Comparison

Hacker News Tech Reader vs Hacko for Hacker News

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

Head to head
About

Hacker News Tech Reader

This app offers a beautiful and intuitive way to read the latest tech, startup, and STEM news from Hacker News. It features customizable reading options, push notifications, and advanced search capabilities, all without ads or subscriptions.

Highlights
  • Ad-free and subscription-free experience
  • Push notifications for replies
  • Nested comment threads
  • Advanced search with filters
  • Customizable fonts and themes
  • Article sharing and archiving
  • Support for multiple browsers
Features
Read full description

HACK for YC's Hacker News is the most beautiful and easy way to read about the latest tech, startup and STEM news. - No Ads. No subscriptions. - Login or Register your Hacker News account - PUSH NOTIFICATIONS for Hacker News replies to comment or post - Supported on iPhone, iPad, and Mac - Setting to block AI posts on HN. - Comments are presented in nested threads - Tap a comment to collapse that thread - Swipe left or right on stories and comments to upvote and favorite - Ability to submit new posts including drafts - Long press a story, link or comment to share - iPad supports split view - On iPads, you can drag a story / comment / story's image (link) to open it in safari in split view. This is useful for when you are viewing the app in split view / multitasking and like opening the link / story / comment in a browser side by side. - Landscape and Portrait support - 3D touch for peek, pop support - Home screen 3D touch shortcuts - Hide posts from the feed - Tap the bottom button to scroll to the next root comment in the thread. Long press it to go to the previous one - All known hacker news endpoints - News, front page, Ask HN, Show HN, Show HN Newest, classic, active, best stories, best comments, new stories, new comments, noob stories, noob comments, jobs, over 100-500 points - Submit posts, reply, comment using your HN account - Browse top 100 leader accounts - Browse stories from a specific site, user or date - Search in comments and usernames! Search is case and diacritic insensitive and ignores punctuations. Search uses an CONTAINS, OR operation if multiple words are typed. - Can select / highlight the comment/post title text for lookup/copy/translate etc iOS native operations. - Powerful search (powered by Algolia API) - use @date to sort by date, #story to filter for stories, #comments to filter for comments, #author_username to filter by user etc. These tags can be separated by commas. Refer to https://hn.algolia.com/api for more tags. - Dark mode - both pure black and gray mode - Low contrast text mode to make the text not be pure white - Many color choices & color picker for customization - App icons in variety of colours for light and dark mode - Font choices - Ability to change font sizes, padding etc to make the layout as compact as you like! - Threaded comments with color bar to maintain visual orientation - Articles open in Safari view with setting to automatically open in "readability" mode - Tap the domain in a story to see all stories from that site - Tap the username in a story or comment to go to the user profile - Browse your submitted stories and comments, favorited stories and comments, upvoted stories and comments - Archive: View an archive of the post website. archive.is, archive.org & google cache. - Share comment as image - Articles can be opened in built in safari or 3rd party browsers. Supports Brave, Firefox, Firefox Focus, Orion, Opera Touch, Dolphin, DuckDuckGo, iCab Mobile, Microsoft Edge and Chrome. Go to settings > Disable the "Use in-app Safari" setting > tap that row to change the default browser. All stories and comments are via Algolia API and Hacker News API: https://news.ycombinator.com/ https://hn.algolia.com/api https://github.com/HackerNews/API Profile picture robots lovingly delivered by Robohash.org There are ongoing costs of developing and maintaining HACK. I am a small indie developer and need your help keep the lights on. I offer a beautiful app for the absolute best user-experience. I don't use intrusive ads, trackers, third-party analytics, subscriptions, or other nonsense. I need to run my own server for caching high quality favicons shown in the app plus for push notifications for replies to hacker news posts. If you can afford it, please support me by purchasing the one-time-only in-app-purchase or giving me a tip. No subscriptions. It's a small and fair amount which helps cover development costs of future updates. Contact me at: pran@pranapps.com

About

Hacko for Hacker News

This client offers a unique way to navigate Hacker News discussions, keeping comments readable at any depth. Enjoy smooth navigation, custom boards, search, and a reading list for an enhanced experience.

