lire vs Hourly Newsy
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
lire
This app transforms partial RSS feeds into full-text articles, eliminating the need to click "Read more" links. It offers offline reading and syncs with various services, providing a seamless news consumption experience.
- Full-text RSS feed conversion
- Offline reading of cached articles
- Syncs with Feedly, Feedbin, and more
- iCloud sync option
- No need to click 'Read more' links
- Standalone feed reader functionality
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Love RSS feeds? So do we!! RSS feeds are a great way to follow updates on your favorite website. However, some sites set up their feeds to only show a portion of each entry, you know, to get you to click through to their actual website. We find that really annoying, and we're sure you do too. Which is why, unlike other RSS feed readers, that either push you into a browser (in-app or otherwise), or depend on third party text parsing services and require you to be online to fetch the full text of one article at a time (which makes it no different from having to click/tap through to a website), in lire, you get your favorite RSS feeds as they should've been. You don't need to click through to any website (though, you do still have the option to, if you really wanted). It takes your favorite partial feeds, does its magic, and converts them in to full feeds, so you don't have to click/tap on those annoying 'Read more' or 'Continue reading' links. Once they're cached, you don't even need to be connected to read your full-text feeds. Use as a standalone feed reader, sync with iCloud, or, sync with any of the several services: Feedly, Feedbin, FeedHQ, The Old Reader, Inoreader, BazQux Reader, Newsblur, Feed Wrangler, FreshRSS, Miniflux, Nextcloud News, Tiny Tiny RSS.
Hourly Newsy
This audio news player offers quick access to over 60 hourly and daily global news feeds. Organize, update, and play news from various sources with features like continuous playback, favorites, and playback speed controls.
- 67+ news sources
- Custom source presets
- Favorite sources
- Continuous playback
- Playback speed controls
- Background audio playback
- Sleep timer
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Hourly Newsy is a fast, flexible, one-tap audio news player for people who like to stay current throughout the day. With 60+ hourly and daily global feeds covering business, tech, politics, and world affairs, plus presets, favorites, continuous playback, and fresh feeds, Hourly Newsy keeps your news just a tap away. Hourly Newsy was designed to do something podcast apps just don’t: make fresh, rolling news feeds easy to organize, update, and play. Keep your podcast app for everything else. Features: • Choose from 67 news sources (new sources added regularly) • Save custom source presets • Favorite sources for quick access • Continuous playback across selected sources • Skip played episodes • Sort sources by approximate episode length • Hide unselected sources for easier ordering • Group sources by publisher • Drag sources into your preferred order • Refresh feeds to check for new episodes • Remember playback position by episode • Native lock screen and AirPods controls • Playback speed controls • Sleep timer • Share episodes • Background audio playback • Dynamic source artwork and card colors • Optional audio messages between episodes Included sources: • ABC Australia: The World Today • ABC News: ABC News Update • ABC News: ABC Start Here • Al Jazeera: Al Jazeera News Updates • Associated Press: AP Headline News • BBC: BBC Global News Podcast • BBC: BBC Newscast • BBC: BBC World Service 5-Minute News • BBC: Newshour • BBC: Tech Life • BBC: World Business Report • Bloomberg: Big Take • Bloomberg: Bloomberg News Now • Bloomberg: Bloomberg Tech • CBC: As It Happens • CBC: CBC Front Burner • CBC: CBC The World This Hour • CBC: CBC World Report • CNBC: CNBC Squawk Pod • CNBC: Morning Call • CNN: Amanpour • CNN: CNN 5 Things • C-SPAN: C-SPAN Washington Today • Democracy Now!: Democracy Now! Audio • Deutsche Welle: DW News Brief • Deutsche Welle: Inside Europe • Financial Times: FT News Briefing • Fox News: Fox News Hourly Update • France 24: Focus • France 24: The Debate • Marketplace: Marketplace • Marketplace: Marketplace Morning Report • Marketplace: Marketplace Tech • Monocle: The Briefing • Monocle: The Globalist • Monocle: The Monocle Daily • NBC News: NBC Nightly News with Tom Llamas • New York Times: NYTimes The Headlines • New York Times: The Daily • NHK: NHK Asian View • NPR: NPR News Now • NPR: NPR Up First • NPR: State of the World • PBS: PBS News Hour - Supreme Court • PBS: PBS NewsHour - World • PRX: The World from PRX • PRX: The World Latest Edition • Punchbowl News: The Daily Punch • Reuters: Reuters World News • RFI: International Report • RTE: World Report • SBS: SBS News Headlines • SBS: SBS News In Depth • TechCrunch: Daily Crunch • TechCrunch: Startup News • The Economist: The Economist The Intelligence • The Economist: The World in Brief • The Guardian: Guardian Today in Focus • The NewsWorthy: The NewsWorthy • The Washington Post: The Washington Post The 7 • United Nations: UN News - Global Perspective • United Nations: UN News Today • USA Today: USA TODAY The Excerpt • Vox: Vox Today, Explained • Wall Street Journal: WSJ Minute Briefing • Wall Street Journal: WSJ The Journal • Wall Street Journal: WSJ What's News
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Hourly Newsy at 5.0 against lire's 4.4. Hourly Newsy also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 5) and review sentiment (100% vs 68%). lire's advantage is ratings volume (158 vs 1) and update cadence (fortnightly vs every 2 months). On ads, monetization model, device support and iOS requirement 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
lire costs $9.99 and Hourly Newsy $4.99 up front. lire sells 5 one-off in-app purchases. Hourly Newsy asks for nothing beyond the download.
Hourly Newsy holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: lire has 158 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 68% of lire's written reviews are positive against 100% of Hourly Newsy's.
lire ships an update fortnightly, Hourly Newsy every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | lire | Hourly Newsy |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $9.99 | $4.99 — better |
| Rating | 4.4 (158 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 68.3% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 158 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Fortnightly — better | Every 2 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Best chart rank | #10 — better | #101 |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 | 15.1 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 168 MB | 80 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Kunal Sood | Mike Lapchick |
Customer experience
lire
Hourly Newsy
Bugs and requests
lire
Reported bugs
7 issues- Crashes on launch
- Incorrect feed display
- Articles not opening
- Overlapping UI elements
- Sync errors with FreshRSS and Wallabag
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- Revert to old articles after sync
- VoiceOver issues after update
Requested features
9 requests- Bulk unsubscribe option
- Ability to add multiple feeds at once
- Custom keyword filtering
- Highlight/annotate articles
- Embedded video support
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- Automatic article categorization
- Sharing options
- PDF export
- Multilingual support
Hourly Newsy
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
lire
- Generous Tip$0.99
- Massive Tip$1.99
- Amazing Tip$4.99
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- Humongous Tip$9.99
- Stupendous Tip$19.99
Hourly Newsy
No in-app purchases
