Comparison

Paper2Audio vs Reader

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

Head to head
About

Paper2Audio

Listen to your documents, articles, and ebooks with advanced text-to-speech technology. It intelligently skips irrelevant content and summarizes visual elements, making learning hands-free and productive. Enjoy natural voices and a familiar interface for an enhanced listening experience.

Highlights
  • Reads PDFs, webpages, ebooks, .docx, .txt
  • Summarizes math, code, tables, and figures
  • Intelligently skips junk text and ads
  • High-quality, natural text-to-speech voices
  • Document summarization and context addition
  • Highlighting, notes, and table of contents navigation
  • Adjustable playback speed
Read full description

Paper2Audio is a free text to audio app that reads aloud your PDFs, ebooks, web articles, text documents, and plain text, turning complex reading into clear audio you can listen to anywhere. Paper2Audio’s text to speech (TTS) reader technology intelligently skips clutter like page numbers, footnotes, citations, and more. It summarizes figures, tables, and math so you can focus on what matters. Convert your documents and pdfs to audio to turn your commute, workout, or chores into productive learning time by listening to your documents hands-free. Over 700,000 documents converted to audio! Key features: • Read PDFs, webpages, EPUBs, .docx, .txt, scanned documents and copy-pasted text Turn your ebooks into audiobooks and your pdfs to audio to read text out loud • High quality text to speech voices Enjoy natural text to voice with engaging and realistic voices that make hours of listening engaging and easy to follow, including for people with visual impairments or learning challenges like dyslexia or ADHD. • Reads documents aloud with summaries of visual elements Summarizes equations, code, tables and figures in plain language instead of confusing symbol-by-symbol narration • A smarter audio text reader that cuts junk text you don't want to hear (page numbers, references list, ads, etc.) Our text reader skips the clutter and focuses only on the meaningful content • Read along with the audio with Reader View Reformats your documents for easier readability on small screens and shows images, math, formatting, and word-level highlighting in sync with the audio. • Highlighting and notes Keep track of key text with highlights and add your own notes • Familiar UI similar to a podcast or audiobook app Jump right in with an intuitive interface you already know how to use • Table of contents to select a section of your PDF or ebook Navigate instantly to any section that interests you most without endless scrolling • Read text aloud at your own speed with playback speed control from 0.5x to 4.0x in 0.05x increments Find your perfect listening pace whether you're a speed listener or prefer to savor every detail • Scan and read documents aloud Upload scanned PDFs to turn them into listenable audio. • Screen reader compatible and dyslexia-friendly fonts Pricing: Paper2Audio is a free text to audio document reader (up to 56 hours of audio generation per week) with no ads or annoying stuff. Paper2Audio Plus, our paid tier for business users, has higher limits and allows for audio file exports. Terms of use: https://www.paper2audio.com/terms-of-use Privacy: https://www.paper2audio.com/privacy

About

Reader

Features
Read full description

Reader turns the EPUBs you already own into books read aloud, in a voice you choose, entirely on your iPhone. CLASSIC BOOKS, BUILT IN Open the app and start listening. A shelf of classic novels is included free, with cover art made for them, refreshed for the season. No book purchases, no extra downloads, no account to make. YOUR OWN BOOKS TOO Bring any EPUB from Files, Safari, AirDrop, or another app. Standard Ebooks and Project Gutenberg both offer thousands of free, beautifully prepared books, and Reader points you to them. READ ALOUD, IN YOUR VOICE Reader uses Apple's built-in voices, so you can pick the one you actually want to listen to and change it whenever you like. Every word is highlighted as it is spoken, so you can follow along, look up, and find your place again. BUILT FOR LONG LISTENING • Playback continues with the screen locked, with controls on the Lock Screen • Adjust the reading pace from half speed to double • Your place is saved, and a book reopens where you left it • Jump between chapters, or scrub to any point • Choose your typeface and size, including OpenDyslexic WORKS ANYWHERE Reading and speech happen on your device. Once your books and voices are available, no connection is needed to listen, so Reader works on a plane, underground, or off the grid. Your books stay on your iPhone. FREE TO READ Every reading feature is available to everyone. There are no listening limits, no subscription, and no paid feature tier. Reader is supported by banner ads, with an optional one-time purchase to remove them. Reader is built and supported by one person who reads every message. If something is wrong or missing, write to nick@thefreereader.app.

Screenshots

Paper2Audio4 screens
Reader4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Paper2Audio at none against Reader's shown. On price, update cadence, in-app purchases 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Paper2Audio sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $20.00 per month and Reader sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 5 days. The most recent releases landed on October 25, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
Paper2Audio versus Reader: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPaper2AudioReader
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (742 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews97.1% of reviews—
Number of ratings742 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 5 daysEvery 5 days
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad — betteriPhone
Requires iOS17.0 — better18.6
Further details — not scored
Size68 MB34 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPaper2AudioNick Ueda

Bugs and requests

Paper2Audio

Reported bugs

1 issue
  • Occasional issues with chapter/section detection in long documents

Requested features

4 requests
  • Add support for footnotes and citations
  • Implement custom pronunciation dictionary
  • Improve handling of multilingual content
  • Expand compatibility to more file formats

Reader

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Paper2Audio

Subscriptions2
  • Paper2Audio Plus Monthly$20.001 Month
  • Paper2Audio Plus Annual$191.991 Year
1 purchases

Reader

One-time1
  • Remove Ads$2.99

Questions

Is Paper2Audio free?
Paper2Audio is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Reader free?
Reader is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do Paper2Audio or Reader have ads?
Reader shows ads; Paper2Audio does not.
Which is updated more often, Paper2Audio or Reader?
Paper2Audio ships an update every 5 days, and Reader every 5 days. Most recently, Paper2Audio was updated on October 25, 2026 and Reader on October 24, 2026.

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