I’m deeply frustrated by the state of RSS reeders. As a long time Reeder (now Reeder Classic), the developer’s move from classic RSS to all feeds (via iCloud) has left this great app in a usuable, but lacking state. Should I be happy that things work for the most part? Maybe. But man do I wish this guy gave a shit about his app. Charge me a subscription, I’ll pay! Instead the app just sits there, collecting digital dust like a vintage game console works in the back of your entertainment center: you know it’s one bad day away from breaking.
I went on a QUEST for a new RSS app. In the end, I chose to suffer and Reeder Classic is still my phone’s main. While RSS is an app design playground, I seem to like the kid who sticks his head in the sand and eats worms.
So here, learn from my pain:
Backend: Feedbin
Migrated my RSS reading from iCloud in Reeder Classic to full RSS powered by Feedbin. I love the ability to send newsletters into Feedbin and it has made bouncing between apps easy.
I do use the new Reeder as a social media consumption for BlueSky and Mastadon. Keeping my eye out for an Indigo update based on some podcast chatter from beta testers.
ReadKit: Made with a touch of Liquid Glass.
ReadKit: Made with a touch of Liquid Glass.
MacOS:
The Liquid Glass (does this get capitalized?) implentation isn’t half bad and stays out of the way of reading. It also supports the J/K keyboard shortcuts from navigating articles out of the box. Caching is quick. This is my main MacOS RSS reader.
iPadOS:
Doesn’t require much customization on my part after installing. Uses up/down arrows for UI, but the swipe gesture is left/right on screen — are we Tinder? — and for the life of me I cannot figure out if there’s a setting to fix this!
I like double tapping to switch between condensed and full text mode.
The animations when swiping in a list to mark read/unread are clunky AF.
iOS:
Lost of shared thoughts with the iPadOS versions. Animations not as smooth as Reeder Classic. Why does swiping go left/right when the buttons are up/down arrows? This seriously drives me crazy and I have to mention it again here!
Reeder Classic: Why do our loved ones hurt us the most?
MacOS:
Why do you hurt me Reeder Classic? You’re smooth and polished. Your animations are great. Loading is fast. You’re a Mac-Assed Mac App to the core. Out of the box, I login to Feedbin and you work. Even your weird bugs are mostly solved. I hope your creator cares about you again one day.
iPadOS:
Smooth like butter. Fluid. Easy to use. Change for iOS 26 and charge me a subscription. I’ll pay!
iOS:
Swipining up/down is smooth and easy to flick between articles. This isn’t Tinder for websites. Wish some of your menu bar buttons could change, like putting the share button on the bottom, but I’ll suffer for you if you keep working. Seriously, charge me a sub!
Lire:
MacOS:
It could replace Reeder Classic and ReadKit now with its fluid animations. No J/K key navs is a deal breaker for me. I’ll keep it installed for now in the off chance the developer gets back to me and implements this basic feature.
iPadOS:
It’s smooth and pretty. Swiping between articles is clunky. More annoying when you have a long article in full text and it keeps rubber banding at the bottom.
I keep hitting the “fetching” full article message.
iOS:
Swiping between articles not fluid unnless you use the arrows, which are in a weird spot for my hands. Weird moments where it’s still caching articles
Unread: Too much customization
iPadOS / iOS:
Someone shoudl copy the ability to save full site logins. It’s genius.
You get a lot of value without requiring a subscription. Required a lot of drilling into menus to setup like Reeder’s view. I feel like there’s so many sub menus that are a swipe away. It gets frustrating.
Also felts like I had to customize article views too much. More time fiddling with views and setup vs reading. Like a PC games for RSS feeds. You can overtweak the settings instead of playing the game!
Where I landed:
Desktop: ReadKit, but I could go back to Reeder Classic now and be so happy.
iPadOS/iOS: Reeder Classic. It hurts, but I’m a sicko for you.
Leave a Reply