You've probably read a million news stories. They're dry. They’re fast. They give you the "who, what, when, where" and then they get out of your way. But every once in a while, you stumble onto something else. Something that feels more like a movie than a memo. That’s feature writing. Honestly, finding a great example of a feature writing article is like trying to find a good restaurant in a city you don't know—you have to look past the flashy signs and find the place with the soul.
Feature writing isn't just "long-form" journalism. Length is cheap. Impact is expensive.
If you're looking for an example of a feature writing article, you aren't just looking for words on a page. You're looking for a specific kind of alchemy. It’s that blend of hard reporting and narrative flair. It’s what Tom Wolfe or Joan Didion did back in the day, and what writers at The Atlantic or The New Yorker are still trying to pull off today. It’s about the "why" and the "how it felt" rather than just the "what happened."
Why Most People Get Feature Writing Wrong
A lot of students—and let’s be real, a lot of professional bloggers too—think a feature is just a news story with more adjectives. It’s not. If you take a boring report about a city council meeting and add words like "shimmering" or "tumultuous," you haven't written a feature. You've just written a long, annoying news story.
A real example of a feature writing article is built on a "nut graph." That’s the paragraph, usually a few inches down, that tells you what the story is actually about. It’s the "so what?" factor. If you’re writing about a local baker, the news story is "Bakery Opens on 5th Street." The feature story is "How a Sourdough Starter Saved a Man’s Sanity After the Recession." See the difference? One is information. The other is a human experience.
The Anatomy of a Classic Feature
Let’s look at Frank Sinatra Has a Cold by Gay Talese. It’s widely considered the gold standard example of a feature writing article. Published in Esquire in 1966, it’s famous because Talese never actually interviewed Sinatra. Not once. Sinatra wouldn't talk to him.
Instead of giving up, Talese watched. He observed. He talked to the people around Sinatra—the guy who carried Sinatra's hairpieces, the woman who stood by with a glass of water. He built a psychological profile through peripheral vision.
That’s a huge lesson for anyone trying to write these. You don’t always need the "main" source to have the "best" story. Sometimes the view from the sidelines is clearer.
Structure Is Fluid, Not Fixed
Unlike the "inverted pyramid" used in hard news—where the most important stuff is at the top—a feature can be a slow burn. You can start with a scene.
The smell of burnt coffee. The sound of a radiator clanking in a dusty apartment. The way a woman holds her pen.
🔗 Read more: The Green Bean and Feta Salad Recipe That Actually Tastes Good
These are "status cues." They tell the reader who the person is without you having to explain it like a textbook. If you're looking for a modern example of a feature writing article, check out anything by Eli Saslow. He writes for The Washington Post and now The New York Times. He doesn't just tell you about the opioid crisis or poverty; he sits in people’s living rooms for days. He waits for the moments that most reporters miss because they're in a hurry to get a quote and leave.
The Different "Flavors" of Features
You might be looking for a specific type. Not all features are the same. Some are profiles. Some are "color" stories.
- The Profile: This is a deep dive into one person. It’s not a biography. It’s a snapshot of a moment in their life that reveals their character.
- The Trend Piece: You see these in Vox or The Verge all the time. They take a weird thing happening in culture—like why everyone is suddenly obsessed with "cottagecore"—and explain the deeper societal anxiety behind it.
- The Investigative Feature: This is the heavy lifting. Think of the Boston Globe’s "Spotlight" team. It’s data, it’s facts, but it’s told through the lens of the victims and the people involved.
When you analyze an example of a feature writing article, look at the transitions. In a news story, transitions are "Furthermore" or "In addition." (Actually, don't use those, they're robotic). In a feature, the transition is usually a shift in time or a shift in scene. You move the reader from the kitchen table to the courtroom just by changing the description.
Why Google Discover Loves These Stories
Google Discover is that feed on your phone that shows you stuff you didn't even know you wanted to read. It loves features. Why? Because features have high "dwell time."
If someone clicks on a headline like "The Last Man Who Knows How to Fix 19th-Century Clocks," they aren't going to skim it and leave in ten seconds. They’re going to read the whole thing because it’s a narrative. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end.
To make your example of a feature writing article rank well, you need a hook that isn't clickbait. Clickbait promises something it doesn't deliver. A feature hook promises a journey.
"How One Small Town Stopped a Mega-Corporation" is a decent headline.
"The Librarian Who Said No" is a better feature headline.
It’s about the person. Always the person.
The Secret Sauce: Sensory Details
I can’t stress this enough. If you’re writing a feature and you don’t mention a smell, a sound, or a specific texture, you’re failing.
Basically, your job is to be the reader’s eyes and ears. Most people write from their heads. Great feature writers write from their gut. They notice that the subject of the interview keeps twisting their wedding ring when they talk about their father. They notice that the paint is peeling in a specific pattern on the wall.
These aren't "extra" details. They are the story.
When you study an example of a feature writing article from someone like Lane DeGregory (who won a Pulitzer for her story "The Girl in the Window"), notice how she uses silence. She describes the things people don't say. That’s where the emotion lives.
Ethical Boundaries in Feature Writing
Here’s a tricky part. Because features feel like "stories," some writers get tempted to embellish. Don't.
The moment you make up a quote or "combine" two people into one composite character without telling the reader, you aren't a journalist anymore. You’re a fiction writer. And in the world of SEO and E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness), getting caught in a lie is a death sentence for your rankings and your reputation.
Readers can feel when something is "too perfect." Life is messy. Real quotes are often fragmented and weird. Keep them that way. It feels more human.
Actionable Steps for Writing Your Own Feature
If you’re tired of looking at an example of a feature writing article and want to actually write one, here’s how you start. Don't overthink it. Just start.
- Find a "Micro" story to tell a "Macro" truth. If you want to write about the housing crisis, find one person who just lost their house. Don't start with the statistics. Start with the boxes they’re packing.
- Over-report. If you think you have enough for a 1,000-word story, you probably need three times more information than you'll actually use. You need to know what the person's childhood was like even if you only write about their life now. It informs your "voice."
- Show, then tell, then show again. Start with a scene (Show). Explain the context (Tell). End with a lingering image (Show).
- Kill your darlings. That's a famous writing advice for a reason. Sometimes your favorite sentence doesn't actually fit the story. If it’s just there to show how "smart" you are, delete it. The story is the star, not the writer.
- Read it out loud. If you run out of breath before the end of a sentence, the sentence is too long. If you sound like a robot, you need more "kinda" and "sorta" energy (in the right places).
Feature writing is an art form that’s survived the death of newspapers and the rise of TikTok. Why? Because humans are hardwired for stories. We want to know what it’s like to be someone else. We want to feel something.
So, next time you’re browsing and you see an example of a feature writing article that makes you forget you’re looking at a screen, pay attention. Look at the bones of it. Look at how the writer moved you from point A to point B. Then go try to do the same thing.
💡 You might also like: Why Those Were The Good Old Days Is Actually a Biological Trick
Stop worrying about "keywords" for a second and worry about "key moments." That’s how you win. That’s how you get on Google Discover. That’s how you actually get people to care.
Start by picking one person in your community who has a job nobody talks about. Go sit with them for an hour. Don't take a recorder at first; just watch. You'll be surprised what you find when you're not looking for a soundbite.