Write for Better Humans
Everything you need to know about becoming or being a Better Humans writer
Updated April 26, 2023
Better Humans is one of the top publications on Medium. Here’s what writers need to know about submitting articles to the publication.
Sometimes, writers try to reach out to us directly (via personal emails, messages, etc.). As editors who receive well over 100 submissions each week, we don’t appreciate direct inquiries and communication attempts. There’s a submission process for a reason, and we only want to work with writers who respect our boundaries.
We especially want to hear from writers who are from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds.
Here’s what we publish:
- Detailed how-to articles on attaining self-improvement goals, backed up by the writer’s personal experience.
- Articles that go beyond generic advice, including insider tips and details that would be known only by someone who actually worked toward the goal themselves.
Write from your substantial personal expertise. That’s the core of producing a trustworthy article.
We strongly prefer articles in the form of empathic tutorials. When selecting articles, we ask ourselves:
- Does this help the reader do something specific they will want to do?
- Is there evidence that the advice worked for the writer? Did the writer include advice they tried that didn’t work? Does the writer share tips on implementing the advice (the “how” rather than just the “what”)?
- Does the article make a case for why we should trust the advice?
- Does the article have an encouraging and compassionate tone?
- Is the reader likely to achieve their goal by using this advice?
We ask all writers to take care in preparing their articles for publication. Follow the guidelines here to format your article and make sure it has every chance to succeed:
Your article must meet Medium’s Distribution Standards. (Be sure to read about disqualifying story types).
Apply to Become a Better Humans Writer
New writers should use this form to submit your first draft.
Usually, you’ll hear back via email within two weeks, but this can vary depending on holidays, the number of submissions in our queue, and other factors.
We are very specific about the kind of article we publish; we decline many excellent articles that just aren’t a fit for what we do.
Submitting Articles (for Accepted Writers)
Once you’ve been accepted into the publication, you’ll submit the article via the Medium interface. Go into the article, use the “•••” menu to add the draft to the Better Humans publication:
Choose “Select and continue”. You then need to click the green Submit button to finish the submission process:
On the next screen, you’ll see the option for making your story eligible for payments (if you’re in the Medium Partner Program): “Meter your story”. Be sure to select this!
Click “Submit to publication”. At this point, you’re finished. (Don’t click “Publish” yet.)
We will generally review your article within the Medium interface within two weeks and do one of the following:
- Accept it into the publication and schedule it for publishing. If we don’t publish it right away, we will leave you a private note with the scheduled publishing time.
- Decline your article. You should get a notification from Medium that the article was declined. You can then submit to other publications or publish it on your own.
On rare occasions, we find that there’s some additional work we need from you before publishing the article — a clarification, link, etc. In that case, we’ll leave you a private note about what’s needed, and give you some time to complete that. (If we don’t hear back from you in a few days, we’ll decline the article.)
