The most popular FWT advice of 2025
It's been a rough year, but our community came together in huge ways.
Hello friends, happy holidays! The year is almost over! It’s officially winter now! It’s all happening!
In the time-honored tradition of publications rounding up their best work of the year, this week I’m pleased to present 2025’s most popular FWT posts. Below are the newsletters and stories that have most resonated with the FWT community, not only in terms of traffic, but also in the robust conversations that surrounded these topics. Some are super practical — like the nuts and bolts of getting started in freelance journalism — while others are more abstract, like how to get editors to come to you.
But more broadly speaking, what did we learn this year?
Not to get too ~down~ during the holiday season, but one of the overarching themes of many conversations I’ve had this year with freelancers is that ... well, it’s rough out here. Between budgets being slashed, opportunities disappearing, and competition being tougher than ever, so many of us have had a rough year in the industry.
Personally, I have found a weird sort of comfort in that. Despite all of us facing pretty rough headwinds, the freelance community has rallied around each other and supported one another in ways I haven’t seen since the worst days of the pandemic. The generosity of freelancers has been on display in a wonderfully heartening way this year, and though the bad times aren’t going to end any time soon (or ever?), the succor I’ve seen freelancers offer has been a beautiful example of lifting others up. No freelancer makes it without the support of fellow freelancers, and it’s a pleasure to be a part of it. (Sorry to get all sappy, but I really mean it!)
With that, below are the 10 best posts from FWT this year. I hope you’ve gotten as much out of them as I did researching them and putting them together, and I’m so excited for a ton of really great stuff coming in 2026. (And a quick programming note: I’ll be off this Thursday, but back in the saddle after that.)
Happy holidays!