Medium: Clapping for articles

A Medium Clapping Tip Makes It Easy To Clap The Max!

So don’t be stingy — one clap is like a slap in the face. Express your support!

Photo by Guillermo Latorre on Unsplash

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This isn’t my normal subject for Medium articles, but it’s Thanksgiving and I learned something new to share. Jump to the bottom for the tip if you’re in a hurry.

Clapping once? Please, you can do better…

Let’s just agree: Clapping once for an article is a slap in the face.

Who attends a concert or performance and does one clap? No one.

Multiple claps, or continuous clapping at a concert, show your degree of support and enjoyment from the experience.

It’s a way to show appreciation to the artist.

Consider that. Medium gives you 50 claps to give on an article; if you gave one clap, why? That’s like a limp handshake — no one likes that.

Note: If you disagree with that, then you probably won’t enjoy the rest of this article. Before you leave, I encourage you to jump to the bottom for the clapping tip.

How Many Times to Clap

How many times to clap on Medium is probably as debatable as restaurant tip percentages; everyone has a perspective, some of it is cultural, and some of it is personal.

My thoughts on clapping

Clapping for an article or comment is a great way to express your level of support or agreement on Medium.

By using multiple claps, you emphasize your opinion and degree of agreement.

I’m told it helps push the article for broader distribution across the platform, so that’s cool.

Multiple claps can be quicker than leaving a comment to express your views. Life gets busy; the higher clap count can be quick.

Another benefit is that you can show support for the article or comments without repeating what others have commented — less repetition and it helps the comments be noted as ‘most relevant’ to the article.

I don’t have firm rules for clapping, but I generally follow the philosophy below.

Clapping for an Article

If I follow you, 30–50 claps will follow.

If your article showed up on my feed, but I don’t follow you. After reading your article,

• I’ll clap 30–50 if I decide to follow you.
• I’ll clap 20–30 if I agree with your article and think it’s worth encouraging broader distribution.

Clapping for a Comment

If I agree with your comment and would write the same or very similar comment, 30–50 claps will follow.

If I agree with your comment, but I hadn’t considered your perspective before, 50 claps will follow — hey, I learned something and thank you.

If I don’t agree with your comment, I won’t clap.

Another Clapping Variable: Total Claps

I’m an engineer, so my eyes are drawn to numbers.

If I’m clapping and I see my usual number of claps is close to the next 10, 25, or 100 in total count, then I’ll likely keep clapping to get it past that figure — encouraging total claps to get to the next level where others may see the total and might be interested in your article.

The Clapping Tip You Didn’t Know You Needed

Yesterday, my son showed my wife and me:

Just touch & hold down the clapping icon and it keeps adding claps up to the max.

This works on the iPhone app and desktop web browser, so I assume it works on all devices.

Who knew?! I’m sure many of you do, but for the rest of us: what a great tip!

You don’t need to keep clicking or tapping to give multiple claps.

So, think about your clapping strategy and don’t be afraid to leave your finger or mouse button on the clapping icon just a bit longer than you might have before you read this article.

How about you? Did you know about this feature?!

Enjoy Life and Thanks for Reading,

-Jeff

So my CTA for this article, for no other reason but to see if we can get a large total clap count:

Max out your claps on this one! Let’s see if we can get it to crazy numbers!

Copyright © 2025 Jeff Goetz. All Rights Reserved.

Previous Medium Articles About Clapping

After writing my article, I searched for articles about clapping on Medium. There are quite a few articles already. Search for the following topics if you want to find them. It’s interesting to read others perspectives on clapping.

Clapping Topics:

• “Claps on Medium”
• “Medium Clapping”
• “Clapping on Medium”