A guide to publication sections
As your publication expands, you may want to add sections, which are separate newsletters or podcasts that are managed within your main publication.
Each section will appear in a tab at the top of your publication’s homepage. Additionally, your subscribers can opt in or out of receiving emails for each section on their account page at https://yourdomain.substack.com/account.
In this guide, we’ll walk you through our publication sections feature:
How to create a new section
How to edit a section
How to add posts to a section
Example publications with sections
Create a section
To create a new section, go to your publication dashboard, then click on the “Settings” tab. On the Settings page, search for or scroll down to “Add a section,” then click “Add new.” You can select whether you’d like the new section to be a newsletter or a podcast to start, though you can still add podcast capabilities to newsletter sections later on.
Next, you can write a name, a one-line description, and a logo for the new section. You can decide whether your current and future subscribers will receive email notifications for the new section by default.
If the section is a podcast, you’ll also be prompted to add discovery categories, the podcast language, and whether it features explicit language. Each podcast section is a separate RSS feed with its own link. (Learn more about podcasting on Substack here.)
If you’re not ready for your section to go live, you can return to “Add a section” in your publication Settings page, click the three dots next to the section name, and click “Hide.”
Edit a section
You can change the section URL or edit its name, description, and logo by clicking “Edit” in the section’s dropdown menu. Sections themselves cannot be marked free or paid, but you can control free or paid access at the post level.
To view or analyze subscriber data for each section, navigate to the “Subscribers” tab of your publication dashboard. Click “Filter,” select “Emails enabled for” in the first dropdown, then select one or more sections that you want to display subscribers for. (You can learn more about using your subscriber dashboard in our guide here.)
Note that sections are managed under your main publication. The theme, team permissions, subscription settings, and emails to subscribers that you designate in your main publication’s Settings page will apply to all sections.
Add posts to a section
When drafting a new post, you can choose to publish it to a specific section by using the dropdown menu that displays above the post title.
You can also add an existing post to a section by clicking “Edit post,” then selecting a section from the dropdown menu. Posts can be pinned to individual sections after publishing.
Your publication homepage will display a feed of all posts, including those published to specific sections. Readers can view posts from a specific section by clicking on the tab at the top of the homepage. Your subscribers can also opt in or out of receiving emails for each section on their account page.
Example publications with sections
Substack writers are using publication sections in a variety of creative ways. Here are some examples to inspire you:
Charlotte Ledger: A local news publication with sections for transit news and obituaries.
Recommentunde: A comedy publication with sections for multiple podcasts.
From the Desk of Alicia Kennedy: A food and politics newsletter with a section for Spanish-language posts.
Space Impact: A science newsletter with sections for different space topics.
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