Chiu has made appearances in numerous media outlets. She was Lead Juror for the television docu-series "The Exhibit" premiering on MTV and Smithsonian Channel in 2023 featuring artists from around the country including Jamaal Barber, Frank Buffalo Hyde, Misha Kahn, Clare Kambhu, Baseera Khan, Jillian Mayer, and Jennifer Warren.

In 2010, Chiu joined the Sunday Arts television show on PBS WNET to conduct a series of interviews with cultural leaders. Interview subjects have included William Kentridge, Shirin Neshat, Tan Dun, and Antony Gormley. Additionally, Chiu has been seen and heard on Charlie Rose, PBS Newshour, WQXR’s Arts File, NPR’s All Things Considered, the Kojo Knamdi Show, the Take Away, TEDx and MSN travel.

Chiu is also a regular speaker at international conferences, symposia, museums and institutions of higher learning such as the Aspen Ideas Festival, MOMA, the Guggenheim Museum, the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Frost Art Museum, the Getty Center, the Aspen Institute, Harvard University, Columbia University, Yale University, the University of Michigan, Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi and the China Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing.

Melissa Chiu was identified as one of the “Most Powerful Women in Washington” by the Washingtonian on it's annual list in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020, and 2021. In 2021, Chiu was named by ARTnews as one of twenty five curators shaping the art world today.