100+ Websites That Pay Writers

Being a freelance writer can be a hard gig. You might love writing (and be good at it) but finding places that will pay you for writing can be a tedious task.

If you are going to submit articles to websites, make sure that you read the submission guides carefully to work out what they are after before submitting a request. Editors are busy and will automatically discard anything that doesn’t meet their guidelines so adhering to their submission guides will give you a better chance for success.

Here is a list of magazines, websites and blogs that will pay you for accepted submissions.

Business, Career, and Finance

I Work Well is all about HR. If you are a human resources expert then this website may be for you.
B. Michelle Pippin pays $50-$150 for business-related articles.
Back to College pays $55+ for articles that address the needs of adults going back to school.
Brazen (formerly Brazen Careerist) will pay if you pre-arrange it with their editor. They’re looking for posts about higher ed administration, marketing, networking, and recruiting and HR.
DailyWorth pays $150 for articles about women and money. They list a blackhole editorial@ email address, but I recently tweeted them about how to submit a pitch, and they suggested hitting up the managing editor, Koa Beck.
Doctor of Credit pays $50 for personal finance articles that focus specifically on credit.
eCommerce Insiders pays $60-$150 for articles about online retailing.
IncomeDiary pays $50-$200 for articles about making money online, including SEO, affiliate sales, and traffic generation.
Mirasee (formerly Firepole Marketing) pays $200 for 1,000-2,000-word posts on marketing, business productivity, and growth topics.
Modern Farmer reportedly pays around $150 for articles.
The Work Online blog pays $50 per post.

Essays

Meanjin takes short stories, poems, essays and memoirs.
Cosmopolitan.com pays $100 for essays about college. They’re also using this essay submission as a way to find writers to give assignments to.
Essig Magazine offers $100 for essays about a personal experience.
The Establishment pays $125 and up for reported stories and essays.
Everyday Feminism pays $75 per post, but they are not always in the market for contributors. Sign up for their newsletter or check back often to see when they need a writer.
Guideposts pays $250 for faith-based essays.
LightHouse pays $100 for uplifting essays by blind or visually impaired writers.
Narratively pays $100+ for essays on specific topics. Check their guidelines for a list of current needs.
The New York Times Modern Love column reportedly pays as much as $300 for essays on any topic that could be classified as modern love.
The Washington Post’s PostEverything section reportedly pays $250 for essays on politics or culture.
The Toast pays for essays. Negotiate your rate as part of the pitching process.
xoJane pays $50 for essays about crazy things that happened to you, beauty or fashion trends you’ve tried, and other women-focused topics.

Family and Parenting

Essential Baby is a parenting website targeting parents with kids aged 0 – 4.
Essential Kids is the sister site to Essential Baby focusing on kids ages 4-12.
A Fine Parent solicits articles on a rotating topic. Check out the topic, then pitch your idea on the theme. Each accepted article earns $100.
Adoptive Families covers the adoption process from every perspective. You’ll need to negotiate your pay rate.
Babble pays $100-$150 for posts on parenting, entertainment, pregnancy, beauty, style, food, and travel.
Lies about Parenting is a site that tells the truth about raising kids. They pay $50 per post.
The Motherlode (the New York Times’ parenting blog) pays $100. Pitch the editor.
Scary Mommy pays $100 for original parenting posts.

