July 13, 2026

Hey everyone, I'm @nick, still running out of creative ways to kick off these monthly product updates.

The new story categories have been a pretty big change behind the scenes, but unless you're a writer, you probably haven't noticed much yet. Stories are still organized by tags, and Browse still looks familiar on the surface.

That's about to change.

Now we want to rebuild Browse around the new taxonomy. With a hierarchical system of super-genres, genres, and sub-genres, we can create a Browse experience that makes exploring stories feel more intuitive. That means dedicated landing pages for genres and sub-genres, richer content, and more ways to discover stories you'll actually want to read.

This also ties into a bigger rethink of discovery across Wattpad. Right now, Home, Search, Browse all have similar goals (to make the most people find the most-likely story to read) and use similar methods to surface stories. That made sense during the era when huge breakout hits like After introduced millions of readers to Wattpad. But the platform has evolved, our library has grown, and we've heard your feedback that discovery can sometimes feel repetitive instead of personal.

We're making changes across all three discovery experiences, but today we're talking about Browse. 

To explain how we're thinking about them, we've been using a simple library analogy:

🏡 Home - This space is for you. Think of it as the librarian who knows your reading taste and always has a recommendation ready.

🔍 Search - This is for when you know what you're looking for, whether it's a specific title, writer, or keyword. It's the library catalogue that helps you find exactly what you came for.

👀 Browse - This is for discovery when you're not quite sure what you're looking for. It's wandering the library aisles, checking out the display tables, and stumbling across your next obsession.

In the new Browse experience, that's the feeling we're trying to capture. Right now, it's impossible to browse every story on Wattpad. Search results are limited, and Browse only surfaces up to the top 1,000 stories in a tag, often ranked by Hotness. We think you should have more ways to explore.

Future Browse will include dedicated landing pages for every genre and subgenre which you can navigate between. Each page can feature editorial recommendations, community reading lists, creator spotlights, rankings, and other content that's relevant to that space. It also opens the door to a true "Browse All" experience, where you can scroll through every story in that subgenre. (Assuming you have 10,000+ years to spare. Or, more realistically, you'll use the new filters and sorting tools we're building).

Fanfiction deserves its own approach. Instead of 100 sub-genres, there are 900+ fandoms (and counting). Every fandom will have its own page, but the experience may look a little different from other genres. We'll be working closely with the community as we build this because fanfiction has always been shaped by the fans who make it.

For now, these are very early concepts as we explore what a new Browse experience could become. Everything you see is a work in progress and could change as we continue designing, testing, and listening to your feedback. The goal is simple: make it easier to explore Wattpad your way while bringing the new story taxonomy to life (note: these designs don't represent the final product and can change significantly as we continue to work on them).

And yes... we noticed it too.

"Become a Fan?"

A Fandom section at the bottom?

👀 We'll have more to share on that soon.