An Introduction to Fanfiction Websites
Originally published on Medium.
When you’re first getting into fanfiction, it can be hard to know which websites to check out. There are many options out there, and each has a unique atmosphere and offers different flavors of fanfics. It can be hard to know which site is best for you without spending time on them, but where do you even start?
Part of the answer will depend on which fandoms you’re interested in. Your fellow fans will be more active on certain sites than others, so that’s one thing to check. But it also depends on the site itself, including which features it has and the overall atmosphere.
Here are some of the fanfiction sites to check out during your search.
An important note before we start: This list only focuses on fanfiction sites that host fanfiction for multiple fandoms. There are many fanfiction archives that only focus on one fandom. Those are also great to check out, but they’re not featured on this list.
Fanfiction.net
Fanfiction.net (FF.net) was established in 1998, so it’s a well-established source for fanfiction. It has thousands of fandoms, and most fanfiction readers and writers have heard of the site. Because it’s been around so long, it’s easy to find stories from decades past there. It’s a great archive of stories for fandoms that are no longer particularly popular.
The majority of fics on the site are written in English, though other languages are supported as well.
FF.net has policies that forbid fanfiction written about the works of certain authors who disapprove of fanfiction, so if you’re in one of those fandoms, it’s not the place to go. Since 2001, it has also banned real person fiction (RPF), which is fanfiction based on celebrities. Songfics, fanfiction which often includes song lyrics as part of the work, have been banned as well due to copyright concerns.
The site has a rating system that allows works rated Mature (the equivalent of an R-rated movie) but bans NC-17 works. This led to a purge of the site in both 2002 and 2012 where a large number of works that were deemed to violate this policy were deleted in a short period of time.
The site allows users to filter by fandom, rating, characters, and pairings. Writers are limited to four characters and two pairings listed on a work. Crossover works can be posted, but these works appear on separate pages only for crossover works.
Communities where works can be curated and collected by users are also available on the site.
FF.net has some features that are hard to find on other sites. There are forums, and for particularly active fandoms, you can find challenge forums where users are given prompts and sometimes compete with each other by writing fics. Other fans also use these forums for roleplaying or just chatting.
Users can also list themselves as beta readers, and writers can search this list by fandom to find possible beta readers for their work.
Archive of Our Own
Archive of Our Own (AO3) was established by the Organization for Transformative Works (OTW) in 2008. The OTW is a non-profit that advocates for fanworks, and the AO3 was established to be a non-commercial place to host fanfiction, which means it has no advertisements and is funded by donations. AO3 was also established in response to “purges” on other sites where large numbers of works were suddenly deleted. Because of this AO3 has a strong commitment to hosting all fanworks that aren’t illegal, which has also created some controversy around the site.
The site offers collections that can be used to create works, and users can host events and gift exchanges through the site. Users also have the option to add pseudonyms to their account if they’ve been previously known under multiple names in fandom, and they can orphan works that they no longer want to be associated with, leaving them on the site but without their name attached.
One feature on AO3 that isn’t found on other sites is the tagging system. Writers can type any tags they want to their work. Then, tag wrangling volunteers connect similar tags together, making it easier for readers to find the kind of works they’re looking for.
Wattpad
Wattpad was established in 2006 and hosts original fiction along with fanfiction. In fact, it wasn’t meant to be a fanfiction site when it was created, but it has many fanfiction readers and writers today. Wattpad is particularly popular among RPF fandoms, especially self-insert fanfic where a fictional version of the author is the main character.
Wattpad started as a mobile-only site, so it works well for people who want to do most or all of their fanfiction reading and writing on mobile.
Recently, Wattpad was bought by a new company, and there have been reports on social media that they are more stringently enforcing their terms of service, which prohibits a lot of adult content. Some fans have reported their stories being deleted from the site.
Wattpad has a reputation in fandom communities for having a younger user base. It’s seen as a place where people first begin writing and reading fanfiction before possibly moving to other sites.
Wattpad has also launched Wattpad Books to publish some of the more popular works posted on the website, though this only applies to original fiction.
Tumblr
Tumblr, which started in 2007, is a blogging website, not just a fanfiction website. Since it began, it has become a popular place for fandoms to congregate, and many people use it to post their fanworks, including fanfiction and fan art.
In late 2018, Tumblr announced that they would no longer host adult content. This led to a purge of such content from the site, and many angry fans moved to other platforms. However, there are still active communities on the site.
The site allows for readers to also reblog fanfiction and share it on their own blogs as well. Many fanfiction writers who post on other sites will create posts on Tumblr with links to their stories on other platforms, even if they don’t post the work on Tumblr itself.
These are only a few of many sites on the internet where people can post fanfiction. All of them have their pros and cons, so it’s worth exploring them all to see which works best for you.