Where Medium Articles are Published

A topic-by-topic analysis of 100,000+ articles “chosen for further distribution”.

Medium Topics

At the time of writing, there are 103 Medium topics. These may be different from the “tags” you select for your own articles. The topic(s) will be selected by the Medium curators, if your article is “chosen for further distribution”.

This article shows where recent articles distributed in each topic were published. While some topics are dominated by a few big publications, some are spread over many publications, and some contain mostly self-published articles.

My Medium Story

Feel free to skip this section and just scroll down to the topic analysis. But I thought I should give a little background to the article. After all, Medium is about stories, right?

Since joining Medium a few months ago, I published several articles on things that interest me in the world of Mathematics. (If you also get excited by patterns and problem solving, check out my profile!)

After 5 articles, I was surprised to receive an email from Medium with the subject “Congrats, you’re a top writer in Education on Medium”. Sure enough, my name was listed with 49 other Top Writers on medium.com/tag/education. “Look at me mum!”

So I decided to branch out from my Mathematics articles and self-publish a more general article on Education: 5 things I love about being a teacher. Take a look if you’re interested. I think you’ll agree it’s both insightful and uplifting. Over half the readers in the first week gave it a “clap”. The only problem was… less than 50 people had seen the article after a week 😓. Despite the fact that it was “chosen for further distribution”, and that I was a Top Writer.

I learned that I should submit my next article to a publication. But searching for “Education” under the Publications tab gave hundreds of results, many of which had not published any articles in 5 years, let alone an article on Education!

So there is the motivation and story behind this analysis. Hopefully it helps you find publications willing to accept your work, and that your next article will reach more than 50 people. 😊

Topic Analysis

The 103 Medium topics (as of August 2021) are listed below in order of article volume. Charts for the first 53 topics are arranged in the same numbered order below. Clicking a topic heading will also scroll you down to the relevant charts.

1. Programming (3000+ articles per month)
2. Self (2000+)
3. Data Science (1000+)
4. Javascript (1000+)
5. Machine Learning (900+)
6. Relationships (900+)
7. Work (800+)
8. Family (700+)
9. Writing (700+)
10. Nonfiction (500+ articles per month)
11. Poetry (400+)
12. Politics (400+)
13. Sports (400+)
14. Lifestyle (400+)
15. Startups (400+)
16. Equality (400+)
17. Technology (400+)
18. Mental Health (300+)
19. Climate Change (300+)
20. Artificial Intelligence (300+ articles per month)
21. Culture (300+)
22. Film (300+)
23. Music (300+)
24. Travel (300+)
25. Cryptocurrency (300+)
26. Design (300+)
27. Parenting (300+)
28. Humor (300+)
29. History (300+)
30. Business (300+ articles per month)
31. Books (300+)
32. Health (200+)
33. Society (200+)
34. World (200+)
35. Spirituality (200+)
36. Cybersecurity (200+)
37. Creativity (200+)
38. Marketing (200+)
39. Education (200+)
40. Fiction (200+ articles per month)
41. Philosophy (200+)
42. Money (200+)
43. Food (200+)
44. Feminism (200+)
45. Software Engineering (200+)
46. Language (100+)
47. Space (100+)
48. Race (100+)
49. UX (100+)
50. Social Media (100+ articles per month)
51. Science (100+)
52. Gaming (100+)
53. Math (100+)
54. Freelancing (100+)
55. Religion (100+)
56. True Crime (100+)
57. Coronavirus (100+)
58. Product Management (100+)
59. Sexuality (100+)
60. Media (100+ articles per month)
61. Productivity (100+)
62. Android Dev (100+)
63. Photography (100+)
64. Blockchain (100+)
65. Leadership (100+)
66. LGBTQIA (100+)
67. Transportation (100+)
68. Pets (100+)
69. Mindfulness (100+)
70. Psychology (100+ articles per month)
71. Art (100+)
72. iOS Dev (100+)
73. TV (100+)
74. Economy (90+)
75. Outdoors (80+)
76. Style (80+)
77. Addiction (70+)
78. Remote Work (60+)
79. Fitness (60+)
80. Gun Control (60+ articles per month)
81. Gadgets (60+)
82. Justice (50+)
83. Visual Design (50+)
84. Podcasts (50+)
85. Digital Life (40+)
86. Comics (40+)
87. Neuroscience (40+)
88. Beauty (40+)
89. Disability (40+)
90. Future (40+ articles per month)
91. San Francisco (20+)
92. Cities (20+)
93. Accessibility (20+)
94. Astrology (20+)
95. Immigration (20+)
96. Self Driving Cars (20+)
97. Cannabis (10+)
98. Venture Capital (10+)
99. Basic Income (10+)
100. Psychedelics (10+ articles per month)
101. Makers (10+)
102. Biotech (10+)
103. Privacy (10+)

1. Programming

With such a broad topic and over 3000 distributed articles per month, it’s no wonder they are spread over a broad range of publications. There is also a relatively large proportion of self-published articles. Take advantage of Medium’s great SEO and get your article on the first page of Google. Just don’t forget that alt text!

