Serial Reader vs Tertulia
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Serial Reader
Read classic literature in daily, manageable segments. This app breaks down over 900 books into daily issues, each readable in 20 minutes or less, helping you build reading habits and tackle lengthy classics. Customize your reading experience with various themes, fonts, and sync options.
- Daily book installments
- Over 900 classic books
- Serialize your own EPUBs
- Sync with Goodreads/Readwise
- Word lookup
- Reading streaks and badges
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Read classic books in daily bite-sized bits! Serial Reader helps you fit more reading into your busy life. Choose from more than 900 books — or add your own! — and the app delivers a new issue from the book every day. Build great reading habits and tackle daunting classic books. Each daily issue can be read in 20 minutes or less, making it easy to fit reading into your spare time! Picked as one of Apple's Best New Apps and Best New App Updates. "This free app will make you ridiculously well-read in 20 minutes a day" — Mashable "For those who are intimidated by thick, leather-bound tomes, Serial Reader is a good way to break it all down" — The Washington Post • Read hundreds of popular classic books for free • Large variety of themes & fonts • Serialize your own EPUB books • Sync to Goodreads and Readwise • Lookup words with quick dictionary & Wikipedia access • Earn fun badges and track your reading streaks Plus, with the Serial Premium upgrade: • Read tomorrow's issue early • Sync your reading across multiple devices • Save quotes & notes while reading • Save books to Read Later • Pause delivery of new issues • Pick specific delivery days and hours for new issues • Custom app icons "Serial Reader’s subscription format makes it a little bit more fun to crank through the classics" — Lifehacker "A useful tool that makes it easy in our modern world to make classic books part of your reading diet" — MacStories More than 900 books available in the app with new titles added each week. Every book is free to read! A preview of available books: Most Popular • Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen • A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens • The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald • Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky • War & Peace - Leo Tolstoy • Les Misérables - Victor Hugo • The Time Machine - H.G. Wells • The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde • The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway American Lit • Moby-Dick - Herman Melville • Little Women - Louisa May Alcott • My Antonia - Willa Cather • Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain Adventure • The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas • Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson • Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe • The Odyssey - Homer • King Solomon's Mines - H. Rider Haggard Romance • Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte • Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy • Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare Science Fiction • The War of the Worlds - H.G. Wells • 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne • A Princess of Mars - Edgar Rice Burroughs Horror • Dracula - Bram Stoker • The Dunwich Horror - H.P. Lovecraft • Frankenstein - Mary Shelley • The Fall of the House of Usher - Edgar Allan Poe • The King in Yellow - Robert W. Chambers • The Wendigo - Algernon Blackwood Mystery • The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle • The Mysterious Affair at Styles - Agatha Christie • The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins Biography • The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass • Twelve Years a Slave - Solomon Northup Children's • Peter Pan - J. M. Barrie • Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll • The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame • Anne of Green Gables - Lucy Maud Montgomery Fantasy • The Well at the World's End - William Morris • Time and the Gods - Lord Dunsany • The Wood Beyond the World - William Morris Philosophy • The Republic - Plato • Leviathan - Thomas Hobbes • Rights of Man - Thomas Paine Nonfiction • Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Mary Wollstonecraft • On the Origin of Species - Charles Darwin • The Federalist Papers • The Communist Manifesto - Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels Westerns • Riders of the Purple Sage - Zane Grey • The Virginian - Owen Wister • Gunman's Reckoning - Max Brand Religion • King James Bible • The Dhammapada • The Quran Build great reading habits and finish classic books in days with Serial Reader!
Tertulia
Discover your next favorite book with curated recommendations from across the web. Organize your reading lists and purchase books seamlessly. Enjoy the best bookstore membership for passionate readers.
- Book recommendations from social media, podcasts, and web
- Reading list tracking
- Seamless book purchasing (US only)
- Bookstore membership benefits
- Discover trending books
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Welcome booklovers! Tertulia is a one-stop shop for finding your next great read, keeping track of your reading lists and purchasing books with the best bookstore membership for avid readers. Tertulia serves up book recommendations from across social media, podcasts, and the web — all in one app which incorporates seamless book purchasing (US only). If a book has moved someone enough to get them talking, you can find it, buy it, and share it on Tertulia.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Tertulia at none against Serial Reader's 5. Tertulia also leads on update cadence (weekly vs every 3 months) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.6). Serial Reader's advantage is review sentiment (95% vs 67%) and ratings volume (4.1K vs 507). On price, rating, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Serial Reader sells 5 one-off in-app purchases. Tertulia asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.8 for Serial Reader against 4.7 for Tertulia. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Serial Reader has 4.1K ratings behind it against 507, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 95% of Serial Reader's written reviews are positive against 67% of Tertulia's.
Serial Reader ships an update every 3 months, Tertulia weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 15, 2026 and October 11, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Serial Reader | Tertulia |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.8 (4.1K ratings) — better | 4.7 (507 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 95.1% of reviews — better | 67.2% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 4.1K — better | 507 |
| Update frequency | Every 3 months | Weekly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Freemium | Ad-supported — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 | 13.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 29 MB | 14 MB |
| Age rating | 12+ | 12+ |
| Developer | Michael Schmitt | Tertulia, Inc. |
Customer experience
Serial Reader
Tertulia
User reviews
Serial Reader
From 4.1K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Bite-sized reading
- 📚 Wide selection of classics
- 👍 Simple and intuitive interface
- 💰 Free with affordable premium upgrade
- 🎉 Motivating achievements and badges
Room to improve
- 🐛 Sync issues across devices
- 🔍 Limited customization options
- 🕰️ Inflexible delivery schedule
- 🤔 Lack of modern/non-classic book selection
Tertulia
From 507 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Fast and efficient app
- 👍 Visually appealing and user-friendly design
- 💡 Excellent book discovery and recommendations
- 👍 Convenient book tracking and management
- 🚀 Quick delivery of purchased books
Room to improve
- 🐛 Glitchy and slow performance issues
- 🔍 Lack of detailed book descriptions
- 💸 Overly commercial focus on selling books
- 🔍 Inconsistent or missing order tracking/history
Bugs and requests
Serial Reader
Reported bugs
2 issues- App crashes when changing fonts
- Issues with new chapter delivery not working
Requested features
4 requests- Add more modern/non-classic book options
- Improve sync functionality across devices
- Allow more customization of reading experience
- Provide flexible delivery schedule options
Tertulia
Reported bugs
4 issues- Frequent crashes and freezes
- Login and account issues
- Disappearing user book lists
- Inconsistent pricing and shipping information
Requested features
4 requests- iPad app version
- Ability to rate and review books read
- Improved personalized recommendations
- Smoother scrolling and list management
In-app purchases
Serial Reader
- Tip Jar - Essay$1.99
- Serial Premium$2.99
- Tip Jar - Short Story$4.99
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- Tip Jar - Novel$9.99
- Tip Jar - Epic$14.99
Tertulia
No in-app purchases









