Substack vs Blogger vs dev.to for technical SEO

TL;DR

For technical SEO, publish the canonical on your own domain first, then choose platforms by job: dev.to for developer discovery and fast indexing, Substack for the newsletter audience (SEO is secondary there), Blogger for a free hosted blog with decent Google indexing. No platform beats owning the canonical; the platform choice is about audience, not rankings.

Substack vs Blogger vs dev.to for technical SEO

Use this when

• Choosing where to publish technical articles
• Deciding a canonical-plus-syndication strategy
• Evaluating platform SEO claims

Not for this skill when

• Newsletter growth is the goal (then it is Substack, SEO aside)
• You already have strong domain authority (platforms matter less)
• You want one home for everything (your own domain)

Steps

1. Put the canonical on your domain. Whichever platforms you use, the original lives on a URL you control with proper meta and sitemap. Expected: search engines have one source of truth.

1. Use dev.to for developer discovery. Strong domain authority, fast indexing, and an audience that actually reads technical posts. Set the canonical URL on every post. Expected: quick visibility among developers.

1. Use Substack for the subscriber relationship. Its SEO is fine but unremarkable; its value is the inbox and the subscriber graph. Expected: audience building, not search traffic.

1. Use Blogger if you need free and simple. It indexes well on Google and costs nothing, but the audience and tooling are thin compared to dev.to. Expected: a no-cost hosted option.

platform jobs:
  canonical: your domain (SEO home)
  dev.to:    developer discovery
  Substack:  newsletter audience
  Blogger:   free hosted fallback

1. Cross-link deliberately. Platform copies link to the canonical and to each other where it makes sense. Expected: authority flows to the version you own.

Variant phrasings

best blogging platform for developer SEO

Your own domain for the canonical; dev.to for discovery; Substack for subscribers.

dev.to vs Substack for technical content

dev.to wins on discovery and indexing speed; Substack wins on the subscriber relationship.

where should developers publish for SEO

Own the canonical. Platforms are distribution, not homes.

Why it happens

SEO value comes from the canonical page's authority and content, not from which platform button you pressed. Platforms contribute audience and crawl speed, but a post on someone else's domain builds their asset. The canonical-first split captures both.

Edge cases / pitfalls

• dev.to canonical support must actually be set per post; it is not automatic.
• Substack publications can rank, but migrating off Substack later is painful; plan ahead.
• Blogger's future is uncertain; do not build your only home there.
• Do not publish the full text everywhere with no canonicals; that is how you split your own rankings.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_tO21uQYSEUaKJl2osJH7BA