Substack wants its creators to stick around. A TikTok-style feed will help them promote their newsletters.

The winds of change are blowing in Substack‘s direction, and one update is an attempt to cut into TikTok‘s territory. As the newsletter platform’s user base trends in an increasingly political direction, it is launching an infinitely scrolling vertical video feed that is meant to increase discoverability for its creators.

TechCrunch notes that the TikTok-style feed is a redesign of the Media Tab that arrived on Substack last year. The timing of the update is curious; Substack is launching its take on short-form video days before the deadline for a deal that would avert a U.S. TikTok ban. Like many other platforms, Substack is making a play to siphon off users who would be looking for a new content hub in the event of a TikTok ban. It has already established a $20 million fund to reward creators who port their followers over to its shores.

Though text-focused newsletters are Substack’s bread and butter, the platform has spent the past few years cribbing features from the online video world. The 2022 introduction of native video paved the way for enhanced monetization features and new products. Substack says that 82% of its top-earning authors utilize a multimedia approach.

The TikTok-style hub ties into Substack’s video monetization, and it also has potential as a tool for newsletter promotion and audience growth. Creators can condense video posts into short-form clips that tease their work, and they can reach potential subscribers as those consumers scroll through the vertical feed.

Visitors to the Substack’s TikTokified hub should prepare for a preponderance of political posts. The platform is serving as a refuge for journalists who have been displaced from the traditional media ecosystem. To support its rising class of reporters, Substack has partnered with the nonprofit Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression to defend writers targeted by the federal government. (Rival newsletter hub beehiiv offers a similar legal support system as part of its Media Collective.)

Increased support for authors has sent Substack’s paid subscriber numbers soaring past five million, but not everyone is pleased with the platform’s pivot toward political content. According to a report from Digiday, approximately 3,000 creators have moved from Substack to beehiiv over the past year. beehiiv CEO Tyler Denk told Digiday that nearly 1,000 of those creators changed over during the first three months of the second Trump term.

Sportswriter Joe Posnanski was one of those defectors. “When you search my stories online, you see Substack above my name,” Posnanski told Digiday. “Whenever something would blow up a little bit with Substack, I was somehow connected to that, and I didn’t like that at all.”

Substack may not be able to put the cat back in the bag when it comes to political fare, but it can satisfy the creators who remain loyal to it. The TikTok-style feed is part of that effort. With a critical mass of scrollers, it can become a potent discovery engine — especially if the U.S. TikTok ban ends up going through.