2. Self

Everyone has one! (except hardcore Buddhists 😉). Another broad range of publications here for you to pitch your article.

3. Data Science

You don’t need a deep learning algorithm to predict the number 1 publication in this topic. According to Smedian, Towards Data Science is the second most followed publication on Medium, with 570,000+ followers.

4. Javascript

Is it surprising to anyone else that Javascript has its own topic but Python does not? Is the assumption that Python developers are more interested in Data Science, Machine Learning and AI, while JS developers just love JS?

5. Machine Learning

Here is where Python developers come out to play. Publications 2 to 10 may look small on the bar chart, but look at the scale on the x-axis. Even after taking out the 40% published by TDS, there is still a large number of articles in the other publications.

6. Relationships

Love is all you need… right?

7. Work

You don’t gotta go to work, work, work, work, work, work, work… We can work from home, oh, oh, oh-oh (it’s a song).

But seriously, notice the large proportion of “other publications” here. Some of them that did not quite make the list are DataDrivenInvestor, Forge, Making of a Millionaire, Work Today and Curated Careers.

8. Family

Interestingly, this is the topic with the largest proportion of self-published articles. Keep in mind these are all “distributed” articles.

9. Writing

Writing about writing. Can’t writers think of something else to write about? Oh wait, I guess that’s what this article is.💀

10. Nonfiction

Another high proportion of self-published articles here. It makes sense that most non-fiction articles would be distributed under more specific topics.

11. Poetry

Great to see many different publications featuring here.

12. Politics

This topic also has a high proportion of self-published articles. But look at the “big names” in this top 10 list.

13. Sports

A broad topic with niche publications for specific sports.

14. Lifestyle

Another broad topic. Note that an article may be distributed under more than one topic, eg. Lifestyle & Fitness, or Lifestyle & Relationships.

15. Startups

You are probably aware that the second most prolific publication on this list has the largest amount of followers of any Medium publication (730,000+ according to Smedian).

16. Equality

The fact that this topic is so popular is a good sign for our society. ✌

17. Technology

Interesting to see the New York Times make another appearance on this list.

18. Mental Health

Fantastic to see mental health ranking in the Top 20. If your article doesn’t get accepted by Invisible Illness, there are many other options…

19. Climate Change

A few main players here, but also many other publications willing to publish articles on the “challenge of our generation”.

20. Artificial Intelligence

Similar names here as the Data Science and Machine Learning topics. Remember, it is possible for one article to be distributed in multiple topics.

21. Culture

22. Film

23. Music

24. Travel

This topic would have been higher on the list in 2019. Hopefully it will rise again in 2022!

25. Cryptocurrency

26. Design

There is a high degree of overlap between this list and the list for the UX topic.

27. Parenting

28. Humor

29. History

30. Business

31. Books

32. Health

33. Society

34. World

35. Spirituality

36. Cybersecurity

37. Creativity

38. Marketing

No prizes for guessing the number 1 publication on this list.

39. Education

Here they are… the publications that drove me to create this article!

40. Fiction

Some other options for those writers still working their way up to The Lark.

41. Philosophy

Another large number of self-published articles here.

42. Money

43. Food

44. Feminism

45. Software Engineering

46. Language

47. Space

48. Race

49. UX

50. Social Media

Medium is social media, right? Maybe this article will get distributed here. Or not.

51. Science

52. Gaming

53. Math

If you are into Mathematics, check out some of these great publications. Or click on my profile!

Sorry if you are looking for a topic ranked 54 to 103, but this article was getting far too long. Leave a response below to let me know, and if there is enough interest I will publish another article covering the remaining topics.

Data Sources and Methods

All the data presented here was obtained from the Medium website under the topic pages (eg. medium.com/topic/math). The articles were mostly published in 2021 between January and August. For smaller topics I had to go back over a year to collect 100+ articles. For larger topics, I obtained 5000+ articles from the past 2–3 months.

All URL requests were sent from my home IP address, at the gentle rate of one request every few seconds.

Charts were created using the Plotly Python open source library. Here is a link to an article where I explain how I obtained the data and generated the charts.

https://readmedium.com/analysing-medium-topics-384eb0df42b8

Note that the data presented here relates only to “distributed” articles. Other articles that were not “chosen for further distribution” would not appear on the topic pages.

This article focuses on “number of articles published”, and does not consider “number of views per article”. Some publications, such as The Mission, do not publish a high volume of articles but do have a very large following. I plan to write a follow-up article using “number of claps” as a proxy to analyse number of views (and earnings). Follow me if you want to be notified when it comes out!