Fluent Reader vs News Explorer
Fluent Reader
hyliu.meNews Explorer
betamagic.nlSide by side
| Figure | Fluent Reader | News Explorer |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $14.99/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | — |
| iOS | Yes | Yes |
| Android | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 1 | 4 |
| Spec score · RSS Reader Software | 8.8 (#5) | 8.6 (#10) |
| Privacy | The maker says the app does not collect, store, or share personal information; third-party or self-hosted RSS services may see activity through their API. | Betamagic says it cannot access in-app data, which remains on the device or in the user's iCloud container. |
Plans
News Explorer
- Mac editionPriced on request
- Mobile edition$4.99, paid once
- Mac personal license$9.99, paid once
- Setapp edition$14.99 a month
In their own words
Fluent Reader
Fluent Reader is a free, open-source news aggregator and RSS reader for desktop, built for local, distraction-free reading. Its built-in article view handles RSS full text and can use Mercury Parser to load full text; webpages can also open inside the app or externally. Search spans titles and article contents, with regular expressions available for searches and rules that can mark, hide, or star articles. Subscriptions can be grouped, imported or exported as OPML, and included in backups. Desktop versions are distributed for Windows, macOS, and Linux. It supports Inoreader, Feedbin, and services compatible with Fever or Google Reader API, alongside listed compatibility with services such as FreshRSS, Miniflux, The Old Reader, BazQux Reader, and Tiny Tiny RSS. Fluent Reader Lite offers iOS TestFlight access and Android APK downloads. The project says it does not collect, store, or share personal information. However, a connected RSS service may see activity through its API, and connecting one removes local articles with matching source URLs while retaining rules and preferences.
News Explorer
News Explorer has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.