Gotta disagree with you Tom, Medium versus Substack is not Coke versus Pepsi, it's Coke versus lasagna - both good but not really comparable. (I make >$8.5K per year on Substack, started with 0 subscribers in 2021) .

Medium is great for getting your writing in front of people. Substack is great for publishing a free newsletter for free and for monetizing a subscription-supported newsletter.

Medium and Substack don't do the same things - and they are not supposed to - so your side-by-side comparison is unhelpful.

The only similarity in my mind is that they are both platforms used by writers.

If you want to be discovered, be on Medium (and youtube and twitter and LinkedIn). If you want to send newsletters, use Substack. Simple!

Money-wise, Substack profits are more predictable and controllable. I initially thought the member referral system on Medium might be an easier 'sell' than asking readers for a paid subscription on Substack. I was wrong. When I put the same content on both platforms for 30 weeks in a row, the Substack sign up rate was much higher than the Medium membership conversion rate.