What tool do most creators use to write & publish?

Notion is the most-adopted tool for this job among the creators we track: 23 tracked creators have an active usage record for it. 90% of its classified mentions are organic, meaning no sponsorship signal was found in them (mentions we cannot classify are excluded from that ratio). Adoption counts, not editorial opinion, order this list, and the receipts behind it are linked above.

What is the runner-up to Notion, and when is it the better choice?

Gmail ranks second with 15 active creators, against 23 for Notion. The honest differentiation our data supports: Gmail sits in Email & Newsletters, Notion in Note-taking & PKM, so choose by which part of the job you actually spend time in. Where a creator has explained the choice on the record, the quote appears in the list above with a source link.

How is this ranking decided?

By counting creators, not opinions. Every mention we ingest carries a receipt: a source link, a timestamp or position, a verbatim quote of at most 120 characters, and a sponsorship classification (organic, sponsored or ambiguous). The list orders tools by how many tracked creators actively use each one; organic mentions weigh four times more than sponsored ones in scoring. Affiliate links on this page have no path into that computation. Full detail is on the methodology page.

How fresh is this data?

The scores behind this ranking are snapshotted weekly, and the data behind the current list was computed on 31 Jul 2026, the same date the stamp at the bottom of this page shows. After a recompute, the page refreshes within roughly ten to twenty minutes (two stacked 600-second caches). Recency also shapes the ranking itself: mention weight decays with a 14-day half-life, so current usage counts more than last year's.

Are these affiliate recommendations?

No. Some links on this page, marked with an arrow, are affiliate links, and if you buy through them we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That revenue has no path into the ranking: positions, trending scores and sponsorship labels are computed exclusively from creator-mention data. The full disclosure, in FTC wording and the German paragraph 5a UWG wording, sits on this page above the list.

Where do these creator mentions come from?

From public content by the creators we track: YouTube videos, podcast episodes, X posts and newsletters. When a tracked creator mentions a tool there, we ingest the mention together with its receipt: a source link, a timestamp or position, a quote of at most 120 characters, and a sponsorship classification. Rankings are computed exclusively from that mention data; money never changes them.

What do creators use to write and publish?

Notion is the most-adopted tool for this among creators we track, used by 23 creators (90% of its mentions organic). This ranking counts real, receipt-backed creator usage — no editorial opinion, no paid placement.

Spans: 3 categories · ranked by active tracked creators

Affiliate links · Werbung›

Affiliate disclosure: links marked with ↗ on this page are affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. This never influences rankings, trending scores or organic/sponsored labels — those are computed exclusively from creator-mention data.

Werbehinweis gemäß §5a UWG: Mit ↗ markierte Links auf dieser Seite sind Affiliate-Links (Werbung). Bei einem Kauf über diese Links erhalten wir eine Provision; für Sie entstehen keine Mehrkosten. Dies hat niemals Einfluss auf Rankings, Trend-Scores oder Organisch/Gesponsert-Kennzeichnungen — diese werden ausschließlich aus Creator-Erwähnungsdaten berechnet.

