70k+ reviews
Your newsletter built the audience. Circle helps you build the business
Your members are already paying. Give them somewhere to connect, learn, and keep coming back to — not just an inbox to check.
A real community where members connect — not a flat thread list
One platform for courses, events, email, payments, and more
AI and workflows that do the retention work you'd otherwise hire for
Trusted by more than 15 million members across 20,000 communities
Ali Abdaal
6.5M subscribers
Tim Ferriss
500K monthly listeners
Ness Labs
100K readers
Jay Shetty
900K readers
The Futur
2.7M subscribers
Substack was built to broadcast content, not run a business
VS
Substack limits you to one-way communication
Circle’s complete community platform actually helps you grow
Substack users are switching to Circle to build real community businesses every day
“We’ve made over $3M on Circle over the last two years. It supported our live cohorts, self-paced courses, virtual summits, a subscription-based membership, and our first in-person summit in LA. This is the power of a true ‘all-in-one’ platform.”
Tiago Forte — Founder, Forte Labs
You’re ready for Circle if this sounds like you
Your members pay every month and have nowhere to actually connect with each other
Your posts are a long, flat feed with no spaces, no structure, no way to organize anything
You want to offer a course, but Substack has no course builder
You're paying 10% to Substack and still buying three other tools to run your business
Your brand lives inside Substack's app, competing for attention alongside thousands of other newsletters
Build a community that becomes the reason members stay
Give members structured spaces, live interaction, and learning paths that make them feel invested, not just subscribed.
Structured spaces and access groups
Member connection recommendations
Direct messaging between members
Community-specific activity and discussion feeds
Drag-and-drop course builder
Live events with RSVP, ticketing, recordings, and gated replays
Gamification — points, leaderboards, badges
Run an entire member business from one platform, not five tools
Community, courses, events, email, and more. All native. No integrations to manage, no data scattered across platforms.
Custom domain
Website builder with custom pages
Email Hub with community-behavior triggers
Payments — one-time, subscription, installment
Analytics across community, courses, and events
Member CRM with customer profile fields
Scale your growth without scaling your workload
Automation to handle onboarding, follow-ups, and re-engagement. AI to handle questions and moderation. You focus on the work that matters.
Conditional and branching workflows
Community-behavior communication triggers
Activity scoring of members
AI agents with distinct roles and placement controls
AI inbox (visibility into AI interactions)
Mobile app and desktop app, with notifications
The complete community platform
Circle is the best platform to build, engage, and scale your business
Circle moves fast — so you can grow even faster
Industry-leading product velocity, support, and customer ratings make Circle the most trusted platform for serious community and creator businesses.
Upgrade from Substack to Circle in three steps
Let our migration team handle the heavy lifting—so you don’t have to.
Request your migration
Fill out a quick form to tell us about your setup. We'll take it from there. We’ll migrate your:
1. Courses
2. Email list
4. And more
Approve your custom plan
We’ll create a tailored migration plan based on your needs. You review and approve before we begin.
Sit back while we migrate
Our team moves everything over—content, members, settings—fully structured and ready to go live.
Leader on G2
Trusted by 20,000+ businesses to power their communities
Frequently asked questions
Is Circle more expensive than Substack?
Generally, no.
At low revenue, Substack’s 10% cut of the revenue you earn looks affordable. But as you scale:
- Paying 10% becomes a larger figure.
- You’ll inevitably buy and integrate more tools to offer discussions, courses, and more to your members.
On the other hand, Circle charges:
- $89 per month for the Professional plan, plus a 2% transaction fee.
- $199 per month for the Business plan, plus a 1% transaction fee.
- A custom price for Circle Plus, plus a 0.5% transaction fee.
So, if you’re earning more than $1,500 per month on Substack, you’ll ultimately pay less for Circle.
You can learn more by using our community ROI calculator or exploring our pricing page.
Does Circle have a native email tool like Substack?
Yes. Circle's Email Hub handles broadcasts, newsletters, and automated sequences natively.
The meaningful difference is what can trigger your emails. Substack's automated sequences are rolling out to select Bestsellers only as of early 2026 — they're not available to all creators, and the triggers are limited to new subscriber, upgrade, and cancellation events.
Circle triggers emails based on community joins, event attendance, course progress, and member behavior. If your email strategy is about keeping members engaged rather than just broadcasting content, that behavioral data is what makes it work.
Substack has a mobile app. Does Circle?
Yes. Circle includes a free native mobile and desktop app on every plan.
The key difference is whose brand members see when they open it. Substack's app shows your content alongside every other Substack publication on the platform — members are browsing a newsstand, not visiting your community.
Circle's app is your community. Members get push notifications for activity in your specific spaces and see your brand, not Circle's, front and centre.
As your community grows, you can upgrade to a fully-branded iOS and Android app with your own icon, name, and app store listing.
Will I lose Substack members when I switch to Circle?
We’ll work with you to migrate your content, email list, payments, and more to ensure minimal churn.
Because Circle delivers a meaningful upgrade in terms of user experience and your value proposition to members, you’ll soon see membership, engagement, and revenue growth.
During migration, can I run both Substack and Circle?
Yes. Many creators keep Substack live during the migration period to ensure a smooth transition.
Before sunsetting Substack, it’s best practice to:
- Clearly communicate with your members about the move
- Set a specific cutover date
- Offer existing members an easy path to join your Circle
Still can’t find the answer? Go to help center
