Comparison

Unread vs Kagi News

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Unread

This app is a beautifully designed RSS reader that focuses on a clean reading experience with customizable typography and themes. It offers seamless syncing across devices and integrates with various read-later services, allowing for offline access to cached content.

Highlights
  • Gesture-based navigation
  • Customizable color themes
  • Cross-device syncing
  • Automatic webpage text display
  • Offline access with caching
  • Integration with read-later services
  • Widgets for unread counts
Features
Read full description

Rediscover the joy of reading your favorite writers and publications with Unread. Unread is an RSS reader with beautiful typography, comfortable gesture-based navigation, and a variety of color themes. Unread is available for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Unread won the MacStories Selects 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award. Capabilities include: SYNCING: Our free Unread Cloud service keeps your devices in sync. Unread also syncs with Feedbin, Feedly, Fever, FreshRSS, Gobbler, Inkwell, Inoreader, Miniflux, and NewsBlur. AUTOMATIC WEBPAGE TEXT: For feeds that contain only article summaries, Unread will display the full article text from the webpage. Easily switch between feed text and webpage text for any article, and change the default for individual feeds. WEBSITE ACCOUNTS: For news websites that require an account, sign in and get full webpage text. SUBSCRIBE IN UNREAD: This share sheet extension lets you subscribe to a website’s feeds while visiting that website from Safari or any other web browser. SAVE TO UNREAD: This share sheet extension creates an article in Unread with the contents of the webpage you are visiting from Safari or any other web browser. (Subscription required.) COLOR THEMES: Unread provides a variety of color themes. Choose one theme for light mode and another for dark mode. CACHING: Unread caches webpage text and images for instant loading and offline access. (Subscription required.) READ-LATER SERVICES: Unread can save articles to Anybox, Flyleaf, GoodLinks, Instapaper, Matter, Pinboard, Plinky, Raindrop.io, Readwise, Safari Reading List, and wallabag. On a device with a hardware keyboard, assign a custom keyboard shortcut to each. (Subscription required.) SHORTCUTS: Perform shortcuts on articles and links inside articles. On a device with a hardware keyboard, assign a custom keyboard shortcut to each. (Subscription required.) --- “Most importantly, I should stress again how refreshing it feels to have such a great native experience with Unread. The app is really fast, even when it’s loaded up with hundreds of feeds.” — Niléane Dorffer, MacStories “It’s an RSS reader made with taste. It has great typography, themes, search, and compatibility with the usual suspects. I love having this app on my Mac.” — David Sparks, MacSparky “Unread is focused on eliminating chrome — it is a pure reading app. It’s like reader mode all the time, and the assortment of color themes is nicely curated.” – John Gruber, Daring Fireball --- Unread has full VoiceOver coverage. Every screen and every feature is available to users with vision impairments: • From any screen you can perform a magic tap, a two-finger double tap, to open a menu of options available for that screen. • When on an article list, there are actions available for each article in the list. After selecting an article, invoke the accessibility rotor and then select “Actions”. There is an action to mark the article read or unread, an action to share the article, and many others. • Use the VoiceOver escape gesture, a two-finger “Z”, to back out of the current screen. --- UNREAD SUBSCRIPTION Unread is a free app. Additional functionality is available with a $29.99 (USD)/year auto-renewing subscription: • Article actions for sending articles directly to supported bookmarking and read later services, and for sharing via email or iMessage. • Ability to execute shortcuts on articles and links. • Caching of webpage text and images. • Widget customization options. • Save to Unread share sheet extension. • Custom app icons. • Premium support. A subscription automatically renews unless it is canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Your account will be charged for renewal within 24 hours prior to the end of the current period. You can manage and cancel your subscriptions by going to your account settings on the App Store after purchase. Unread’s Terms of Use are available at: https://www.goldenhillsoftware.com/unread/terms-of-use/

About

Kagi News

Receive a curated daily press review summarizing global news from diverse sources. This app uses AI to distill information, offering multiple perspectives and one-tap access to original articles. It prioritizes privacy with no ads or trackers.

