Comparison

EPUB Reader vs Afterglow

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

Head to head
About

EPUB Reader

Customize your reading experience with extensive font and layout options. Effortlessly manage your library, track reading habits, and enjoy eye-care features. Sync your books across devices via cloud storage without proprietary lock-in.

Highlights
  • 200+ built-in fonts and custom font import
  • Adjustable text and layout settings
  • Smart dark mode with intelligent image inversion
  • 20-20-20 eye health reminders
  • Library management for 5,000+ books
  • Cloud sync via iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive
  • Highlighting, notes, and bookmarking
  • Reading progress tracking and goal setting
Features
Read full description

EPUB, PDF, comics, and audiobooks in one native iOS reader. Fast, deeply customizable, and built to disappear so you can simply read. FOUR FORMATS, ONE SHELF Read EPUB 3 and PDF. Read CBZ and CBR comics and manga, with two-page spreads, double-tap zoom, and a reading direction you set per book. Listen to audiobooks with chapters, a sleep timer, Car Mode, and CarPlay. Or follow along with EPUB 3 narration, where the text highlights in time with the voice. READ ALOUD Any book can be read to you, by any Apple voice on your device or by natural neural voices in 31 languages that you download once and then run offline. The sentence highlights as it is spoken and the pages turn on their own, with speed presets, sentence skips, a sleep timer, and Lock Screen controls. Prepare a book in advance and keep listening with the screen off. TYPOGRAPHY YOU CONTROL 200+ fonts, or import your own. Tune size, weight, line and paragraph spacing, alignment, hyphenation, and separate margins for portrait and landscape. Save settings per book so a novel, a textbook, and poetry each look right. Build your own color themes and let them switch at sunset. Choose which buttons the reader toolbar shows and where a tap opens it, and give links their own color and style. Smart dark mode keeps images natural, and in-reader brightness, Line Focus, and eye-care break reminders protect your eyes. NO LOCK-IN, EVER Your books stay ordinary files in an ordinary folder, never a proprietary database. Point justread at any folder: on device, iCloud Drive, or one your cloud app syncs through Files. Import from a Calibre server or any OPDS catalog. Email a book to your Kindle or PocketBook. IN SYNC WITH YOUR E-READER Your reading position follows you to any e-reader running KOReader, a Kobo included, in both directions. Connect a self-hosted Grimmory server to browse and download its books, send books to it, and keep status, ratings, highlights, notes, and bookmarks in step both ways. A LIBRARY THAT SCALES Thousands of books with no lag, and a book opens in about a second. Instant search by title, author, or series. Automatic metadata and series detection, 11 sort modes, saved filters, collections, and tags. Edit any book's details by hand, description included. Spotlight opens any book from your home screen. HIGHLIGHTS, NOTES, BOOKMARKS Highlight, underline, and attach a note. Browse every highlight across your whole library in one place, share a quote as a card, or export to Markdown, PDF, or Readwise. YOUR READING, IN NUMBERS Daily goals, a yearly books goal, streaks, and milestone badges. An hourly heatmap shows when you read best. Monthly and yearly recaps, plus a story-style Reading Wrap that turns your year into cards worth sharing. AND THE REST Home screen and lock screen widgets. Dictionary and translation. Full-text search and a nested table of contents. iCloud sync, so you resume on the exact line on any device. Right-to-left and Japanese vertical text. A page curl, if you want one. Free for 14 days, then a subscription or a lifetime purchase, both with Family Sharing. Available in 18 languages. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://justread.app/en/privacy_policy

About

Afterglow

Experience ebooks with a personalized ambiance. This reader intelligently creates unique themes from book cover art, offering a clean interface with customizable typography and layout for comfortable reading.

Highlights
  • Ebook reading interface
  • Cover Tone themes
  • Custom ambiance per book
  • Typography controls
  • Layout controls
  • Light and dark modes
Features
Read full description

A beautiful way to read ebooks. With Afterglow, give each book it's own ambience with Cover Tone themes, intelligently created from the book's cover art. Key features • Ebook reading with a clean, focused interface • Custom ambience for each book • Typography and layout controls for comfort and style • Light and dark reading options

Screenshots

EPUB Reader4 screens
Afterglow4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Afterglow at none against EPUB Reader's 7. Afterglow also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.7). EPUB Reader's advantage is ratings volume (36 vs 1) and iOS requirement (18.1 vs 26.4). On price, update cadence, ads 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. EPUB Reader sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. Afterglow asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Afterglow holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: EPUB Reader has 36 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

EPUB Reader ships an update every 5 days, Afterglow every 6 days. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 14, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
EPUB Reader versus Afterglow: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterEPUB ReaderAfterglow
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (36 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews88.9% of reviews—
Number of ratings36 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 5 days — betterEvery 6 days
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.1 — better26.4
Further details — not scored
Size124 MB14 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPETR JAHODAMohammad Qureshi

Customer experience

EPUB Reader

All ratings36 ratings
Positive91.7%
Neutral2.8%
Negative5.6%
Written reviews27 reviews
Positive88.9%
Neutral3.7%
Negative7.4%

Afterglow

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

7 purchases

EPUB Reader

Subscriptions5
  • Monthly Premium14 Days trial$2.991 Month
  • Monthly: Read Aloud Offline$4.991 Month
  • Yearly – Launch Price7 Days trial$12.491 Year
Show 2 more
  • Yearly Premium14 Days trial$24.991 Year
  • Yearly: Highlights & Notes$29.991 Year
One-time2
  • Lifetime – Launch Price$29.99
  • Lifetime: Library & Kindle$79.99
None

Afterglow

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is EPUB Reader free?
EPUB Reader is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Afterglow free?
Afterglow is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, EPUB Reader or Afterglow?
Afterglow is rated higher. EPUB Reader averages 4.7 out of 5 from 36 ratings, while Afterglow averages 5.0 from 1 ratings.
Do EPUB Reader or Afterglow have ads?
Neither EPUB Reader nor Afterglow shows ads.
Which is updated more often, EPUB Reader or Afterglow?
EPUB Reader ships an update every 5 days, and Afterglow every 6 days. Most recently, EPUB Reader was updated on September 24, 2026 and Afterglow on September 14, 2026.

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