114 Comments
User's avatar
Matt Lerner's avatar

Thank you, this is great! Is it possible to host it as a directory of my domain rather than a subdomain, for SEO reasons? (e.g. instead of substack.mydomain.com have it be www.mydomain.com/substack)?

'verse gallery's avatar

Has this been solved? Would love to have the www.mydomain.com/substack solution.

Lisa Roolant's avatar

Any answers on this? Wondering this also. Even better would be if you could have the Substack "homepage" replaced with mydomain.com.

Test profile's avatar

OH that would be AWESOME. I do wish the substack sites had a better "home page" configuration. I think I have found a way to sort of force a "home" page, but it will be primitive.... Sadly.

Andrew Skotzko's avatar

+100 to this. It's possible, and would be a huge SEO aid to writers!

Theory Gang's avatar

I just found out the hard way: no you still cannot use a subdirectory.

Charlene Wang's avatar

I'd love to know this too!

James Clark's avatar

I am interested to know this as well

Narayan's avatar

Has this been addressed? I was also planning to do it sub directory instead of subdomain.

Clifford Lawrence's avatar

I'd like to know this too..

Mihir's avatar

I was searching for a solution to this exact request. Thanks for post and the replies herein that state that this is currently not possible.

Mihir's avatar

on a related note, does anyone know of any other application like substack that lets you do this? basically the link www.mywebsite.com/blog/ should go to substack.

Terrell Johnson's avatar

Just set mine up -- incredibly easy. Thanks guys! You can find me at https://www.thehalfmarathoner.com/ now 😃

FPL Bitesize's avatar

Thanks for sharing this. Can I ask how you managed to keep all your posts with that same domain too? Mine defaults to substack.domain.com

Test profile's avatar

Thanks for the example. Well done site. Sadly, I don't run.

Linda Goin's avatar

Thank you! So direct domain is possible. That's all I wanted to know.

Yann's avatar

(How) will this impact newsletter distribution? Will emails still be sent from substack or will they now be sent from my custom domain?

Kevin Burke's avatar

Good question, any answer yet?

8Lee's avatar

💥 — boom goes the dynamite.

Jatan Mehta's avatar

After a bit of musing, I realized the one-time $50 fee is actually a fair deal––you get the entire publishing system for free anyway with no limits on number fo subscribers and no ads unlike other platforms. Mapping the domain was easy and now my newsletter both looks and sounds professional. It’s live at https://updates.jatan.space 🚀

Thank you team Substack!

Aus Property Investors's avatar

Will there still be Substack branding?

Evgeny Lepekhin's avatar

Is it me, or is it actually overpriced? I can't see a point to pay that much for a custom domain. Especially if I'm from Russia and I can't make money on Substack.

Jatan Mehta's avatar

Same. I’m from India and while I can technically charge Indian readers in INR currency, it’s not useful for me as my audience is global. Charging in $ doesn’t work.

arav's avatar

Thanks you! JUST ABOUT TO POST THAT

The Wandering Student's avatar

Nice - this is a good change. Thanks for listening!

Jon Swerens's avatar

Well done, Substackers! I'm not ready to pull the trigger yet, but a one-time $50 fee is peanuts. The fee supports the platform's staff and is a reasonable hurdle for writers to jump to demonstrate they have a seriousness for their platform. *chef's kiss*

Nikhil Basu Trivedi's avatar

How will changing the domain impact our existing link equity? i.e. SEO?

Rajat Mittal's avatar

If they properly set a redirect in robots.txt to let search engines know, You should be good. One way to check yourself is still go to your old .substack domain. If it redirects to your new site, you are 👍🏼

Salim's avatar

Finally! Thank you for adding this.

Black To School's avatar

How do I setup a custom domain without the https://

Scott Monty's avatar

This is stupendous news! After your helpful team answered a quick question, Timeless & Timely is now looking more professional than ever at https://www.timelesstimely.com.

GAM3 ON: LEVEL UP's avatar

It looks great! did you have to use code to make it look like that?

Laz's avatar

Does anyone have instructions specific for Squarespace?

Desh's avatar

Took some time, but was quite easy in the end. The only thing you need to get right is the CNAME record in your domain DNS settings. Rest Substack takes care of behind the scenes!

Here is mine (went for a brand-new .news domain for the newsletter) - https://www.drishtikone.news/

Craig J Todd's avatar

Hi Desh - your publication looks great. In terms of the custom domain (which I'm considering doing), do I need to have my own SSL certificate with my domain name - or does Substack provide this? Thanks, Craig

Nathan Lambert's avatar

Craig, did you need to do the SSL certificate? I see your site has that set up :)

Craig J Todd's avatar

Yes, if I recall correctly, I had to pay 50 dollars to get that set up.