Show HN: Readwise Reader, an all-in-one reading app (readwise.io)
Probably the most notable thing that makes Reader unique is that it supports almost any content type you could want to save/read/highlight:
* web pages
* emails/newsletters
* PDFs
* ePubs
* twitter threads
* youtube videos (with transcripts)
* RSS feeds
With all of your knowledge content in one place, we built powerful reading and highlighting, as well as a bunch of novel triage/organization features, so you can actually consume & stay on top of that content!
There are also a lot of advanced features too, such as text-to-speech, GPT3 questions/summaries, super powerful highlighting (that includes markup and images), complex filtering/search (with our own query language), sleek mobile triage UI, keyboard shortcuts for reading/everything, integrations with note-taking apps, a browser extension for both saving pages and highlighting them, and much more.
If anyone's interested in more product details, as well as our business model, etc, we wrote a detailed launch post: https://blog.readwise.io/the-next-chapter-of-reader-public-b...
Predicting a common question: Reader is part of the Readwise subscription pricing right now in beta -- there's a 30 day free trial and then it's paid at ~$8usd/month. We also promise to not raise this price for existing subscribers.
Reader is also fairly technically interesting -- our iOS, Android and webapp all work fully offline and sync your reading data/progress with eachother. Our search on web is built with wasm sqlite. We have a fairly intense pipeline for cleaning web articles (removing ads/styling). We share lot of modules around syncing/highlighting across all platforms, etc...
Happy to answer any questions :)
161 comments
[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 241 ms ] threadMy _several hundred_ pocket articles all moved over seamlessly! Very impressed so far!
Hoping this can replace pocket and my ereader.
The things I like:
- easy to send articles to it (with or without highlights) from any platform I use (Android, iOS, Chrome), or by forwarding emails, or by subscribing to mailing lists using the reader email address
- nice way to read Twitter threads
- nice workflow for creating flashcards from highlights
- keyboard shortcuts on web
- reading feels immersive, and choose a next article is easy
I am usually reluctant to add yet another monthly subscription, but this is so nice that I paid for an annual subscription a couple of hours after I started using it.
Personally, I have two suggestions for a future release:
1). Invert-color PDF dark mode harms readability.
Simply invert the color will make serif fonts less readable. I use PDF.js with the following canvas renderer snippet to create a more pleasant reading experience.
```css
#viewerContainer > #viewer > .page > .canvasWrapper > canvas { filter: sepia(23%); filter: saturate(45%); filter: hue-rotate(181deg); filter: brightness(90%); filter: contrast(93%); filter: invert(81%); }
#viewerContainer > #viewer > .spread > .page > .canvasWrapper > canvas { filter: sepia(23%); filter: saturate(45%); filter: hue-rotate(181deg); filter: brightness(90%); filter: contrast(93%); filter: invert(81%); }
```
Try this with this PDF.js extension: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/pdf-reader/ieepebp... by pasting it to the option page.
2). Custom Font support.
As a power user, I'd like to render the article with my personally preferable font (locally installed in most cases.) Why not simply give users the option to set css:font-family? It's really easy to implement.
Anyway, the current product is pleasing enough! I'm already spiritually a paid-user.
1) Haha yeah, the inverted colors was kind of a quick hack to make some folks happy. That css looks great -- will definitely explore something like that with our designer :)
2) Not a bad idea at all...
It doesn't yet have an Apple Watch app though, and since (I assume like you) I listen to podcasts while out on a run w/o my phone, that would be the killer feature I'd drop everything for.
- It would be great if you add a feature to import an OPML
- Definitely needs a way manage feeds in folders/tags
- I would also really like a way to export my stuff in JSON/XML in case I want to move somewhere else (not sure if that exists already)
Keep up the good work! Would be happy to pay for this.
The language is a little different than folders/tags (and believe me, I stan folders the one and only time I ever hit the front page of HN it was for an article written in defense of using folders for notetaking) but you can get basically the same effect with filtered views. Here's a deep dive our community manager Erin made if you're interested: readwise.io/reader202
I hope that helps!
PS: Dan said more export features are coming.
For a front end, I use “Reeder 5” - writing this reply in it now. ( https://www.reederapp.com/ )
Couple it with an on demand vpn like Wireguard and I can sync with the freshrss feed at home from anywhere.
