With Just a Phone: 10 Wattpad Tools to Write Stories

Free to write on, from your phone

Phone story for $0: ten Wattpad tools to write and publish, simplest first. Here's how you do it. Number ten: Wattpad lets anyone write and publish a complete story on a phone. It's a free service, and ads keep it free.

You can share a story with the world anytime, from anywhere on Wattpad. More than 85% of its users read on a phone. The app is offered in twelve languages. Originals, its paid stories, come in six languages.

Premium is an enhanced, subscription version of Wattpad. Readers pay for those extras, once or on a recurring basis. The best way to make money writing there is Originals, with an ongoing story. By our count, twelve app languages is twice the six for Originals.

The link is in the description. Up next, starting a story on your phone.

Start a story in the app

Number nine: the app has five sections, and the Write one is where a story starts. There, you create a new story or keep writing one you started. Your Library tracks the stories you follow, privately. Updates holds comments, messages, mentions and new followers.

Your username is unique to you. Your profile's about section holds up to 2,000 characters, with no links. Your profile picture is 128 pixels square, under one megabyte. To begin, you register, choose an account name and set a password.

Every account needs a valid, verified email to reach all of the app. Publishing opens once your email is verified. By our count, that profile picture holds 16,384 pixels. If step-by-step guides like this help you, subscribe.

Every official page is linked below. Next, setting up your story.

Set up the story details

Number eight: story details make your story easier to find. They cover the story type, the language, the copyright and the rating. Copyright says if the story is just yours, or open to reposts and remixes. Every creator must rate the story, and the details can change at any point.

You pick up to three genres, and up to three subgenres for each. By our count, three genres plus three subgenres each make twelve labels. A cover works best at 512 by 800 pixels. On some phones it shows as small as a finger.

A description runs 900 words or less, with your main character's goals and stakes. Then, writing the first part.

Write the first part

Number seven: a story can go up in parts or in full. Many writers post in parts, to get feedback from readers along the way. The writing page has bold, italic and underline, and left, right or center alignment. There's no font switch, because readers pick the font they like.

Text files can't be uploaded, so a backup off Wattpad keeps your own copy. Pictures and videos can go in the header or inside the text. Drafts stay private until you publish. A fifteen-minute timer helps get ideas down without editing yourself.

Chapters of 1,500 to 2,000 words are easy to digest. By our count, ten parts that size make fifteen to 20,000 words. Coming up, publishing a part.

Publish or schedule a part

Number six: a part goes live from Publish, at the top right of the page. Two options appear: Schedule, or Publish Now. A part can be scheduled up to one year ahead. The scheduler runs in the web version, and the app shows what's scheduled.

Readers can't see your upcoming scheduled parts. Every part should meet the content guidelines as you write it. Stories are public by default, and they can't be set to private. When a story ends, marking it Complete tells readers it's finished.

That can also help, since search can filter by completed stories. Chapter titles work best with no more than one emoji. By our count, a part a week for a year is fifty-two parts. Then, keeping readers coming back.

Keep readers coming back

Number five: the writer guide suggests one to three new chapters a week, on a regular schedule. Telling readers helps, like a line in the description saying new chapters every Friday. Letting followers know ahead of time when new parts come out helps too. Search favors serialized stories that update on a regular schedule, and completed stories.

Ongoing stories that stop updating come after those. If you can't update often, the scheduler or draft mode keeps things regular. Draft mode takes a story off public view until you're ready to update it more regularly. A message on your board can be announced to every follower.

You can post up to three announcements a day. By our count, three a day for seven days is twenty-one a week. Followers get notified when you start a new story or send an announcement. Following other creators keeps you up to date with their stories too.

Cliffhangers give a story energy and bring readers back for more. Inside the text, you can remind readers to vote and comment on each chapter. An open question at the end of a chapter can start a discussion in the comments. When readers add your story to a reading list, a personal thank-you shows you care.

Reading lists show on profiles as public recommendations. Say Maya posts two chapters every Friday for four weeks. By our count, two chapters for four Fridays make eight in her first month. Up next, tags and the community.

Tags and the community

Number four: tags tell readers what your story is about. They put it in search, on tag pages and in readers' home feeds. Accurate, relevant words make the story easier to find. Each tag should give a reader an idea of what they might find in the story.

