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Problems with Reader as a Pocket Replacement
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Posted by satis
Aug 2, 2025 at 09:34 PM
I never wanted to rely on Safari Reader because I wanted tagging, folders, read it later and archive features, and I didn’t want to be restricted to just using Safari.
Goodlinks uses tags and folders, as well as highlighting and notetaking within the app, along with full-text search across saved articles. Goodlinks lets you can export to Markdown as an option, so articles can easily be thrown into other apps. And the macOS Share extension can be accessed in any app that permits sharing, not just a web browser.
Plus I like to use more than just Safari. My main browser is Brave, and Safari and Firefox are secondary browsers for me. Goodlinks has share extensions for all of them.
Goodlinks is private, saves everything in your iCloud, and is cheap as chips: $10 for the app, which works across Mac/iOS/iPadOS, with a $5 optional one-year feature ugrade support. (When new functionality comes out the upgrade unlocks it forever, plus any new features that come out in the next 12 months.)
Last I checked, with Safari Reader Mode you could only search within saved pages (perhaps this changed), but Reader does not let you use tags or folders, has no metadata/notetaking inside saved pages, and Safari Highlights is only available in the United States and supports English-language websites.
With choices like Goodlinks I have no reason to consider Safari Reader or even Instapaper (which has a free tier but charges $60/year for permanent archives and full-text search and notes).
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Aug 3, 2025 at 03:17 PM
Thanks Satis - Goodlinks looks good. I use Windows and Android. You mentioned Instapaper. If it also works on Mac have you familiarity with it? Thanks.
Daly
satis wrote:
I never wanted to rely on Safari Reader because I wanted tagging,
>folders, read it later and archive features, and I didn’t want to be
>restricted to just using Safari.
>
>Goodlinks uses tags and folders, as well as highlighting and notetaking
>within the app, along with full-text search across saved articles.
>Goodlinks lets you can export to Markdown as an option, so articles can
>easily be thrown into other apps. And the macOS Share extension can be
>accessed in any app that permits sharing, not just a web browser.
>
>Plus I like to use more than just Safari. My main browser is Brave, and
>Safari and Firefox are secondary browsers for me. Goodlinks has share
>extensions for all of them.
>
>https://goodlinks.app/
>
>Goodlinks is private, saves everything in your iCloud, and is cheap as
>chips: $10 for the app, which works across Mac/iOS/iPadOS, with a $5
>optional one-year feature ugrade support. (When new functionality comes
>out the upgrade unlocks it forever, plus any new features that come out
>in the next 12 months.)
>
>Last I checked, with Safari Reader Mode you could only search within
>saved pages (perhaps this changed), but Reader does not let you use tags
>or folders, has no metadata/notetaking inside saved pages, and Safari
>Highlights is only available in the United States and supports
>English-language websites.
>
>With choices like Goodlinks I have no reason to consider Safari Reader
>or even Instapaper (which has a free tier but charges $60/year for
>permanent archives and full-text search and notes).
Posted by satis
Aug 3, 2025 at 11:05 PM
Daly de Gagne wrote:
>Thanks Satis - Goodlinks looks good. I use Windows and Android. You
>mentioned Instapaper. If it also works on Mac have you familiarity with
>it? Thanks.
I started using Instapaper when in came out in 2008 as a one-time paid app. But the dev at the time was a one-man shop and he refused to compete on features from services like Pocket, so I stopped relying on it by mid-2013, which is the date of my last saved article. That dev ended up selling Instapaper, and it’s since transferred to three different owners.
When I used Instapaper I saved articles exclusively in iOS, and I if I need to access my saved articles on Mac I do so only through the web interface. Instapaper added a Mac app in 2020 but I have never used it.
Instapaper offers a free tier whose features might be enough for you if you want to move saved articles into other apps or save them into storable formats.
https://www.instapaper.com/premium