Why do I see a sudden change in my stats?
You may see fluctuations in your recent stats based on the way that we calculate and provide real-time stats. This does not reflect a change in the actual metrics, but rather is a temporary side effect when tracking live stats. Below is an explanation:
We maintain two sources of stats for your stories:
- The first is a stable, long-term count of all engagement throughout time.
- The second is a short-term count that is updated in real-time. This real-time count has not yet been processed through robust deduplication checks and other safeguards.
Every hour, recent engagement on your post from the last hour is processed and converted from the short-term count into the long-term stable count. During this processing, we may identify duplicate or erroneous counts of the same clap or read. Therefore, the long-term stable count for that time period may end up differing slightly from the short-term count you previously saw. You will not observe fluctuations to your stats for a given time period in the long run.
What counts as a presentation surface?
We count a “presentation” as any time we present your story to a reader in a trackable way inside Medium, on all stories published after January 1, 2025. Here’s the list:
- On the home feed
- In Medium search results
- On topic pages
- Inside publications
- Recommended reads at the bottom of related stories
- On your profile page
- Email notifications to your subscribers
- In a list
This does not include places where we don’t track, such as the digest emails, or if someone is shown your story outside of Medium, such as on another social media platform or as a search page result on Google.
How is the feed clickthrough rate calculated?
The feed clickthrough percentage you see calculates how many people clicked into your story after seeing it in the feed on the app or webpage. For example, if 1000 Medium users see it on their homepage feed, and 50 of them click on it from there, that’s a feed clickthrough of 5 percent.
This does not take into account any presentations from anywhere else in the product, emails, or in notifications. We wanted writers to be able to use this number to understand how their stories perform when our recommendation system presents them to readers in the feed.
The feed clickthrough rate will be displayed once we have enough data.
How far back do presentation stats go?
You’ll be able to see the presentation data on stories published from January 1, 2025, onwards.
What’s a good feed clickthrough and read ratio?
There’s no one universal “good” or “bad” feed clickthrough or read ratio, since your audience, topic, and writing voice will be very different from someone else’s.
The best way to compare these stats is within your own stories, rather than to other writers.
I’m a new writer and I’m not getting any presentations. What can I do?
As a new writer on Medium, you may get very few or no presentations on your story, especially if you don’t submit your story to a publication, which can help you piggyback on their existing audience. I recommend finding a publication that is a good fit for your story, and using all five topics to help our recommendations system match your story to readers likely to be interested in it. And as you start to get more followers and email subscribers, clicking the option to notify your subscribers when you publish a story is a good way to ensure you're getting more presentations.
I’d also recommend reviewing our Distribution guidelines to understand how to get more presentations (and hopefully views, reads, and followers) and what topics can limit your reach.
For example, generally speaking, we don’t recommend stories about erotica, true crime, or stories about Medium to readers on Medium unless they follow you, or the publication you publish in. This is because many readers have told us they don’t want to see those stories unless they opt in by following. However, it means that if you write about those topics, you may experience a more limited reach.
Will this change how my story is distributed, or my earnings on paywalled stories?
None of these improvements affect how earnings from the Partner Program are calculated or how stories are distributed across Medium. These are just tools for writers to better understand their performance on Medium, how they are building their audiences, and to get a clearer idea of how we distribute those stories.
What should I avoid doing with my feed clickthrough data?
Don’t make decisions based on too little data. It’s tempting to draw conclusions about your feed clickthrough after getting just a few presentations, but try to avoid that. Wait a few days to see how your story performs so you can gather more information about how readers are reacting to your story.
Don’t try several different titles and images in quick succession on your story. It’s difficult to make sure each story is being seen by the same audience, so differences in feed clickthrough might be due to factors outside your control rather than the title or thumbnail.
Don’t try to use clickbait titles or images. Readers hate clickbait and don’t tend to read those stories, so Medium will be less likely to recommend those stories to additional readers. Clickbait stories are also likely to be marked for Network Distribution, which further limits their potential reach. Read more about our clickbait policy here.
How do I know if my feed clickthrough rate is high or low?
Presentations will vary based on the type of story, who Medium’s recommendations system thinks is most likely to read it, and where on Medium readers were presented the story.
Remember that your story is always competing with other stories all over Medium, including in the home feed, on the Following feed, on Topic pages, and in the search.
Brand new stories, especially those from newer writers, can see a very large range in presentations. If a story gets a lot of presentations, it’s normal for the feed clickthrough to be lower, since the story is reaching a wider audience who may naturally not be as interested in clicking on it.
Ultimately, it's best to compare feed clickthroughs between stories over a long period of time.
Why do I have more views than presentations?
Remember that we calculate the feed clickthrough rate only using presentations from the feed surfaces. If a lot of readers come to your story from outside Medium, for example if you share your story on social media, or you get a lot of traction from search engines, you may have more views than presentations.
Why doesn't the feed clickthrough rate match my calculations?
We calculate feed clickthrough based on views that come from presentations in the feed. If you divide the total views on your story by the number of presentations, you may not see the same number as the feed clickthrough because those views may come from readers finding your story on surfaces other than the feed.