1
NotionNote-taking & PKM
Connected workspace combining notes, documents, wikis and databases. Pages are built from blocks and can embed tables, boards and calendars; teams and solo creators use it for planning, documentation and content pipelines. Includes the Notion AI add-on.
23 active creators · 40 mentions · 90% organic · Free plan; paid plans from ~$10/user/month
“Based on my quarterly goals doc in Notion, tell me what meetings I shouldn't be in” — Dan Martell source ↗
try Notion receipts →
2
GmailEmail & Newsletters
Google's email service, with labels instead of folders, strong spam filtering and search across the whole mailbox.
15 active creators · 29 mentions · 100% organic
“Send personalized emails to hundreds of people directly from Gmail using a 100% free mail merge add-on.” — Kevin Stratvert source ↗
try Gmail receipts →
3
HostingerWebsite Builders & Publishing
Provider of web hosting, domains and virtual servers.
14 active creators · 32 mentions · 81% organic
“Code NATEHERK for 10% off VPS (annual plan)” — Nate Herk | AI Automation source ↗
try Hostinger receipts →
4
SubstackEmail & Newsletters
Newsletter and media platform where writers publish free or paid posts, podcasts, video and Notes. No upfront cost — the platform takes roughly 10% of paid subscriptions — with a recommendation network that drives subscriber growth.
12 active creators · 39 mentions · 100% organic · Free to publish; Substack keeps ~10% of paid subscription revenue
try Substack receipts →
5
NotebookLMNote-taking & PKM
Research notebook that answers only from the documents you upload, and cites the passage behind every answer.
11 active creators · 20 mentions · 90% organic
“NotebookLM just added a brand new feature called short video overviews” — Futurepedia source ↗
try NotebookLM receipts →
6
ObsidianNote-taking & PKM
Local-first Markdown note app built around bidirectional links and a graph view. Notes are plain files on disk, extended by thousands of community plugins. Optional paid services add end-to-end-encrypted sync and web publishing.
10 active creators · 11 mentions · 100% organic · Free for personal use; Sync ~$5/month, Publish ~$10/site/month
“Learn how to use Obsidian step by step in this beginner-friendly tutorial.” — Kevin Stratvert source ↗
try Obsidian receipts →
7
Google SheetsNote-taking & PKM
Browser spreadsheet with shared editing, formulas and links into the rest of Google Workspace.
7 active creators · 8 mentions · 100% organic
“I created a functional CRM and business toolkit with Google Sheets called Sheetify CRM that connects to Google Workspace” — Stewart Gauld source ↗
try Google Sheets receipts →
8
GranolaNote-taking & PKM
Meeting notepad that listens along, fills in around your own bullet points and summarises afterwards.
6 active creators · 10 mentions · 70% organic
“Granola is my go-to tool” — Tool Finder source ↗
try Granola receipts →
9
SuperhumanEmail & Newsletters
Speed-focused email client for Gmail and Outlook: keyboard-first triage, split inboxes, snippets, follow-up reminders and AI drafting. Marketed at founders and executives; acquired by Grammarly in 2025.
6 active creators · 15 mentions · 93% organic · From ~$25–30/month per user
“I also share one of my favorite productivity tools, Superhuman Mail, which helps me manage emails faster with AI” — Ishan Sharma source ↗
try Superhuman receipts →
10
KitEmail & Newsletters
Email marketing platform for creators, formerly ConvertKit, rebranded to Kit in 2024. Visual automations, tagging, paid newsletters, a creator network for cross-promotion and built-in commerce for digital products.
5 active creators · 15 mentions · 100% organic · Free up to 10,000 subscribers; paid from ~$25/month
“I'm the Creative Director at a remote tech company called Kit” — Charli Marie source ↗
try Kit receipts →
11
FramerWebsite Builders & Publishing
Visual website builder that publishes production sites directly from a Figma-like canvas. Components, CMS collections, animations and localization without code; popular for portfolios, landing pages and marketing sites.
5 active creators · 8 mentions · 75% organic · Free plan; sites from ~$10/site/month
“my studio rebranded and built in Framer” — Phil Pallen source ↗
try Framer receipts →
12
WordPressWebsite Builders & Publishing
Publishing platform for sites and blogs, extended through themes and plugins.
5 active creators · 6 mentions · 100% organic
“WordPress is still one of the best platforms out there” — Charlie Chang source ↗
try WordPress receipts →
13
WebflowWebsite Builders & Publishing
Professional no-code website platform: a visual designer that outputs clean HTML/CSS, a structured CMS, ecommerce and hosting. Favored by freelancers and agencies building client sites and complex marketing systems.
4 active creators · 8 mentions · 100% organic · Free staging plan; site plans from ~$14/month
“I'm updating an entire Webflow site - pages, CMS content, components - without even opening Webflow!” — Flux Academy source ↗
try Webflow receipts →
14
ExcelNote-taking & PKM
Microsoft's spreadsheet, with formulas, pivot tables and charts.
4 active creators · 10 mentions · 100% organic
try Excel receipts →
15
OutlookEmail & Newsletters
Microsoft's email client with calendar, contacts and tasks.
4 active creators · 4 mentions · 100% organic
try Outlook receipts →
16
beehiivEmail & Newsletters
Newsletter platform built by former Morning Brew engineers: publishing, referral program, recommendations network, ad marketplace and paid subscriptions without revenue cut. Focused on growth tooling for media-style newsletters.
3 active creators · 45 mentions · 96% organic · Free up to 2,500 subscribers; paid from ~$39/month
try beehiiv receipts →
17
Microsoft WordNote-taking & PKM
Microsoft's word processor, with styles, tracked changes and comments.
3 active creators · 3 mentions · 100% organic
“In this APA 7th edition tutorial I set up a complete student paper in Microsoft Word from scratch” — Andy Stapleton source ↗
try Microsoft Word receipts →
18
Google DocsNote-taking & PKM
Browser word processor where several people write in the same document at once, with comments and version history.
3 active creators · 2 mentions · 100% organic
“We use Gmail, Google Docs, Zoom, Stripe, Calendly, and a basic CRM.” — The AI Advantage source ↗
try Google Docs receipts →
19
GammaWebsite Builders & Publishing
Generates presentations, documents and pages from a short brief, without laying out slides by hand.
3 active creators · 3 mentions · 67% organic
“Gamma is one of the leading AI presentation software. We created one doc, one slides, and one website using Gamma to sho” — Tool Finder source ↗
try Gamma receipts →
20
SquarespaceWebsite Builders & Publishing
Website builder with templates, a store, scheduling and domain management.
3 active creators · 13 mentions · 0% organic
try Squarespace receipts →
21
ShortformNote-taking & PKM
Book summaries with commentary and cross-references to related titles.
1 active creators · 3 mentions · 0% organic
try Shortform receipts →
22
GhostWebsite Builders & Publishing
Open-source publishing platform for blogs, newsletters and paid memberships, run by a non-profit foundation. Native subscriptions with 0% platform fee; self-host for free or pay for the managed Ghost(Pro) hosting.
1 active creators · 2 mentions · 0% organic · Open source (MIT), free self-hosted; Ghost(Pro) from ~$9/month
try Ghost receipts →
23
MailchimpEmail & Newsletters
Intuit's email marketing and automation platform: campaigns, customer journeys, segmentation, landing pages and ecommerce integrations. A long-standing default for small businesses, with pricing that scales by contact count.
0 active creators · 0 mentions · – organic · Free up to 500 contacts; paid from ~$13/month
try Mailchimp receipts →
24
Roam ResearchNote-taking & PKM
Outliner-based networked note tool that popularized daily notes and bidirectional block references. Every bullet is an addressable block that can be embedded and linked across pages, aimed at researchers and writers building long-term knowledge graphs.
0 active creators · 0 mentions · – organic · ~$15/month or ~$165/year; long-term 'Believer' plan available
try Roam Research receipts →

