Always the tinkerer, I’ve been kicking the tires on the publishing platform, Ghost. After learning that Ghost can be self-hosted, I spun up a local installation and gave it a try. First impression? This is a dream for writers looking for an easy, elegant way to publish online content.
At a glance, Ghost is a modern, minimalist publishing platform that puts content front and center—and for many writers, journalists, and independent creators looking to share and monetize their work, Ghost performs this single task beautifully. Unlike WordPress, which has evolved into a sprawling ecosystem capable of powering everything from online stores to complex membership sites, Ghost takes a more focused, streamlined approach: it’s built specifically for publishing.
Here’s my main takeaway – whereas a self-hosted WordPress site requires paying for monthly hosting, installing software, managing plugins, and keeping everything updated, Ghost offers a more simplified experience. Its fully managed service—Ghost (Pro)—takes care of all the behind-the-scenes work, including hosting, maintenance, and updates. Writers can focus entirely on creating and publishing content without getting bogged down in the technical aspects of managing a website. It’s a premium, ready-to-go platform designed for publishers who want to hit the ground running and stay focused. The monthly subscription for Ghost is reasonably priced—especially when compared to the combined costs of hosting, maintenance, and ongoing support that many of my WordPress clients pay me to manage.
As someone who’s worked with WordPress since its early days, I’ve seen it evolve into an incredibly flexible and powerful platform. Most of my clients use WordPress for their websites. However, some rely on the WordPress platform purely to publish content—and for them, the complexity of WordPress can sometimes feel like overkill. Not everyone needs to manage plugins, updates, or deal with the occasional technical hiccup. They just want to write. For clients wanting a no-fuss approach, Ghost offers a balanced, cost-effective alternative without the extra maintenance, updating, and costs.
Ghost is proudly open-source and this philosophy is baked into the platform. Created by John O’Nolan, a former deputy lead of the WordPress UI team, Ghost was born out of a desire to build a focused, ethical platform for content creators. Ghost is run as a non-profit organization, meaning the platform is developed transparently and without pressure from ad-based revenue models or venture capital. It’s a creator-first model that empowers users to truly focus on their work and building an audience.
Ghost’s writing experience is exceptional. Its user interface encourages a distraction-free, text-first workflow. While it lacks the visual, block-based flexibility of WordPress’s Gutenberg editor, many writers actually prefer the simplicity—it keeps the focus on the writing, not the layout.
The platform’s interface is sleek and elegant. The dashboard is refreshingly minimal, offering just what writers need to create, manage, and publish content—without the clutter. This stands in contrast to WordPress, which, while extremely powerful, can feel overwhelming for users who simply want to write and share.
Under the hood, Ghost is built on Node.js, making it fast and lightweight by design. Performance and SEO are optimized out of the box, and features like membership management, email newsletters, and paid subscriptions are integrated directly into the core platform. There’s no need to rely on third-party plugins—Ghost offers an all-in-one toolset for building an audience and monetizing one’s work.
Compared to the increasingly popular publishing platform Substack, Ghost’s pricing model is another major strength. Instead of taking a percentage of subscription revenue, Ghost uses a flat-rate fee model. This means creators keep 100% of what they earn—a huge advantage for those building sustainable, independent publishing businesses.
WordPress remains unmatched in flexibility and it’s still a great choice for publishing a wide variety of online content. With thousands of plugins and themes, a WordPress website can be crafted to accomplish just about any task. Ghost isn’t trying to do everything. It’s a refined, purpose-built tool for publishing—and here it excels.
If WordPress is the Swiss Army knife of content management systems, Ghost is the precision-crafted fountain pen: elegant, intentional, and designed for people who simply want to write and publish. For creators who want to build an audience and publish online without distractions—or revenue cuts—Ghost is a practical solution.