Yes, Substack is Still Social Media. But—

Coming at you with another very on-brand, impromptu Monday rant that I didn’t proofread.

“Deleted social media in 2025 and feeling so great about it!”

“Day 15 of no social media! I’m never going back.”

“Hot girls have deleted social media and evolved to Substack.”

I’m sure some variation of the above has crossed your Substack Notes newsfeed in the last month or so, as more and more people have begun to turn their backs on the Big Three: Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter (sorry, I physically can’t bring myself to get into the habit of calling it X). I don’t think I can discuss this topic without addressing the elephant in the room (pun intended), which are the political reasons people may have for pulling away. As Mark Zuckerburg and Elon Musk aligned themselves with Donald Trump’s presidency, it created a sense of cognitive dissonance for anyone with an account on those platforms who may oppose the current president’s far-right agenda. Even TikTok, which was the only major social platform free from those clutches, was infamously banned in the U.S. a few weeks ago, all just to come back, like, ten hours later with a spooky message thanking the Trump administration for “saving” it.

So, yeah, social media feels weird right now. But politics aside, there are plenty of other reasons people have for migrating away from these platforms, and I think most of it comes down to the mental health ramifications that, by now, we’re all well aware of. I deleted Twitter years ago for no reason other than I got tired of seeing other people’s shortform thoughts. The takes I was seeing there tended to be mindbogglingly stupid, but I am not one of those people who finds it productive to argue with strangers on the internet, so it was a lot of just scrolling, rolling my eyes, and scrolling on repeat.

I personally never got into TikTok, but I understand why so many people did, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, as it was literally created to become addicting, help us disassociate, and demolish on our attention spans. I removed the Instagram app from my phone at the start of this year, as I found myself constantly comparing my clothes, apartment, body, relationships, lifestyle, and (lack of) travel experience to everyone else’s hyper-edited, carefully curated highlight reel.

Lately, I’ve seen a lot of Notes and essays from people who are understandably annoyed at people posting to Substack Notes that they’ve deleted social media, the irony of the fact that they are announcing this on a social media platform comically lost. Never mind the fact that Substack Notes is basically just Twitter. I think these criticisms are fair…to an extent. I must admit, I’ve seen a lot of ex-TikTokers and Instagram influencers flocking to Substack lately, where they kind of just post…the same content they do on their other platforms? It’s the same $60 candle recommendations and aesthetic photos on Notes, all the while their “newsletters” are just lists of things they’re encouraging you to buy. Behind a paywall.

However, judging everyone who forgets that Substack is, in fact, still social media, as some wannabe intellectual who thinks reading is an aesthetic is unfair. I myself have been tempted to consider myself social media-free and then I’ll remember, “Oh yeah, jk, I’m still on Substack.” The reason for this momentary lapse, I think, comes down to the fact that, at least for now, Substack makes a lot of us feel better than the other major social media platforms do.

The point of Substack is still to share and read newsletters from regular people who like to write. Subscribing to a newsletter written by a young woman living in Vermont who juggles her corporate job, hobbies, marriage, and still finds time to spend hours pouring her heart and time into what will ultimately end up being a six-minute cultural commentary read? Inspiring. Following the impossibly thin influencers on Instagram who were born into generational wealth but still get paid to take free trips to Saint-Tropez in $200 bikinis to promote a protein powder they don’t really consume? Not inspiring.

When I discovered Substack, it felt like a breath of fresh air for a society that is collectively moving away from influencer culture. Substack feels genuine, the way social media in the early days of the internet felt.

So, while I get why Substack maybe doesn’t come to the forefront of our minds when we consider social media platforms, it is still social media. And it can come with the same problems presented by all other platforms. For example, while scrolling Notes, I sometimes see girls posting their cute outfits, all to discover the shoes, bag, and dress they’ve linked are each well over $1000. EACH. Queue the comparison spiral: Where are you all getting this money? Is everyone actually secretly rich except me? How are you all seemingly able to own multiple pieces from the Row while also renting one-bedroom apartments in NYC?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I do love a good shoe recommendation, and I follow many amazing fashion writers on here who have a lot of incredible, valuable, things to say when it comes to personal style, trends, design, and the evolution of consumer culture. I’m also not trying to say that there isn’t room on this app for influencers to migrate over if they so choose. I do just wish that, if they do move over to Substack, they’d shift their content accordingly, rather than just still posting here as if it is Instagram or TikTok and treating it as an easy way to make more money off their already-huge audience by using their newsletters to solely list product recommendations.

While I mostly feel inspired and eager to create as a result of consuming content on this app, I think it is still important to keep in mind that everything we see here is still curated content, just like it is on every other social media platform. It is important to treat this app like any other app with a well-crafted algorithm designed to get you addicted to the scroll.

Consume your content wisely and consciously, even on Substack. Be cognizant of the way the content you consume makes you feel, and if you need to take breaks from Substack, do so. And do so without letting your growing subscriber count pressure you into choosing numbers over your mental health.