Alternatives to Tumblr
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newcomersTumblr is at risk of malfunction or collapse. We are following this concern and posting updates to help other folks track what is happening and decide what to do about it.
Of course, we think Dreamwidth is awesome, and our main focus here is helping new users make it work for them. However, no platform can be all things to all people. Here are some alternatives to Tumblr that might meet some of your needs for which Dreamwidth may not be the best fit...
5 Best Tumblr Alternatives in 2025
10 Best Tumblr Alternatives Bloggers Are Using In 2025
15 Best Tumblr Alternatives- 2025: With NSFW Content
18 Best Blogging Platforms for Free Blogging in 2025
The 20 Best Alternatives for Tumblr in 2025
The 36 Best Tumblr Alternatives for 2025
List of Best Tumblr Alternatives & Competitors 2025
TOP 10 Best Blogging Platforms for 2025
Top Tumblr Alternatives in 2025
Tumblr Alternatives & Competitors 2025
Which other sites do you use, and what parts of your Tumblr experience are they replacing? What do you recommend for other Tumblr refugees?
Of course, we think Dreamwidth is awesome, and our main focus here is helping new users make it work for them. However, no platform can be all things to all people. Here are some alternatives to Tumblr that might meet some of your needs for which Dreamwidth may not be the best fit...
5 Best Tumblr Alternatives in 2025
10 Best Tumblr Alternatives Bloggers Are Using In 2025
15 Best Tumblr Alternatives- 2025: With NSFW Content
18 Best Blogging Platforms for Free Blogging in 2025
The 20 Best Alternatives for Tumblr in 2025
The 36 Best Tumblr Alternatives for 2025
List of Best Tumblr Alternatives & Competitors 2025
TOP 10 Best Blogging Platforms for 2025
Top Tumblr Alternatives in 2025
Tumblr Alternatives & Competitors 2025
Which other sites do you use, and what parts of your Tumblr experience are they replacing? What do you recommend for other Tumblr refugees?
no subject
Date: Apr. 17th, 2025 04:35 am (UTC)Anyways, as for my Tumblr replacements,
1. I made my own website for my creative work. Things there that I really like get reuploaded anywhere that will support the format, but if any of those things get shut down, there's a central hub of my stuff still out there.
2. Random short updates and observations go on Bluesky/Mastodon/Plurk. Since Bluesky doesn't have locked accounts or privacy settings on posts yet, I'd recommend the latter two if you're a more private individual. (If you're super private, your best bet is a Fediverse instance run by yourself or a techie friend. Not everyone has that kind of time or know-how, but if it's within your means it's worth looking into. (I would like to add that if you want to join Mastodon, try not to join mastodon.social. Why?)
3. I use Dreamwidth for longer posts, but I don't want anyone to think you HAVE to write essays on Dreamwidth or everyone will point and laugh at you. I'm kind of a talker who always felt constrained by character limits on microblogging sites, yet Tumblr feels so image-focused on my side of it that it's near-embarrassing posting anything that's longer than a few sentences. DW has good privacy settings, and if it weren't for the ubiquitous nature of microblogging (meaning I kinda need a presence there to meet people and show people things), I would probably only be here and my website.
If you're hopelessly addicted to talking in the tags, the only site that has that is Pillowfort. For me, using small text on Dreamwidth gives the same feeling. I remember on Twitter people would retweet stuff and then make a tweet that said "lrt blah blah blah," with lrt meaning "[in regards to my] last retweet:," which you could replicate on other microblogging sites if you wanted.
That's all I've got, I think o7
no subject
Date: Apr. 17th, 2025 04:49 am (UTC)Thank you!
Date: Apr. 17th, 2025 04:59 am (UTC)Interesting. I tried to find as many recs as possible, but something always seems to fall through the cracks.
Okay, I found one that lists Pillowfort and added it.
>>1. I made my own website for my creative work. Things there that I really like get reuploaded anywhere that will support the format, but if any of those things get shut down, there's a central hub of my stuff still out there.<<
Good idea.
>>3. I use Dreamwidth for longer posts, but I don't want anyone to think you HAVE to write essays on Dreamwidth or everyone will point and laugh at you. <<
I've been mentioning this a lot, and I'm delighted to see someone else doing so.
>> I'm kind of a talker who always felt constrained by character limits on microblogging sites,<<
Yeah, that's why I never bothered with them. I don't fit in a box that small.
no subject
Date: Apr. 17th, 2025 07:37 pm (UTC)I noticed the article listed these as cons:
Invite-only registration system limits rapid community growth.
Server stability issues during peak usage times.
