Writer

Tessa Okonkwo

Essayist & Newsletter Writer

Brooklyn, NYshe/her English, Igbo
Tessa Okonkwo
Read the newsletter FeaturesGhostwritingSpeaking

40k

Subscribers

120+

Features

12

Years

Writer and essayist on technology, culture, and the strange ways they collide. Bylines in The Atlantic and Wired. I write a newsletter 40,000 people actually open.

About

I write to figure out what I think. For a decade that meant magazine features — long, reported pieces where I got to spend months inside a subject. Now most of my readers find me through my newsletter, where I write shorter and more often about the week's technology stories and what they're really about. The forms are different; the job is the same: pay attention, be honest, and respect the reader's time.

Write the sentence that makes a complicated thing finally click.

Principles: Clarity · Reporting · Curiosity · Reader-first

Experience

12 years in journalism, essays, and independent publishing

Independent Writer

2020 – Present

Self-published + freelance

Grew a newsletter to 40k subscribers. Features for The Atlantic, Wired, and The Guardian.

Staff Writer

2016 – 2020

The Verge

Covered the culture-and-technology beat; two features nominated for industry awards.

Reporter

2012 – 2016

Local daily

Cut my teeth on city-desk reporting and deadlines.

Education

BA, English & Journalism — Columbia University 2012

Projects & publications

References

“Tessa files clean, reports hard, and finds the sentence everyone else missed. A dream byline.”
— Editor, The Atlantic
“The only newsletter I read the moment it lands. She makes the overwhelming feel legible.”
— A subscriber, among 40,000

In the press

Preview — Ledger·Use this template →