Ask HN: Which RSS reader do you use?

Hacker News Discussion ↗

Hosted RSS services

  • Many moved to hosted services after Google Reader’s shutdown.
  • Popular choices: Feedly, Inoreader, NewsBlur, Feedbin, BazQux, The Old Reader, Mailbrew, Readwise Reader, Follow, Digest-like tools.
  • Praise focuses on stability, cross-device sync, decent web + mobile apps, and reasonable pricing.
  • Criticisms:
    • Some services “enshittify” with unwanted business/AI features and higher prices.
    • Free tiers can be limiting (e.g., feed caps).
    • Users often switch when pricing or UX changes unfavorably.

Self-hosted solutions

  • Widely used for control, privacy, and avoiding lock-in.
  • Common servers: FreshRSS, Miniflux, Tiny Tiny RSS, CommaFeed, selfoss, Nextcloud News, self-written servers, yarr, Feedi.
  • Miniflux and FreshRSS recur as favorites; Miniflux praised for minimalism and easy maintenance, FreshRSS for features and broad client compatibility.
  • Some note PHP stacks as “more moving parts,” others say Docker or simple configs make them trivial.
  • Self-hosting on cheap VPSs, webhosting, or Raspberry Pi is common.

Local / client-only readers

  • Desktop/terminal: NetNewsWire, Thunderbird, Newsboat/Newsraft, QuiteRSS, RSS Guard, Sage-Like, Elfeed (Emacs), Newsraft, browser extensions like Feedbro, Brief.
  • Mobile: Reeder (classic and newer), Feeder, FeedMe, Flym, CapyReader, Feedi PWA, various Android apps.
  • Often combined with a sync backend (FreshRSS, Miniflux, Feedly, Feedbin, The Old Reader).

Alternative consumption patterns

  • Email-based workflows: rss2email/feed2mail, email digests (Mailbrew), or direct delivery into mail folders.
  • Slack integrations and custom bots mentioned.
  • Some use RSS only as a “headline list,” always opening in a browser to respect site design.
  • Others rely on full-text fetching (Miniflux rules, FreshRSS selectors, reader apps with “fetch full article” buttons).

Common requirements and pain points

  • Desired: fast UIs, good keyboard shortcuts, offline/“offline-first,” keyword filters (including for mental-health filtering), duplicate removal, full-content extraction, multi-device sync.
  • Complaints: disappearing or abandoned mobile apps, pricing hikes, arbitrary limits, Cloudflare/protection blocking self-hosted instances, and readers that don’t cache content locally.