Conditions of Medium’s Partner Program (What you need to know to earn money!)

Make sure you check out Medium’s Terms and Conditions, outlined below, to make sure you are eligible to earn money through writing on this website.

In order to earn money through your articles posted on Medium.com, you must be part of the Partner Program.

Medium’s Partner Program

The Partner Program allows writers to earn money for the content they publish on Medium based on engagement from Medium members, as well as users they convert to become Medium members.

In order to join Medium’s Partner Program, you must:

Have at least 100 followers on Medium.

Have published at least one story on Medium in the past (Note: responses don’t count).

Remain active on Medium (writing articles at least every six months)

Countries that are supported in the Program

Currently, enrollment in the Partner Program is only available in the following countries. If you are not living in one of the countries below, you will be unable to join the Partner Program (and won’t be able to earn any money from your articles, regardless of how many followers or views you get):

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States

Please note: Outlying territories of supported countries are not supported at this time.

The minimum payout amount

For most users, there is no minimum payout amount. However, there are some exceptions:

EUR bank accounts have a minimum payout of 1.00 EUR GBP bank accounts have a minimum payout of 1.00 GBP CHF bank accounts have a minimum payout of 25.00 CHF NOK, DKK, and SEK bank accounts have a minimum payout of 20.00kr MXN bank accounts have a minimum payout of 10.00 MXN

Earn money through your articles

Once you’ve enrolled to the Partner Program and set up your Stripe account, you now have an option to put your story behind the paywall to start earning money. Note that this needs to be done on per-story basis, and you can still publish stories outside of the paywall.

Medium Partners have access to a Partner dashboard, accessible by clicking on your profile picture in the top-right corner on Medium.com. Your Partner dashboard shows your earnings for each of your stories that are behind the paywall.

Additionally, you will be also able to track your daily member engagement and estimated revenue on your post’s detailed stats pages.

You’ll also be able to track your earnings from Referred Memberships. To access the audience stats page, click on your profile picture in the top-right corner on Medium.com. Then click Stats from the menu, and click on the Audience stats button in the top-right corner of the page. Your Audience dashboard shows referred member earnings.

What if you don’t meet the criteria?

Keep writing and building your community. Once you get 100 Followers you can start earning money, as long as you live in one of the countries stated above, and remain active by writing regularly.

For more articles on engaging with Medium readers and the 100 Followers Challenge, check out:

Five Tips to Improve your Medium Articles

Top 10 Types of Posts to Engage with Medium Readers

Meaningful Quotes to Inspire Your Medium Articles

100 Followers Challenge — How its going

100 Followers Challenge — Let’s help each other

100 Followers Challenge — How to engage with your audience

Bonuses from Medium?

Medium’s publication editors may occasionally reach out to you with an offer of an editorial bonus.

If you accept the offer, then Medium will include that bonus as part of your total earnings for the day on which you accepted. For example, if you organically earn $50 on the same day that you accept a $100 bonus, then you will see total earnings of $150 for that day.

Stay safe! Medium editors will always use an email address @medium.com.

So how much can you earn through Medium??

As Medium members spend more time reading your story (“member reading time”), you will earn more.

How much of their monthly reading time members spend on your story By calculating a share of member reading time, Medium support authors who write about unique topics and connect with loyal readers. For example, if last month a member spent 10% of their monthly reading time on your story, you will receive 10% of their share (a portion of their subscription fee).

Some authors note that 1,000 views will result in $15, so if you received 2,000 views over a week, you’ll get $30. However, this is based on different memberships and viewing times.

In addition, for every new reader that you convert to a paying Medium member, you’ll receive half of that new reader’s membership fee, net of standard payment processor fees. Referral earnings are recurring as long as the reader’s membership plan remains active.

As of August 11, 2021, our monthly membership is $5/month. Taking into account a standard payment processing fee of 2.9%+$0.30, a creator will earn 50% or $2.27/month per membership on a recurring basis as long as the reader’s membership plan is active.

As of August 11, 2021, our annual membership is $50/year. Taking into account a standard payment processing fee of 2.9%+$0.30, a creator will earn 50% or $2.01/month per membership for 12 months. Similar to monthly memberships, the payout will be on a monthly basis as long as the reader’s membership plan is active.

How much can you earn?