And the price was “pay once” not every month.
I run Linux + Android on my devices so can't check out Reeder unfortunately. However, my setup works fine:
- RSS: FreshRSS hosted on personal server, use web interface on desktop and the truly awesome FeedMe on mobile
- Reading: Wallabag hosted on personal server, use web interface on desktop and the Wallabag app on mobile
- Bookmarks: Shaarli hosted on personal server, use web interface on desktop. I can share articles on mobile via Shaarlier but not consult them - but I don't feel the need to; I use it as a "check this website later" thing where I delete the entry after checking or storing it in my org-mode setup if I want to keep it.
Reader would replace pretty much all of that, which is nice. But it comes at the cost of 1. monthly subscription, 2. not truly owning my data/product and 3. storing all my info on an external server which I am actively trying to avoid with the above setup.
For bookmarking I use Shaarli. The two have a clearly different intended use. Probably Archivebox is combining the two, but that clones the entire HTML of a page which is also not what I was looking for.
I'm looking back to the origins because Readwise is aggressively pushing this concept to the "limits". I mean, offering epubs and RSSs (and much more) is pretty inclusive. This may blur the original "simplicity" goal. However, The UX design is flawless. Nothing to say. So, this will surely help order all that disparate input.
HN readers, don't be discouraged by the price tag. Give it a go, and make sure you "invoke the ghost" [1]
[1] https://twitter.com/deadly_onion/status/1592990487257829376
The main thing in bookmark/offline readers is ability to search. I see tons of bragging on highlights and not much on search. Can I search by tags? How can I tag anything any way? Can I import my tags from places like Diigo? My primary question is always "where did I saw that?", not highlighting everything I read.
I use Diigo and they are almost opposite for the better. Solid and clear way of how to migrate from competitors should also be #1 focus but here basic stuff is missing.
This post refers to our new Reader app, which you can install here on mobile:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/readwise-reader/id1567599761
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.readermobi...
I struggled to find how to change it from dark to light mode for a really long time, then found it hidden within the Aa button which is only accessible after opening a bookmark. Could you please surface that to the main screen?
Even though I imagine it’s hard to create software like this, I don’t believe it’s beyond one company to make a do-everything app. Already, it’s do-enough-for-my-needs, and their velocity is impressive. (I want them to add podcasts next, with highlightable transcripts. That sounds easy to me, but every podcast-workflow app I’ve tried has been buggy/crashy/awful.)
My primary use case is tracking serials update and shoving the rss target (not the feed itself as that’s rarely complete) into an offline reader. Is this able to load tte feed into its own timeline on its own without user intervention?
* What is the amount of storage provided for users?
* How is content managed when offline? If/When I start traveling more, there will be times when I like to read without internet access.
Because it works. If we want to stop it, we need to actually stop paying for them.
It’s just that once your device is synced, you will be able to use it + read fully offline, then have those changes sync once you’re back!
The killer feature is exporting highlights to Obsidian for me though. I get a lot of utility from being able to find things I read in the past while doing writing or research.
I would love to use such a product, but I only use open source wherever I have the option, and especially with subscription based services.
Either way, congrats on releasing a seemingly excellent product!
The improvements are a lot more apparent on desktop. I love the fact that I can do pretty much anything using the command palette and keyboard shortcuts. Feels like this is the kind of browsing experience that I'm most contend with. The GPT-3 "ghostreader" feature was also great; most of the summary / text generations fulfilled my expectations.
If I have to pick on something: the mobile app browsing experience isn't that much better from Pocket or Instapaper. The scrolling and animation feels a bit laggy in my iPhone. The "ghostreader" feature in the app feels very limited and awkward to enable here as well.
i have collected thousands of unread articles as bookmarks. and they all have the tags "unread" and "article". i remove the "unread" tag on articles i have read. the process of going through my list became tedious. so i wrote a chrome extension that opens a random unread article for me in a new tab.
the first thing i looked for, when i opened this app, is how to import bookmarks. and it surprised me that the authors overlooked local bookmarks or bookmark files. that's how most people save what they want to read later, no?
looking forward to seeing that feature.
thanks.