News, Lifestyle and General Interest

Words of Worth pays writers to write on variety of topics for websites, advertising and articles.
Birdee a website / online magazine aimed at women.
Bitch Media publishes online content and a print magazine.
Concrete Playground is a lifestyle website dedicated to being a ‘city guide’ to various city’s in Australia and New Zealand.
Broadsheet covers entertainment, fashion, travel, food and things to do.
Mamamia provides payment for original work.
Independent Australia is a news site that pays contributors, however they have currently suspended this.
The Guardian is a news site that accepts freelancers.
The New Daily a news site.
Crikey a news site.
New Matilda states they only pay for commissioned pieces.
Overland pays for article on their website, print magazine and poems.
Eureka Street is an Australian site that pays $200 for analysis or commentary on politics, religion, popular culture or current events in Australia and the world. They also pay $50 for poetry, which seems to be a rarity these days.
Cosmos Magazine is science based magazine.
Archer is a volunteer not for profit, but they do pay $50 for an accepted submission.
The Big Issue is a fortnightly print magazine that is sold on the streets by homeless, marginalized and disadvantaged people, and they get to keep 50% of the selling price. It primarily covers current affairs, social issues and street culture, but is open to articles on other topics as well.
Frankie is a bimonthly print magazine.
Wellbeing is a magazing dedicated to things such as ethical living, wholefood cooking, environmental affairs, alternative therapies, natural health and yoga.
Australia Reader’s Digest. Okay, so it will not be a great literary work, but Reader’s Digest does pay for true stories, anecdotes and even stuff about your pet.
The Atlantic’s online health section reportedly pays $200.
BBC Britain doesn’t publish their pay rate, but I’ve seen reports of $350-$1,000 for various BBC sites. Pitch stories with a British slant for an international audience. Download their guidelines as a Word document.
BlogHer pays $50 per post on a variety of lifestyle and Internet topics. This site is part of the SheKnows family of sites, which also includes StyleCaster, DrinksMixer, and DailyMakeover.
Cultures and Cuisines pays $200 per article.
The Daily Beast reportedly pays $250 and up. Their submission guidelines have a black-hole editorial@ email address, so you’ll want to do a little digging to find the right person to pitch.
Dame reportedly pays $200 for essays. They do accept reported features and other article types, and pay rates may vary for those.
Dorkly pays $75 for long features on Batman, Marvel, Pokemon, and other potentially dorky topics.
END/PAIN is a new site launching in 2016, and they are paying $250.
Expatics serves U.S. expatriates. This is another site where you’ll need to negotiate pay before you write your article.
Fund Your Life Overseas pays $75 for articles about business ideas that provide enough income for U.S. ex-pats.
Gawker Media reportedly pays $250 for reported features and essays on its family of sites, which includes Deadspin, Jezebel, and more. They prefer to see fully written stories. They shuttered a number of their sites yesterday and plan to focus on politics now, so take care with pitching to ensure you hit a paying site.
getAbstract reportedly pays $300 for longer (2,000-4,000 word) book summaries.
Gothamist pays $50-$150 for reported pieces about New York.
HowlRound pays $50 for blog posts about the theater — management and marketing, play production and writing, and so on.
The International Wine Accessories blog pays $25 and up for articles.
Pay at The Daily Dot’s online magazine The Kernel varies, so be prepared to negotiate. I saw a report of $350 for a 1,000-2,000 word option piece.
Knitty pays $75-$100 for articles about knitting.
Listverse pays $100 for long (1,500 word) lists on various topics.
The Mix, a network of contributors to Hearst online publications (includingCountry Living, Bazaar, Esquire, Popular Mechanics, and more) pays $50-$100 for articles.
New York Observer pays $100 on posts about politics and culture for “sophisticated readership of metropolitan professionals.”
OZY does pay freelancers, but rates vary.
Paste pays $50+ for submissions in many different areas.
Penny Hoarder shares money-saving ideas. You’ll need to negotiate pay with the editors during the pitching process.
Playboy.com pays up to $350, depending on the topic.
Pretty Designs covers fashion and beauty. You’ll need to negotiate per-post pay.
PsychCentral covers mental health. They don’t list a pay rate on their site, and they didn’t respond to my query about pay, but a reader on last year’s list reported they are a paying market.
Refinery29 reportedly pays $75 and up for slideshows, articles, and essays on various topics. They also post their needs for specific columns on their guidelines page.
Salon pays $100-$200 for essays and reported features, even very long ones.
Saveur starts at $150 for “amazing stories about food and travel.”
The Salt (NPR’s food blog) reportedly pays $200+.
Smithsonian Magazine Online reportedly pays established freelancers up to $600 for reported articles.
The Tablet pays for articles on Jewish news, ideas, and culture. Pay varies, so be prepared to negotiate. I saw a report of $1,000 for a heavily reported 2,000+ word feature.
TwoPlusTwo Magazine pays $200 for original posts about poker. They post articles for six months, after which time the rights revert to the writer, so you can sell reprint rights or post it on your own blog.
Upworthy pays $150-$200 for 500-word posts.
Vice‘s pay rate varies, so you will need to negotiate if you’d like to write about food, technology, music, fashion, and other lifestyle topics.

Tech

A List Apart covers web design. They pay $200 per article.
Compose pays $200 and $200 in Compose database credits for articles about databases.
The Graphic Design School blog pays $100-$200 for articles and tutorials about Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and open source design tools.
Indeni pays $50-$200 for posts that cover Check Point firewalls, F5 load balancers or Palo Alto Networks firewalls.
Linode pays $250 for articles about Linux, Socket.io, NoSQL databases, game servers, Open Change, and Web RTC.
SlickWP pays $100 for posts about WordPress and the Genesis Theme framework.
Treehouse pays $100-$200 for posts about web design and development.
Tuts+ pays $100 and up for tutorials on various technologies, including Web design and Flash. Tuts once ran a network of 16 different blogs, including Freelance Switch, but it’s all together on a single site now that encompasses design, gaming, photography, writing, and more.
WordCandy pays 6 cents a word for ghostwritten pieces about WordPress — these will appear on some of the larger WordPress blogs, such as wpmudev.
WPHub pays $100-$200 for posts on web design trends, coding best practices, and other WordPress-related topics.

Writing / Literary / Book Reviews

Australian Book Review will pay writers for book reviews for their website.
Kill Your Darlings pays contributors for commentary, essays, memoirs, reviews, and interviews.
The Lifted Brow is a not for profit that pay contributors.
Westerly magazine publishes short stories, micro-fiction, poetry, memoir and creative non-fiction, artwork, essays and literary criticism.
WOW! Women on Writing pays $50-$150 per piece.
Get Absract pays writers to write summeries of books to help people get the essential details in a fraction of the time.
Funds for Writers pays $50 for original articles for the newsletter that cover ways to make money writing. (If you don’t subscribe to their newsletter, it’s worth signing up while you’re there reading the guidelines.)
Make a Living Writing. This blog pays $75 a post. They also pay $100 for longer assigned posts on specific topics (see that guidelines link for a list).
The Write Life pays for some posts — you’ll need to negotiate your rate.
Writer’s Weekly pays $60 for writing-related features.