EPUB Reader vs iRead
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
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.
- 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
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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 21 languages. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://justread.app/en/privacy_policy
iRead
Listen to your EPUB, TXT, and MOBI books with natural-sounding voices, completely offline. Import your existing library and enjoy background playback with lock screen controls. A Pro version unlocks premium voices with a one-time purchase.
- Listen to EPUB, TXT, MOBI aloud
- Natural neural voices
- Fully offline operation
- Background playback
- Import from Files/Share Sheet
- Light/dark themes
- Library management
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iRead reads the books you already own out loud — natural voices, fully offline, no subscription. LISTEN TO YOUR OWN BOOKS • Natural neural voices read EPUB, TXT and MOBI aloud • Keeps playing in the background, with the screen locked • Lock screen and headphone controls, like a podcast • Chinese and English voices, switched per chapter automatically • Runs entirely on your phone — your text is never uploaded READ THEM TOO • Import from Files, the share sheet, or your computer over Wi-Fi • Light and dark themes, adjustable size and spacing • Shelf with covers, categories and reading progress • One backup file carries your library, progress and settings between devices GOOD TO KNOW • PDF opens for reading but cannot be read aloud — convert it to EPUB first (free converter at iread-reader.web.app) • DRM-protected books, including Kindle and Apple Books purchases, cannot be opened • There is no store inside iRead. It never sells or ships books; it opens the ones you already have FREE AND PRO • Free: the whole reader, plus your device's built-in system voice • Pro: unlocks the natural neural voices. One-time purchase, yours forever • No subscription, no account, no ads, no tracking
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: iRead at 5.0 against EPUB Reader's 4.7. EPUB Reader's advantage is ratings volume (48 vs 1). On price, update cadence, 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
Both are free to download. EPUB Reader sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month and iRead sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
iRead holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: EPUB Reader has 48 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
EPUB Reader ships an update every 5 days, iRead every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 20, 2026 and October 13, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | EPUB Reader | iRead |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (48 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 83.3% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 48 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 5 days | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Freemium |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 18.1 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 207 MB | 38 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | PETR JAHODA | Shuhui Sheng |
Customer experience
EPUB Reader
iRead
In-app purchases
EPUB Reader
- Monthly Premium14 Days trial$2.991 Month
- Monthly Premium$4.991 Month
- Yearly – Launch Price7 Days trial$12.491 Year
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- Yearly Premium14 Days trial$24.991 Year
- Yearly Premium$29.991 Year
- Lifetime – Launch Price$29.99
- Lifetime Premium$79.99
iRead
- iRead Pro$11.99









