chats is a space for writers to host conversations with our subscribers and cultivate a community around the Lundinke publication. These are private messages viewable only by subscribers, which are meant to encourage discussion or conversation.
We hope it’ll allow you to share quick updates, photos, and discussion prompts on the go; which will make reader engagement more vibrant through features like image replies and emoji reactions.
Check out frequently asked questions about Substack chat here.
Your Substack profile
At the top of the Substack app, you'll find your notifications and your profile picture.
If you have notifications toggled on for things such as likes, replies, mentions, restacks, and new notes, you'll receive push notifications on your device. If you have these toggled off, you can still see this activity by tapping on the Bell icon.
Tapping on your profile picture will open a menu of your subscription library, archive, and app settings.
In your Settings, you can change things on the app such as:
Notifications: Adjust your push notifications and how you receive new posts.
Edit Profile: Change your name, bio, and select whether to display what publications you read on your profile.
Inbox appearance: Choose between a classic (social preview images will appear) or a dense view (title and subtitle will be smaller and social preview images will be hidden).
What appears on my Substack profile?
Your profile will display:
Your photo and bio
Any social links you've connected
What publications you read (this can be hidden)
Your likes