Medium – January Stats: Bloodbath or Party Time?
January on Medium was errrr …interesting!
Considerably more views, more reads, yet somehow, less money per read.
You’re not alone if you’ve been scratching your head over Medium’s latest payout calculations.
In this article, I’ll break down my Medium stats for January, analyse what worked (and what didn’t), and explore whether the platform is still worth publishing on for revenue.
The month can be summed up as a surge in reads but a significant drop in earnings per read
On the surface, January looked like a big win.
My total views hit 10,000, with 6,000 reads, a threefold increase compared to previous months. But then came the shocking part: earnings per read were drastically lower than before.
Here’s how it compared:
May 2023: 2,200 reads = $275 earned
January 2024:6,200 reads = $102 earned
Despite getting 4000 more reads in January, I earned less than half of what I made in May. This is the kind of math that makes no sense.
Watch as I go through the stats
Where’s the Money Coming From?
Medium’s Partner Program payouts seem increasingly unpredictable. Here’s what I observed:
Most of my articles earned 2 to 2.2 cents per read. Some articles earned fractions of a cent per read—one article received eight reads for a single cent.
One outlier article made $102 with 3,400 reads, saving my overall earnings from being a disaster.
Without that article, my January earnings would have been around $30.
This is a massive drop from just a few months ago, where I was consistently earning 7 cents per read, and even up to 17-20 cents per read in earlier months.
Tracking the Impact on My Newsletter
One of my main reasons for using Medium is to drive traffic to my Substack newsletter.
Fortunately, despite the revenue issues, my traffic strategy still worked:
42 new subscribers came directly from Medium in January. Over the month, I gained 107 new Substack subscribers.
Using Switchy, I tracked which articles generated the most newsletter sign-ups. Articles promoting my “Steal My 2025 Business Model” newsletter performed particularly well, generating over 31 clicks from one article.
From a lead generation perspective, Medium is still valuable—but as a direct income source, it’s looking questionable.
Keep Posting?
Given these stats, I need to rethink my approach. Here’s my revised game plan:
Continue testing for another month to track whether these low payouts persist.
In January, I published one free and one paywalled article per day to compare their effectiveness. I won’t continue that for now.
Instead, I’ll add a free reading option at the top of paywalled articles—if people want to read for free, they can click through.
I’ll continue prioritising traffic over direct earnings, focusing on using Medium as a gateway to my newsletter.
Is Medium Still Worth It?
At this point, I’m not sure if Medium is still viable for revenue-focused creators.
The earnings per read are unpredictable, and Medium’s lack of transparency and communication makes long-term planning difficult.
That said, Medium still drives solid traffic to my newsletter.
If you’re using it purely as a discovery platform to funnel readers elsewhere (like Substack or your own website), it might still be worth publishing.
But if you’re hoping to make decent money directly from Medium’s Partner Program, the numbers suggest it’s getting tougher by the month.
What’s your experience been like?
Have you noticed similar drops in earnings? Let me know—I’d love to compare notes!