FAQ

What tool do most creators use to write & publish?: Notion is the most-adopted tool for this job among the creators we track: 23 tracked creators have an active usage record for it. 90% of its classified mentions are organic, meaning no sponsorship signal was found in them (mentions we cannot classify are excluded from that ratio). Adoption counts, not editorial opinion, order this list, and the receipts behind it are linked above.
What is the runner-up to Notion, and when is it the better choice?: Gmail ranks second with 15 active creators, against 23 for Notion. The honest differentiation our data supports: Gmail sits in Email & Newsletters, Notion in Note-taking & PKM, so choose by which part of the job you actually spend time in. Where a creator has explained the choice on the record, the quote appears in the list above with a source link.
How is this ranking decided?: By counting creators, not opinions. Every mention we ingest carries a receipt: a source link, a timestamp or position, a verbatim quote of at most 120 characters, and a sponsorship classification (organic, sponsored or ambiguous). The list orders tools by how many tracked creators actively use each one; organic mentions weigh four times more than sponsored ones in scoring. Affiliate links on this page have no path into that computation. Full detail is on the methodology page.
How fresh is this data?: The scores behind this ranking are snapshotted weekly, and the data behind the current list was computed on 31 Jul 2026, the same date the stamp at the bottom of this page shows. After a recompute, the page refreshes within roughly ten to twenty minutes (two stacked 600-second caches). Recency also shapes the ranking itself: mention weight decays with a 14-day half-life, so current usage counts more than last year's.
Are these affiliate recommendations?: No. Some links on this page, marked with an arrow, are affiliate links, and if you buy through them we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That revenue has no path into the ranking: positions, trending scores and sponsorship labels are computed exclusively from creator-mention data. The full disclosure, in FTC wording and the German paragraph 5a UWG wording, sits on this page above the list.
Where do these creator mentions come from?: From public content by the creators we track: YouTube videos, podcast episodes, X posts and newsletters. When a tracked creator mentions a tool there, we ingest the mention together with its receipt: a source link, a timestamp or position, a quote of at most 120 characters, and a sponsorship classification. Rankings are computed exclusively from that mention data; money never changes them.

data updated 31 Jul 2026