I can't speak to server stability. I've rarely had any problems accessing it, but then I am not using it in the U.S. evenings so it might well be true.
I was expecting them to list the lack of a mobile app, which is a deal killer for many people. However PF just launched one this past week. I don't use it on mobile so can't speak to it, and I imagine it could be buggy since it's brand new. But one now exists.
Regarding the rolling invite list though (which functions just like AO3's) to me this is a plus, not a con. It means the site won't be overwhelmed by new users but will be able to more steadily add them, waves of people won't crash the servers, and it will deter people adding the site just to add the site and creating lots of dead accounts.
Personally I find PF a good complement to DW, and ideal for Tumblr users since the site functions like a Tumblr/DW cross.
no subject
Date: Apr. 17th, 2025 08:37 pm (UTC)5 Best Tumblr Alternatives in 2025
If you're looking to build your own website from templates and maybe make money off it.
Top 10 Tumblr Alternatives to Publish Blogs In 2025
Repeats all the first article
Pillowfort has a wait list. One of these other suggestion lists says the community feels "dead"; this does not surprise me. I am not confident in them financially going the same way as Cohost. Cohost went belly up at the end of last year and turned off its servers in January 2025.
Reddit, while its reputation precedes it, I would recommend looking into the u/spez scandals; there is a sizable reddit refugee population on tumblr. Tumblr dev invented "Communities" which are functionally very similar to reddit boards, or DW communities here.
Of what I remember, the CEO of reddit suddenly affixed an unreasonable sticker price for 3rd party API pullers (which until this point, API pulling was not monetized), making them virtually unusable, so everyone on app was forced to switch to the Reddit official app, which contains more ads than actual content.
Later then entire corpus of reddit was sold as training data during the generative AI arms race. I think Google was the one who bought it for Gemini, but will not swear.
Mastodon is one of those federated twitter alternatives. With most people migrating to Bluesky instead, I find the people advocating for Mastodon to be much more technologically niche than the average former twitter user.
There is allegedly a way of hooking up mastodon to bluesky. When I asked a friend about it, it's unpopular because it forces bluesky users to follow to the middleman as well.
Overall, your mileage will vary based on which server you create your account on, and how much each server's administrative team is able to keep up with the users on that server.
The reason I am about to shut mine down is due to its poor search features. Within the local server is alright. It's trying to get outside of that bubble that's difficult if you are searching by tag.
Search also doesn't want to pull history further back than maybe 20 posts containing the specified tag. It's a little easier by user, but not enough for me to find what I'm looking for.
15 Best Tumblr Alternatives- 2025: With NSFW Content
This article is out of date.
4chan got hacked so badly this past Monday, it's considered all but dead.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2025/04/internet-cesspit-4chan-apparently-hacked-mostly-unreachable-since-monday-night/
DeviantArt sold out to generative AI as well. https://slate.com/technology/2024/05/deviantart-what-happened-ai-decline-lawsuit-stability.html
Pixiv is a better website if you are using it in a language other than English. The aggressive machine translation makes searching for things difficult unless you can read an asian language.
Twitter, not "x.com" makes it more apparent this article is not viable. We all know about elongated muskrat's hostile takeover and failed rebranding.
18 Best Blogging Platforms for Free Blogging in 2025
I don't find this list trustworthy either?
Mostly repeats of the above, especially among the blogging to get paid tier stuff.
LinkedIn is NOT a blogging platform. Instagram is also not a blogging platform.
I'm also not entirely sure what's happening between wordpress dot COM and wordpress dot ORG. This involves some drama with Tumblr's current ownership and a former friend. I think one of them is a fork of the other after the two of them had a falling out.
The 20 Best Alternatives for Tumblr in 2025
NewTumbl I have never heard of and not seen promoted as a tumblr clone. I fear this one is in the same tier as Pillowfort or Cohost with a very uncertain financial future.
This article also deadnames Twitter, so I must assume it is out of date.
Soul APP looks like a Facebook/Metaverse failure. Facebook isn't a blogging service in the first place.
Pintrest is where art goes to be stolen. It also doesn't appear to have any sort of social component, but I could be wrong.
List of Best Tumblr Alternatives & Competitors 2025 and TOP 10 Best Blogging Platforms for 2025 are all repeats of the above lists.
diaspora* (sic) is another fediverse alternative to Mastodon or Bluesky.
Flickr is not really a blogging platform any more than Instagram is, and Instagram is trying to turn into a Tiktok clone.
The last I have read of it, there's some controversy around it deleting freebie users' archives unless they pony up for a paid account. I do not know if this is still the case. Imgur appears to be safer? More research required.
I hope this helps.