Why does the negativity towards Reader persist? This is a GREAT app!!! It has no problems.
Minimalist apps frequently get panned because they aren't colorful and pretty. If you need pretty, either adapt to the fact that minimalist is elegant or go elsewhere.
If you're looking for excellence in Support & Function, you have arrived!
September 21, 2026 added comments.
I still don’t see the complaints against Reader to be valid. I have installed Reader on my 2024 M4 iMac once more and have found its every function to be perfect and working as promised.
If you need pretty maybe look elsewhere. If minimalist is something you aren’t familiar with find out what it means because Reader is the ultimate implementation of minimalist design done to perfection.
Give the app a real try. Don’t be put off by the complaints. Reader is just what it was designed to be a reader without junk.
If you're looking for excellence in Support & Function, you have arrived!
September 21, 2026 added comments.
I still don’t see the complaints against Reader to be valid. I have installed Reader on my 2024 M4 iMac once more and have found its every function to be perfect and working as promised.
If you need pretty maybe look elsewhere. If minimalist is something you aren’t familiar with find out what it means because Reader is the ultimate implementation of minimalist design done to perfection.
Give the app a real try. Don’t be put off by the complaints. Reader is just what it was designed to be a reader without junk.
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Perplexing
It opened a PDF, but much of what seemed attractive about it (e.g. copying a citation to Author) simply doesn’t work. I even struggled to select text. Really wanted this to work, and I hope it gets better.
It does not work
Promise after promise that the developer would correct the problem with this app and nothing has happened. It still doesn’t work.
It does not work
The title says it all.
SLOOOOW
I don't have an M1 Mac
Speed is terribly laggy - what a shame it's not useable because of the delays.
It may also be slowdown connected with a ling document (10MB) ...
Speed is terribly laggy - what a shame it's not useable because of the delays.
It may also be slowdown connected with a ling document (10MB) ...
Error-Frozen App
When open a pdf file which is a scanned text (which allows for highlighting the text). Selecting any text and right click freezes the app.
Does Not Work. Opening Letter Will Not Close App Freezes
Upon opening the app for the first time you are asked to select a home folder. Then a document opens explaining a few short commands and then remains. You cannot close out of it, nor can you access any of the applications functions. It is essentially useless. You also cannot quit the application unless you "Force Quit".
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Ignore the past negativity! GREAT app!!!
Minimalist apps frequently get panned because they aren't colorful and pretty. If you need pretty, either adapt to the fact that minimalist is elegant or go elsewhere.
If you're looking for excellence in Support & Function, you have arrived!
If you're looking for excellence in Support & Function, you have arrived!
Basic functionality missing
No Table of contents? What does "focus mode" do other than jump to some random location and remove all useful formatting from PDFs? This app pushes minimalism into uselessness. It fails to provide functionality that would enhance the reading experience. If anything, it is counter-productive. Apple' own Preview is far superior.
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Weird!
Can't re-size the window down from the default. I'm on a 40" 4K monitor and I don't need a single page occupying half of my screen. Why can't you re-size the window just like any other app?
A Welcome Alternative
Glad to have this. It’s very helpful to have a PDF viewer that fills the screen with no nav panes on the left. I do wish for an optional scroll feature, but am content enough with the side swipe.
Needs a way to add bookmarks
As the title says; it would be useful for larger documents to be able to bookmark.
Perfect Alternative
As a longtime Windows user, through to coming into MacOS last year, I still managed to struggle with adjustments between Word and Pages. Especially as I had come from a heavy Governmental writing environment, into full-time remote study.
Excuse the copy-paste for both apps, but the broad points apply to both Reader and Author.
But the minimalist approach to these apps is beautiful. Removing all 'distractions' from the UI for someone like myself.
For Author: I don't need access to line/page breaks or formatting at any time I want, I just need to put things on 'paper'. Highly recommend as a tool to encourage thought and provide a space to dump and connect.
For Reader: the addition of an AI assistant to help skim through repeated material, or summarise what you've read prior, is an amazing tool for study and is in it's simplest form to not detract from the user experience.
Excuse the copy-paste for both apps, but the broad points apply to both Reader and Author.
But the minimalist approach to these apps is beautiful. Removing all 'distractions' from the UI for someone like myself.
For Author: I don't need access to line/page breaks or formatting at any time I want, I just need to put things on 'paper'. Highly recommend as a tool to encourage thought and provide a space to dump and connect.
For Reader: the addition of an AI assistant to help skim through repeated material, or summarise what you've read prior, is an amazing tool for study and is in it's simplest form to not detract from the user experience.
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Response from developer
Thank you for your kind words, they are much appreciated!
Poor accessibility
Every PDF reader I have used before has a "fit to width" feature that shows one page as the width of your screen. I cannot find any way to do this in this app. Instead, it shows two pages side-by-side, making both far too small to read comfortably.
Blown away
Really clean interface. See myself using it vs liquidtext or the preview app
Highlighting
This PDF reader is nearly perfect. The only issue I had is that I couldn't figure out how to highlight in different colors. As a PhD student, that part is necessary for me to organize my research. I really liked using this, but without that I can't use it for very much. I'll change to 5 stars & start using it again if/once there is an option to do multi-colored highlighting.
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Almost There
When I magnify the pdf so that a page is larger than the screen, and scroll down, the next page is not displayed at the beginning of the page but at the bottom. Is a little annoying because I have to scroll up back up again so can't read a document by just hitting SPACE. Please consider altering SPACE or DOWN to start at the begiining of the next page.
Excellent job though! Great reader and will become my go-to reader once scrolling is "normal".
Excellent job though! Great reader and will become my go-to reader once scrolling is "normal".
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Perfect Reader
I have been looking for a pdf reader that focused on letting me just read. It's nimble and uncluttered. It's just perfect. Love it.
One smal drawback: it looks like trackpad (Apple Magic trackpad) finger motion to zoom within a window doesn't work. Zoom with Apple magic mouse does work perfectly.
One smal drawback: it looks like trackpad (Apple Magic trackpad) finger motion to zoom within a window doesn't work. Zoom with Apple magic mouse does work perfectly.
Does not consistently format PDFs
I love the potential of this app with its partner 'Author' app, but even with the manual, videos, and comments from the developers, cannot get many PDF articles (which have the DOI on the first page) to be 'auto' formatted to allow for the copy/paste feature to work. This makes it very difficult to meaningful use this app because it isn't working for all articles. It also lags far behind other PDF readers in its ability to annotate documents.
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Buggy
I tried this several months back and had issues with the function to remove highlights or change their color using the context menu. This was apparently on the list of things to resolve, but it is still an issue, so I'm abandoning ship in favor of an app that works.
Love the minimalism, but if I can't highlight, I have no use for this app.
Love the minimalism, but if I can't highlight, I have no use for this app.
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