Comparison

Scribb vs Lumen Reader

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

Head to head
About

Scribb

Features
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Scribb — Read Without Distractions Your personal reading sanctuary. Save anything. Read anywhere. Tired of cluttered apps, endless ads, and losing track of articles you meant to read? Scribb transforms how you consume content — giving you a clean, focused space to save, organize, and enjoy your reading list on your terms. Save Once, Read Anywhere Capture articles, blog posts, and long-form content from any website with a single tap. Your library syncs seamlessly across all your devices via iCloud, so your reading list is always with you. True Offline Reading Download articles for offline access. Perfect for flights, commutes, subway rides, or anywhere life takes you without WiFi. Your content is always available — no connection required. Organize Your Way Keep your reading list tidy with powerful organization tools: - Tags — Categorize articles by topic, priority, or mood - Smart Filters — Find exactly what you're looking for - Auto-updating Sources — Stay current with content from your favorite sites Read Comfortably Customize your reading experience to suit your preferences: - Multiple color themes - Adjustable fonts and text sizing - Clean typography optimized for long-form reading - Bionic font - Distraction-free interface — no ads, no popups, no AI, just content Why Scribb? We believe reading should be simple. No algorithms deciding what you see. No ads interrupting your flow. No tracking your habits. Just you and the content you chose to save. Download Scribb and rediscover the joy of reading.

About

Lumen Reader

Features
Read full description

Lumen Reader turns any webpage, EPUB, PDF, or DOCX into a clean audiobook with on-device narration, lock-screen controls, and word-by-word highlights. Paste a link, tap Listen — no ads, no account, no subscription. PASTE A LINK. GET AN AUDIOBOOK. Found a 10,000-word essay you'd never sit down to read? An hour-long blog post? A web-novel chapter buried under five ad slots? Paste the URL into Lumen. The page is stripped of pop-ups, trackers, cookie walls, newsletter dialogs, and "related articles" carousels — then handed to a natural narrator that starts reading aloud while you keep walking, cooking, or driving. POCKET AUDIO PLAYER Lumen feels like a podcast app, not a reading app, when you want it to. The big Listen button is on every book and every imported article. Lock-screen controls let you play, pause, scrub, skip back 15 s, or jump chapter without unlocking your phone. AirPods double-tap, CarPlay, Dynamic Island, and Bluetooth headphones all work out of the box. Background audio keeps the narrator going when the screen is off. OR READ INSTEAD The same content is also a beautifully typeset, minimalist reader. Three themes (Dark, Sepia, Light) and four type families (Georgia serif, sans, rounded, OpenDyslexic) tuned for multi-hour sessions. Sentence-granular highlights in five colours, per-chapter bookmarks, and a notes catalog searchable across every book. A soft amber word-highlight scrolls along the page in time with the audio when you read and listen at the same time. BUILT-IN LIBRARY Open the app and there's already something to read or listen to. A curated catalog of public-domain titles is one tap away: • The Holy Bible (King James Version) • The Holy Qur-ān (public-domain English translation) • The Bhagavad Gita • The Dhammapada · Tao Te Ching · Analects of Confucius • Meditations (Marcus Aurelius) · The Art of War · Walden • Pride and Prejudice · Frankenstein · Dracula · Moby-Dick • Sherlock Holmes · Alice in Wonderland · The Iliad & The Odyssey • …plus developer docs (Snowflake, Databricks) rendered on-device. Books download straight from canonical archives like Project Gutenberg in seconds — no account, yours forever. YOUR OWN FILES TOO Drop EPUB, PDF, DOCX, TXT, Markdown, or HTML in from Files, iCloud Drive, Dropbox, Google Drive, or OneDrive. Lumen parses chapters into the same clean reader and audiobook UI. ONE LIBRARY ON EVERY DEVICE iCloud syncs your reading progress, highlights, notes, and imported books across iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Vision Pro — silently, with no login. Start a chapter on your phone, finish it on your iPad with the audio resuming at the exact word. OFFLINE BY DEFAULT Every page and audio session is generated on-device. Once a book is downloaded, you never need a signal to re-open it. PRIVACY No account. No analytics. No tracking. Highlights, notes, and progress stay in your own iCloud — never on our servers. The app talks only to the page you explicitly paste, or runs entirely offline against the bundled library. FINE PRINT Every catalog title is public domain or permissively licensed. Lumen does not bundle copyrighted prose and does not redistribute from its own servers — downloads go straight from the canonical archive to your device. For pages or files you import, you're responsible for the rights. Read it. Hear it. Pocket it.

Screenshots

Scribb4 screens
Lumen Reader4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Lumen Reader at every 4 days against Scribb's every 2 months. Scribb's advantage is iOS requirement (18.0 vs 26.0). On price, ads, 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Scribb ships an update every 2 months, Lumen Reader every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 28, 2026 and October 25, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 4 level
Scribb versus Lumen Reader: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterScribbLumen Reader
PriceFreeFree
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 4 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.0 — better26.0
Further details — not scored
Size19 MB98 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperIgor IgorSAMANTH GURRAM

In-app purchases

None

Scribb

No in-app purchases

None

Lumen Reader

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Scribb free?
Scribb is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Lumen Reader free?
Lumen Reader is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Scribb or Lumen Reader have ads?
Neither Scribb nor Lumen Reader shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Scribb or Lumen Reader?
Scribb ships an update every 2 months, and Lumen Reader every 4 days. Most recently, Scribb was updated on October 28, 2026 and Lumen Reader on October 25, 2026.

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