Comparison

Excerpt vs Readwise Reader

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

Head to head
About

Excerpt

Capture and organize quotes and images from physical books using your device's camera. Add notes, customize highlighter colors, and share your findings. Export your compiled excerpts into a PDF for easy reference.

Highlights
  • Scan book pages with camera
  • Capture quotes and images
  • Add notes to excerpts
  • Organize by page and chapter
  • Share excerpts
  • Export to PDF
  • Customizable highlighter colors
Features
Read full description

– FEATURES – • Use your device's camera to instantly grab meaningful quotes and important images from the pages of your favourites books • Add notes to your excerpts, and organize them by page number and chapter • Save unlimited excerpts from unlimited books • Share important excerpts with friends and colleagues • Export all of a book's excerpts into a convenient PDF file • Customize your highlighter color – yellow, blue, green, or pink • Excerpt will always be free to download and will never show you ads

About

Readwise Reader

This app consolidates all your reading content, including web articles, newsletters, and PDFs, into a single, organized platform. It offers advanced highlighting, text-to-speech, and AI-powered assistance to enhance your reading workflow and knowledge retention.

Highlights
  • Consolidate web articles, newsletters, RSS, Twitter threads, PDFs, EPUBs
  • Import from Pocket, Instapaper, and Feedly
  • Advanced highlighting and annotation tools
  • Text-to-speech narration
  • AI-powered reading assistant (Ghostreader)
  • Full-text search
  • Syncs across all devices, offline access
Features
Read full description

Readwise Reader is the first read-it-later app built specifically for power readers. If you’ve ever used Instapaper or Pocket, Reader is like those except it’s built for 2024 and brings all your reading into one place including: web articles, email newsletters, RSS feeds, Twitter threads, PDFs, EPUBs and more. ______________________ “Reader has completely redesigned the read-it-later app. It’s gorgeous and blazingly fast. In many ways, it’s the Superhuman of reading — you won’t want to read anywhere else.” Rahul Vohra (Founder of Superhuman) “I spend my entire day reading, researching, & writing and Readwise is the reading tool I’ve been waiting for. The perfect complement to my writing workflow. Absolute game changer.” Packy Mccormick (Author of Not Boring) “The Readwise reading app is the first read-it-later app that enables a true workflow for serious readers. As an ex-Pocket /Instapaper power user, it's hard to imagine ever going back.” Fitz Maro (Creative Technology Lead at Pinterest) ______________________ ALL YOUR READING IN ONE PLACE Stop juggling half a dozen reading apps. Reader brings all your content into one place including: • Web articles • Email newsletters • RSS feeds • Twitter threads • PDFs • EPUBs You can even import your existing library from Pocket and Instapaper and RSS feeds from Feedly, Inoreader, Feedbin, etc. POWERFUL HIGHLIGHTING FOR POWER READERS We believe that annotations are the key to getting more out of what you read. So we’ve developed highlighting as a first-class feature inside Reader. Highlight images, links, rich text, and more. On any device. READER WILL CHANGE THE WAY YOU READ We’ve reinvented the digital reading experience to apply the power of software to the printed word. This includes TEXT-TO-SPEECH (listen to any document narrated with the lifelike voice of a real human), GHOSTREADER (your integrated copilot of reading enabling you to ask questions, define terms, simplify complex language, and more), and FULL-TEXT SEARCH (find whatever you’re looking for, even if you only remember a single word). FLEXIBLE SOFTWARE TO FIT YOUR UNIQUE NEEDS Your personal interests, your professional projects, your way of doing things — they’re unique. Reader is your home base for the varied documents in your life, customizable to match the way your brain works. PDFs for work, articles for your newsletter, and ebooks for pleasure all live comfortably side-by-side. No more juggling dozens of apps. INTEGRATED WITH YOUR FAVORITE TOOLS Your annotations should flow effortlessly from your reading app into your writing tool of choice. Instead you waste hours reformatting, reorganizing, and repeating. Reader eliminates this hassle. Reader seamlessly connects to Readwise which exports to Obsidian, Notion, Roam Research, Evernote, Logseq, and more READ ANYWHERE, ANYTIME Access all of your content from any of your devices with everything in sync. Even offline. Reader syncs across all platforms, including a powerful, local-first web app and iOS. You can even highlight the open web with the Reader browser extensions. ______________________ If you’re not already a Readwise subscriber, you can get a free 30-day trial with no credit card upfront. At the end of the trial, you will not be charged unless you choose to subscribe. Support: Check out readwise.io/faq or email us at hello@readwise.io Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://readwise.io/privacy

Screenshots

Excerpt4 screens
Readwise Reader4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Readwise Reader at weekly against Excerpt's every 4 months. Readwise Reader also leads on ratings volume (585 vs 36). Excerpt's advantage is review sentiment (95% vs 72%) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 16.0). On price, rating, ads and in-app purchases 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. Excerpt sells 3 one-off in-app purchases and Readwise Reader sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $8.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Excerpt holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Readwise Reader has 585 ratings behind it against 36, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 95% of Excerpt's written reviews are positive against 72% of Readwise Reader's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Excerpt ships an update every 4 months, Readwise Reader weekly. Both last shipped on October 24, 2026.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Excerpt versus Readwise Reader: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterExcerptReadwise Reader
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (36 ratings) — better4.6 (585 ratings)
Positive reviews95.2% of reviews — better72.0% of reviews
Number of ratings36585 — better
Update frequencyEvery 4 monthsWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS13.0 — better16.0
Further details — not scored
Size46 MB193 MB
Age rating4+17+
DeveloperRyan MaksymicReadwise, Inc

Customer experience

Excerpt

All ratings36 ratings
Positive97.2%
Neutral0.0%
Negative2.8%
Written reviews42 reviews
Positive95.2%
Neutral2.4%
Negative2.4%

Readwise Reader

All ratings585 ratings
Positive88.9%
Neutral4.3%
Negative6.8%
Written reviews279 reviews
Positive72.0%
Neutral11.5%
Negative16.5%

Bugs and requests

Excerpt

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Readwise Reader

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Inconsistent sync between devices
  • Unreliable RSS feed updates
  • Frequent crashes on iPad
  • Issues with resuming reading position

Requested features

5 requests
  • Improved PDF and ebook support
  • Customizable reading themes and layouts
  • Better integration with note-taking apps
  • Reading progress and statistics tracking
  • Bulk management of saved items

In-app purchases

3 purchases

Excerpt

One-time3
  • Unlock Colors 1$0.99
  • Unlock Colors 2$2.99
  • Unlock Colors 3$9.99
4 purchases

Readwise Reader

Subscriptions4
  • Reader Monthly Plan$8.991 Month
  • Reader Monthly$12.991 Month
  • Reader Annual Plan$95.901 Year
Show 1 more
  • Reader Yearly$119.991 Year

Questions

Is Excerpt free?
Excerpt is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Readwise Reader free?
Readwise Reader is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Excerpt or Readwise Reader?
Excerpt is rated higher. Excerpt averages 4.8 out of 5 from 36 ratings, while Readwise Reader averages 4.6 from 585 ratings.
Do Excerpt or Readwise Reader have ads?
Neither Excerpt nor Readwise Reader shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Excerpt or Readwise Reader?
Excerpt ships an update every 4 months, and Readwise Reader weekly. Most recently, Excerpt was updated on October 24, 2026 and Readwise Reader on October 24, 2026.

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