Partner Program writers are paid every month based on how members engage with their stories. This is determined by member reading time. Each member’s subscription fee is distributed proportionally to the stories that the individual member engaged with that month. You can always check your payment estimates in your Partner dashboard.

Writers can also earn from referred memberships. For every new reader that you convert to a paying Medium member, you’ll receive half of that new reader’s membership fee, net of standard payment processor fees. Referral earnings are recurring as long as the reader’s membership plan remains active.

Check out more details below in relation to bonuses and how to earn money from your articles.

Medium Membership

You don’t have to be a paying Medium member to join the Partner Program and earn money for your writing. Being a Medium member doesn’t influence how any work is published or featured through the Partner Program.

However, some publications on Medium may require writers to be a member before publishing an author’s articles. Be sure to consider this when contacting publications.

Articles in publications can earn money, as long as your stories are eligible to earn through the Partner Program.

Taxpayer Information

You also need to submit your taxpayer information to Medium, as Medium will be required to issue you a 1099-MISC tax form for your earnings in the Medium Partner Program. This is because the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requires Medium to issue form 1099-MISC based on earnings thresholds. A link to do this will also be sent to you once you’ve been successfully accepted to the Partner Program.

While you cannot receive payments until you add verified taxpayer information, your posts can accumulate new earnings for up to one month. You will be eligible to receive payments if you add your taxpayer information within 180 days from the first day that nonzero earnings are posted to your Partner Program dashboard. After those 180 days have elapsed, your funds will be forfeited.

Remain Active on Medium

At all times you must maintain an active Medium account, connected Stripe account, and valid tax form in order to receive payouts through our Program. If at any point, any of these are not met, you will forfeit any accumulated earnings that have not yet been paid out after 180 days.

Medium encourages all Partner Program writers to remain active, publishing at least once every 6 months. Medium does reserve the right, at its discretion, to disable monetization from a writer if they have been inactive for 6 months or more. Writers who are at risk will receive notification before we take any action.

Deleted or Unlisted Articles

If you are enrolled in the Partner Program with approved tax documents, then your stories are eligible to earn during periods of time when they are public and set to earn as part of Medium’s paywall.

If a story earns money and then later is modified to be ineligible to earn for legitimate reasons (e.g., you choose to unlist the story), then you will still receive those prior earnings at the end of the month.

Your story will not accrue additional earnings for the time period during which it is ineligible to earn.

If a story earns money and then later is modified to be ineligible to earn for illegitimate reasons (e.g., the story violates our Terms), then we reserve the right to withhold payment.

How does Medium calculate reading time?

Medium calculates reading time based on the amount of time that a viewer spends actively reading on the page. They consider the viewer’s scrolling and activity, and then determine how long the viewer spent reading the story. They take care to differentiate between gaps in scroll activity versus long periods of time during which the viewer stepped away for a coffee break.

PayPal Account on Medium?

Medium currently does not support PayPal or any other third-party payment provider for Partner Program payments.

Payment Dates

Medium will typically initiate sending payments for each month (earnings for days in that calendar month) by the 8th of the following month. Payments may take 5–7 business days to appear in your bank account.

Earnings are updated every day. Medium use UTC days, meaning they include all earnings from activity during midnight UTC to 11:59 PM UTC. Earnings are then updated within a few hours.

For more articles on engaging with Medium readers and the 100 Followers Challenge, check out:

Five Tips to Improve your Medium Articles

Top 10 Types of Posts to Engage with Medium Readers

Meaningful Quotes to Inspire Your Medium Articles

100 Followers Challenge — How its going

100 Followers Challenge — Let’s help each other

100 Followers Challenge — How to engage with your audience

About Me

I am a husband, father, hopeful writer and explorer, who loves to write about my experiences in life, becoming a father, and give tips to other writers on Medium.com. Please follow and subscribe, and I’ll make sure to do the same. Check out my full list of articles here: https://james-new-zealand.medium.com/

For articles I have compiled to help you write on Medium.com, go to: Useful Resources for Writing on Medium.com

To read about my experiences becoming a father, go to: Daddy Diaries: Becoming a Father

To read about my experiences living in China and other countries, go to: Experiences Living and Studying in Mainland China

For articles I have written about the National Football League and Fantasy Football, go to: The National Football League

To learn more about the 100 Followers Challenge, go to: 100 Followers Challenge: Thank You for Following (and I’ll Still Follow Back)