Highlights
  • Alternative comment tree display
  • Maintains comment readability
  • Swipe navigation
  • Custom boards
  • Search functionality
  • Reading list
Read full description

It's a Hacker News client that uses an alternative way of displaying the comment tree. Advantages over traditional interfaces: - Comment width doesn't get narrower no matter how deep in the tree you are - You always see the parent of the comment you're currently reading - Swiping allows you to move in and out of subtrees with animated transitions that you fully control - You can easily skip subtrees that don't interest you by simply scrolling As a result it's easier to maintain the context and to keep track of where you are in the Hacker News discussion tree. There are also: custom boards, search, in-thread search, anchors, reading list, recent items. Enjoy your Hacker News reading experience! Developer is not affiliated with Hacker News (https://news.ycombinator.com/) in any way.

Screenshots

Hacker News Tech Reader4 screens
Hacko for Hacker News4 screens

Verdict

The call

Hacker News Tech Reader and Hacko for Hacker News both sit at 4.7 stars, but that hides the real split: 94% of Hacker News Tech Reader's written reviews are positive against 67% of Hacko for Hacker News's. Hacker News Tech Reader also leads on monetization model (free vs free with in-app purchases) and update cadence (every 3 days vs fortnightly). 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. Hacker News Tech Reader sells 6 one-off in-app purchases and Hacko for Hacker News sells 5 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.7 for Hacker News Tech Reader against 4.6 for Hacko for Hacker News. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Hacker News Tech Reader has 1.6K ratings behind it against 31, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 94% of Hacker News Tech Reader's written reviews are positive against 67% of Hacko for Hacker News's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Hacker News Tech Reader ships an update every 3 days, Hacko for Hacker News fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and October 25, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Hacker News Tech Reader versus Hacko for Hacker News: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHacker News Tech ReaderHacko for Hacker News
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (1.6K ratings) — better4.6 (31 ratings)
Positive reviews93.5% of reviews — better66.7% of reviews
Number of ratings1.6K — better31
Update frequencyEvery 3 days — betterFortnightly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — betteriPhone, iPod
Requires iOS15.015.0
Further details — not scored
Size28 MB10 MB
Age rating9+17+
DeveloperPranoy ChowdhuryAndrii Sievrikov

Customer experience

Hacker News Tech Reader

All ratings1,589 ratings
Positive91.4%
Neutral2.6%
Negative6.0%
Written reviews200 reviews
Positive93.5%
Neutral2.5%
Negative4.0%

Hacko for Hacker News

All ratings31 ratings
Positive93.5%
Neutral0.0%
Negative6.5%
Written reviews6 reviews
Positive66.7%
Neutral0.0%
Negative33.3%

In-app purchases

6 purchases

Hacker News Tech Reader

One-time6
  • Nice Tip$3.99
  • Kind Tip$6.99
  • Generous Tip$9.99
Show 3 more
  • Hack Premium$12.99
  • Amazing Tip$12.99
  • Godzilla Tip$19.99
5 purchases

Hacko for Hacker News

One-time5
  • Tip - Regular Tip$0.99
  • Tip - Big Tip$3.99
  • Premium$5.99
Show 2 more
  • Tip - Large Tip$6.99
  • Tip - Huge Tip$9.99

Questions

Is Hacker News Tech Reader free?
Hacker News Tech Reader is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Hacko for Hacker News free?
Hacko for Hacker News is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Hacker News Tech Reader or Hacko for Hacker News?
Hacker News Tech Reader is rated higher. Hacker News Tech Reader averages 4.7 out of 5 from 1.6K ratings, while Hacko for Hacker News averages 4.6 from 31 ratings.
Do Hacker News Tech Reader or Hacko for Hacker News have ads?
Neither Hacker News Tech Reader nor Hacko for Hacker News shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Hacker News Tech Reader or Hacko for Hacker News?
Hacker News Tech Reader ships an update every 3 days, and Hacko for Hacker News fortnightly. Most recently, Hacker News Tech Reader was updated on November 3, 2026 and Hacko for Hacker News on October 25, 2026.

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