Hello, everyone!

Typebar Magazine founder & editor Matt Wolfbridge here with a special announcement: We will be launching a major redesign of the site, and soon. We will also be migrating to Ghost, away from WordPress and Patreon.

It’s my suspicion that several questions have come to your mind. Allow me to answer them.

Redesign? What kind of redesign? I hate change and wish the internet looked how it did in 2012!

I feel the same way. I think it’ll comfort you to know one of the founding principles of Typebar Magazine was a clean, minimally distracting layout. That principle will never change. As a prolific reader of the internet, I cannot stand it when beautiful prose and trenchant insights are forced to fight against pop-up ads, Taboola spam, and other visual indignities.

What visual changes are you making to the site?

• Modifying the grid layout so we can see the beautiful cover art for each issue. Previously you could only see this on the Patreon store thumbnail for the eBook version of the magazine. It’ll still be a grid, just with the cover next to it!
• Adding a section to the front page for fiction (yes, we’ll be publishing fiction on the site in 2026!).
• Adding a section to the front page for “interstitial” essays published in between Official Issues of The Magazine.
• A smattering of tiny tweaks here and there (author bylines adjacent to the essay titles instead of inline in the body of the post, etc).

Are there other changes coming?

• There will be MORE Typebar in 2026.
• As you may have inferred from the design changes, we’ll be publishing fiction on the site instead of exclusively in the eBook.
• We’re excited to expand our publication schedule to include essays published in between issues.
• We’ll be moving to a metered paywall instead of the hard paywall we currently employ.
• We’ll be adding subscriber-only comments sections.

What about the Patreon?

Destinations like Patreon and Substack are increasingly turning into walled gardens prioritizing their own business models at the expense of the artists, writers, journalists, and other creatives who rely on them. Moving to Ghost allows us to have a more direct relationship with the audience, one that a tech industry suit can’t steal from us at any moment. We have paused Patreon payments for December as we wind down our operation there. In the future, sign-ups will be here on the site. Easy!

What about existing subscribers?

We want to take care of you somehow, whether it’s an exclusive deal on the new site for Patreon supporters or in some other way. Your devotion both financially and creatively has not gone unappreciated and we want to appreciate you in kind.

What about the eBook editions?

Not going anywhere! We enjoy the experience of lounging with an e-reader and feel it’s the greatest non-analog conduit to magazine reading experience of old. The eBook will be available to all subscribers at no extra charge, or available for a one-time payment.

Will prices change?

We will launch the new site with one monthly tier of $5. If you’re already on the $5 tier, then prices won’t increase. Sadly, the $1 tier will not be continued into 2026. We did not take that decision lightly. But we believe increasing our costs by increasing output and moving to Ghost is ultimately better for the site (and by extension better for its writers and readers) in the long run. Many successful independent operations run on Ghost, including 404 Media, Hell Gate, and most recently, Aftermath. We’ve been wanting to make this change for a while but we’re finally close enough that we can announce it.

What about Issue 8?

Typebar Magazine Issue 8 was slated to be released in late November/early December. But the redesign is close enough to being finished that it seemed better to wait. Why publish the essays when a better version of the site is so near? It seemed more fair to both readers and writers simply to wait. Rest assured, we’ve got a great line up we can’t wait to pair with a great new website!

When will all this happen?

I have beheld the redesigned site for myself. It’s essentially ready, barring a few tweaks. But that’s just half the story. The real work starts once the redesign is finished and I do the official migration. The optimistic answer to the question, then, is sometime in mid-January. Issue 8 will launch the same day as the new site!

Thank you for letting us know!

Thank you for supporting independent media and our mission of preserving cultural analysis and criticism.

We’ll be seeing each other again in January, and in far fancier a setting!

As always, keep reading!

-Matt Wolfbridge, Typebar Magazine Founder & Editor.