Highlights
  • Daily comprehensive press review
  • Global news coverage
  • Multiple perspectives from diverse sources
  • AI-powered summarization
  • One-tap access to original articles
  • Community-curated RSS feeds
  • Privacy-focused, no ads or trackers
Read full description

Get a comprehensive daily press review with global news. Fully private, with sources openly curated by our community. What You Get: One thoughtful press review per day (updated 12:00 UTC) Coverage: Any and all topics usually covered in the press Multiple perspectives from global sources One-tap access to original articles Clean sections: Summary, Highlights, Key Quotes, Timeline, Context, Impact How It Works: Kagi News uses AI to read thousands of community-curated RSS feeds from publications worldwide and distills them into a single, thoughtful press review. Every review cites the sources it pulled from, so you can dive deeper with one tap. Community Contributions: Contribute sources to broaden perspectives Open source platform with community-curated feeds Privacy by Design: No ads. No trackers. Your attention belongs to you. https://kagi.com/privacy Download now for your daily dose of quality journalism without the noise. If you have any feedback or questions, please reach out to us via https://kagifeedback.org or email us at support[at]kagi.com. Join our vibrant member community on Discord for tips, advice, and feature suggestions: https://kagi.com/discord

Screenshots

Unread4 screens
Kagi News4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Kagi News at none against Unread's 4. Kagi News also leads on chart position (#170 vs unranked) and iOS requirement (15.0 vs 18.0). Unread's advantage is update cadence (every 8 days vs every 3 weeks) and ratings volume (442 vs 90). On price, rating, review sentiment and ads 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Unread sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. Kagi News asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.6 for Unread against 4.6 for Kagi News. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 442 and 90 respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 72% of Unread's written reviews are positive against 67% of Kagi News's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Unread ships an update every 8 days, Kagi News every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on September 21, 2026 and September 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
Unread versus Kagi News: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterUnreadKagi News
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (442 ratings)4.6 (90 ratings)
Positive reviews72.4% of reviews — better67.5% of reviews
Number of ratings442 — better90
Update frequencyEvery 8 days — betterEvery 3 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
Best chart rank—#170 — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, MaciPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better
Requires iOS18.015.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size39 MB29 MB
Age rating17+12+
DeveloperGolden Hill SoftwareKagi Inc.

Customer experience

Unread

All ratings442 ratings
Positive89.8%
Neutral2.7%
Negative7.5%
Written reviews170 reviews
Positive72.4%
Neutral8.2%
Negative19.4%

Kagi News

All ratings90 ratings
Positive90.0%
Neutral1.1%
Negative8.9%
Written reviews83 reviews
Positive67.5%
Neutral14.5%
Negative18.1%

User reviews

Unread

From 442 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Elegant and intuitive UI
  • 🚀 Fast and responsive
  • 🔒 Secure login integration
  • 📚 Excellent article formatting and readability
  • 💡 Automated full-text article retrieval

Room to improve

  • 💰 Subscription model seen as too expensive
  • 🔀 Inconsistent experience between iOS and iPad versions
  • 🔍 Difficult to discover certain features
  • 🔠 Lack of customization options (e.g., font, theme)

Kagi News

From 90 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Reclaim your time
  • 👍 Informed without overwhelming
  • 👍 First and Probably Only News App I Enjoy
  • 👍 My first news app

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Biased news
  • 🐛 Faulty sources
  • 🐛 App crashes all the time
  • 🐛 Incorrect fake news
  • 🐛 Steals your data and sells it to china

Bugs and requests

Unread

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Occasional article duplication
  • Issues with 'Keep Unread' feature
  • Text formatting problems in dark mode

Requested features

4 requests
  • Add support for more RSS providers (e.g., Miniflux, FreshRSS)
  • Implement keyboard shortcuts and power-user features
  • Improve information density on iPad layout
  • Introduce a one-time purchase option

Kagi News

Reported bugs

1 issue
  • Setting Broken

Requested features

2 requests
  • Alerts please
  • Customizable lenses and source ranking/exclusion

In-app purchases

4 purchases

Unread

Subscriptions4
  • Unread Monthly Subscription$4.991 Month
  • Unread Annual Subscription$29.991 Year
  • Unread: Free first year$29.991 Year
Show 1 more
  • Unread: Discounted first year$29.991 Year
None

Kagi News

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Unread free?
Unread is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Kagi News free?
Kagi News is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Unread or Kagi News?
Unread and Kagi News are both rated 4.6 out of 5 on the App Store, from 442 and 90 ratings respectively.
Do Unread or Kagi News have ads?
Neither Unread nor Kagi News shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Unread or Kagi News?
Unread ships an update every 8 days, and Kagi News every 3 weeks. Most recently, Unread was updated on September 21, 2026 and Kagi News on September 24, 2026.

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