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In Search of the Perfect Internet Reader

Google discontinued Google Reader in 2013, more than ten years ago, and yet, even after all this time, there’s still no clear winner in the read-it-later app space. I think that’s a good thing.

Each major player in this space is carving out its own unique angle. Readwise Reader targets power users, Matter is a promising newcomer, Feedly focuses on tracking actionable intelligence, and then there are more established options like Pocket and Instapaper. And there are also smaller players, like Omnivore and others.

I’ve tried them all, but none really clicked for me. Some are too power-focused, others are too bloated and slow, and some just don’t spark joy in daily use. With the recent news that Omnivore has been acquired by ElevenLabs, I decided to switch to Miniflux.
It’s a minimalist and opinionated feed reader, but it’s fast, and I really like it. They got a lot of things right without overloading it with unnecessary features, and I can even use it on my phone via NetNewsWire (a workaround is mentioned here).

However, since this is a feed (i.e., RSS) reader, there are still two features I miss:
  • The ability to view/save standalone articles I find on the web for “read-it-now” or “read-it-later”.
  • Newsletter aggregation. With the recent resurgence of newsletters, a new category of apps — newsletter aggregators — has emerged. But I don’t need a separate app for that (looking at you, Substack).
So, yeah. Even in this extremely crowded space, there are still opportunities to explore. RSS is old, but don’t give up on it yet, and please, for the love of God, add RSS feeds to your blogs!

P.S. My former teammate Olly is building FeedGrab — https://feedgrab.net/ — and I recommend checking it out if you haven’t already.