Readers find stories two main ways: the home feed and search. The home feed recommends stories mostly from what each reader has been reading. In search, readers look up titles and usernames, or tags with the hash symbol. Each tag is one word, with no spaces or punctuation.

Popularity, relevance, trendiness and engagement all shape tag rankings. A story can have up to twenty-five tags. Ten or more can help it be found, the publishing guide says. By our count, ten tags still leaves fifteen of the twenty-five open.

Comments let readers share their thoughts with you and with other readers, right on your story. Voting shows support for a creator and their work. A reader can vote once on each part, and up to 100 times a day. Votes show beside the star symbol on your profile and your story's page.

Answering comments shows readers you appreciate them, and can bring more comments. Say Maya's story has twelve parts. By our count, one loyal reader can give her twelve votes, one per part. Then, the rules to keep.

The rules to keep

Number three: you own all the rights to what you create and post on Wattpad. Wattpad gets a nonexclusive license to publish it, which covers storing and displaying it. It never sells your content to others without your explicit permission. Posting something that wasn't yours to begin with doesn't make it yours.

So you post only work you hold the rights to, or have permission for. Reading the content guidelines comes first, since content that breaks them can be removed. A mature rating is no exception to those guidelines. Even a story marked mature can't hold prohibited content, which gets removed.

Copyrighted work of others, without their legal consent, isn't allowed. Protecting privacy means no personal or identifiable details, yours or anyone else's. Sensitive topics can be flagged for readers on the story details page. On your profile, you can advertise your e-book or printed book for sale elsewhere.

If the whole story isn't on Wattpad, the description has to say so. You're responsible for all the activity on your account, and for keeping your password private. Wattpad is for personal, non-commercial use only, its terms say. Special programs can bring their own terms that override those.

Those terms were last revised in May twenty nineteen, and the content guidelines in August twenty twenty-six. An account closed by mistake can still be restored for six months. By our count, that's about twenty-six weeks to bring it back. Coming up, the numbers on your story.

Read your story statistics

Number two: story statistics show how your story is doing. They're on the web only, and they won't be rolling out on the app. Total reads count every time a part is viewed or read, since it went up. So one reader opening ten parts counts as ten total reads.

Total reads never go down, because they add up from the day your first part goes up. Unique readers are the daily viewers or readers of your story, each counted once. Engaged readers are unique readers with five or more minutes of reading in the last 365 days. Engaged readers is a newer metric, for more insight into how a story performs.

Total reads, unique readers and engaged readers are the three headline numbers. These numbers reset roughly every twenty-four hours. Read counts, vote counts and comments on each part are worth checking regularly too. The statistics also show who your readers are, and their engagement over the last thirty days.

No single number decides who gets into Wattpad's programs. The guide suggests checking at least once a week, to see how many readers a story attracts and how engaged they are. Say Maya's first reader opens all ten parts of her story. By our count, that's ten total reads, but still one unique reader.

Say Maya checks every Sunday for a year. By our count, that's fifty-two checks in her first year. Last, getting paid.

How the paid program pays writers

Number one: writers earn when readers unlock Originals with Coins or a Premium Plus subscription. With Premium Plus, a portion of the reader's payment goes to the writer, under their contract. Readers can wait for free weekly updates, or unlock right away with Coins. After launch, new parts post at least weekly, with the newest behind a paywall.

When a new chapter posts, the oldest posted chapter becomes free. Ongoing stories are released weekly, with strong hooks and characters with clear goals and stakes. Scouts review stories and pitches by the genres Wattpad is monetizing now. Once signed, writers and editors prepare the story for about four months.

The program helps writers hone their craft, but doesn't market their stories for them. Payment only goes through Wattpad's official tools, and no one can demand it any other way. The pages publish no percentage, payout amount, minimum or payment date. Originals are by invitation only, picked by the editorial team.

Completed stories can be Originals too, but they can't be pitched right now. To pitch an ongoing story to that team, a writer must be in the Creators Program. Posting at least 500 words a week, and meeting its entry requirements, makes a writer eligible. By our count, 500 words a week is 2,000 a month.

Creators can also get paid through brand campaigns and initiatives. Say Maya posts 500 words every week for a year. By our count, that's 26,000 words, enough for many weekly parts. Which writing platforms actually pay you next?

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