Medium Articles to Notion Reading List Setup
Medium is one of the best places for long-form learning: deep dives, personal essays, startup breakdowns, self-improvement posts, design thinking, data science lessons, and more. But the platform has one big problem:
You can’t build a real, organized library of what you read.
Medium’s built-in “save” feature isn’t enough — no tags, no highlights, no personal notes, no long-term structure, and no connection to your actual knowledge base.
This guide shows you how to turn Medium into a personal reading hub using Notion Highlights.
You’ll learn how to:
- Save articles instantly
- Build a reading database
- Track progress
- Extract insights
- Connect ideas across topics
- Use Notion AI to summarize and compress long reads
Quick Overview
Time Required: 5 minutes
Difficulty: Beginner
What You'll Learn: How to save Medium articles and highlights to Notion automatically.
Why This Matters
Medium posts cover some of the highest-signal writing on:
- Productivity
- Technology
- AI
- Design
- Entrepreneurship
- Learning
- Personal development
- Software engineering
- Marketing
- Psychology
But Medium content gets buried quickly.
Problems with Medium’s native “save” system:
❌ No tags
❌ No organization
❌ No highlight system
❌ No ability to add your own notes
❌ No AI summaries
❌ No project linking
❌ No reading workflow
❌ Hard to retrieve anything later
If you’re a serious learner, student, founder, or researcher, you need a real system — not a bookmark pile.
Notion solves all of this.
Step-by-Step Guide
Step 1: Open Any Medium Article
This workflow works on:
- Medium posts
- Medium publications
- Stories
- Tutorials
- Long-form guides
- Book summaries
- Data science writeups
- Founder essays
- Productivity systems
- Case studies
If there’s text, you can capture it.
Step 2: Highlight Any Section You Want to Save
Select the text that matters:
- Key quotes
- Actionable steps
- Research notes
- Statistics
- Definitions
- Frameworks
- Examples
- Stories
- Visual descriptions
- Explanations
This is far better than bookmarking the entire article — you capture only signal, not noise.
Step 3: Right-Click → “Save to Notion”
This instantly saves:
- Highlighted text
- Formatting
- Article structure
- Source URL
- Context
- Timestamps (if applicable)
- Your own notes (optional)
No switching tabs.
No copy/paste.
No workflow interruption.
Step 4: Choose Destination in Notion
Most people create a database called:
📚 Medium Reading Library
Properties you can add:
- Title
- Author
- Source
- Topic
- Tags
- Key Takeaways
- Status (Unread / Reading / Finished)
- Rating
- Length
- Saved Date
- Project link
- AI summary
Saving directly into a structured database turns random reading into compounding knowledge.
Step 5: Verify Your Save
Inside Notion:
- Make sure formatting preserved
- Add your notes
- Update tags
- Set reading status
- Connect to related ideas
Now the article becomes part of your long-term learning system — not lost in a feed.
Pro Tips for Medium Power Readers
Tip 1 — Save Highlights, Not Whole Articles
Most Medium posts are 70% fluff, 30% gold.
Capture the gold.
Your future self will thank you.
Tip 2 — Tag by Concept, Not Category
Don’t tag by vague categories like:
- “Productivity”
- “AI”
- “Business”
Tag by actual ideas, like:
- “Mental Models”
- “Prompt Engineering”
- “Founders’ Biases”
- “Decision-Making”
- “Learning Systems”
- “UX Patterns”
This builds a real knowledge graph.
Tip 3 — Use Notion AI to Summarize Long Articles
Prompt example:
“Summarize this Medium article into a 5-point actionable checklist.”
Or:
“Rewrite this article using first principles. Strip out fluff.”
Or:
“Extract only the frameworks and mental models from this article.”
This turns long reads into executive summaries.
Tip 4 — Build a Reading Sprint Each Week
Every Sunday:
- Pick 3–5 articles
- Save highlights
- Add your notes
- Link related insights
- Turn takeaways into actions
This transforms reading into output.
Common Issues
Issue: Formatting looks strange
Medium uses complex typography. Select a slightly larger section.
Issue: Missing parts of the article
Some sections load dynamically — scroll fully before capturing.
Issue: Can’t find saved notes
Search the source URL or check your default save location.
Advanced Techniques
1. Build a “Reading OS” in Notion
Properties:
- Title
- Source
- Author
- Date Saved
- Length (Short/Medium/Long)
- Status
- Tags
- Summary
- Your Notes
- Value Score
- Topic
- URL
Views:
- Unread
- In Progress
- Finished
- By Topic
- Top Insights
- Recently Saved
- High-Value Reads
2. Use Medium as a Research Engine
Search topics like:
- “Cognitive psychology + learning”
- “Founder lessons”
- “SaaS case studies”
- “Systems thinking”
- “Design thinking workflows”
- “AI mental models”
As you find insights, save them instantly.
Medium → Notion → Your brain.
3. Connect Medium Articles to Projects
Examples:
- Building a startup → connect SaaS articles
- Learning coding → connect tutorials
- Improving writing → connect writing guides
- Studying AI → connect ML articles
- Building a personal brand → connect content strategy posts
This is how reading becomes execution.
Building Your System Over Time
Week 1 — Capture
20+ Medium saves
Build the habit
Don’t organize yet
Week 2 — Process
Review highlights
Add your notes
Tag ideas
Summarize with AI
Week 3 — Connect
Link ideas
Build relationships
Create new frameworks
Week 4 — Optimize
Refine tags
Automate workflows
Build personal templates
After 30 days, Medium becomes a personal knowledge accelerator.
Measuring Success
Healthy benchmarks:
- 10–25 Medium saves/week
- 40%+ retrieval rate
- 3+ actionable insights applied weekly
- <10 minutes/day maintenance
- 2+ linked ideas per save
When your reading system compounds, your learning compounds.
Related Workflows
- Save YouTube Transcripts to Notion
- Save X Threads to Notion Automatically
- Save Research Papers to Notion
- Build a Second Brain with Web Clipping
Start Saving Medium Articles in Seconds
👉 Install Notion Highlights (Free)
Save 30 articles per month — no login required.
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/notion-highlights/addpdkeebbfpcgificcaojjkbpddjhka?authuser=1&hl=en&pli=1