The best Pocket alternatives in 2026, compared

Mozilla shut Pocket down on 8 July 2025, and the window to export your saves closed on 12 November 2025. If you're still looking for a replacement, the short answer is this: Instapaper is the closest thing to Pocket, Readwise Reader is the most powerful, Raindrop.io is the best free option, GoodLinks is the best one-time purchase on Apple devices, and Wallabag is the one you can host yourself.

I make one of the apps on this list, Bundle, so take my placement of it with that in mind. I've tried to describe every app the way its own users would.

What happened to Pocket

Mozilla announced on 22 May 2025 that it was closing Pocket. The apps were pulled from the stores that day, and the service stopped working on 8 July 2025. Pocket's website stayed open for exports only until 12 November 2025, when Mozilla turned off exports and the API and queued everyone's data for deletion.

So there's no way to get anything out of Pocket now. If you exported your saves before November 2025, you have a ZIP file of CSVs (or, for older exports, an HTML file), and most of the apps below can read it.

How to choose a Pocket replacement

Four questions narrow the list quickly:

1. Which devices do you read on? Some apps are Apple only. If you read on Android, a Kindle or a Kobo, that rules out half the list.
2. Will you pay? Pocket was free for most people. Raindrop.io, Instapaper and Wallabag have free plans, while Readwise Reader and Bundle are paid after a trial.
3. What do you do after you read? If you only want a clean reader, pick a simple app. If you highlight and want those highlights in your notes, pick Readwise Reader. If you want to remember what you read, that's what Bundle is for.
4. Can it read your Pocket export? If you have one, check before you commit.

The best Pocket alternatives

Instapaper: the closest to Pocket

Instapaper is the app Pocket was always compared with, and it feels the most like it. You save an article, it strips the page down to text, and you read it later on your phone, the web, a Kindle or a Kobo.

The free plan covers saving, syncing, folders and reading. Premium adds full-text search, a permanent archive, unlimited notes, PDFs, Kindle sending and text-to-speech.

• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android, web, Kindle and Kobo
• Price: free, or Premium for $5.99 a month or $59.99 a year
• Best for: people who want Pocket back with as little change as possible

Readwise Reader: the most powerful

Readwise Reader reads almost anything: articles, newsletters, RSS feeds, PDFs, EPUBs and YouTube transcripts. Its highlighting is the best on this list, and highlights sync to Obsidian, Notion and other note apps through Readwise.

There's no free plan, and that much power takes a while to learn. People who save a few articles a week often find it's more than they need.

• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android and web
• Price: 30-day free trial, then $7.99 a month for Reader alone or $9.99 a month for full Readwise, both billed yearly
• Best for: heavy readers who highlight a lot and keep notes

Raindrop.io: the best free option

Raindrop.io is a bookmark manager more than a reader. It's great at keeping thousands of links in collections and tags, with previews and sharing. You can read articles in it, but the reading view is simpler than Instapaper's.

The free plan has unlimited bookmarks on unlimited devices. Pro adds full-text search and permanent copies of pages, so links still open after a site goes down.

• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android, web, Mac, Windows and browser extensions
• Price: free, or Pro for $2.99 a month or $27.99 a year on the App Store
• Best for: people who used Pocket mostly to keep links

GoodLinks: the best one-time purchase on Apple devices

GoodLinks is a fast, well-made read-later app for iPhone, iPad and Mac. It syncs through iCloud, so there's no account to make, and it has highlights, notes, tags and Markdown export.

You pay once, and that includes a year of new features. After the first year, an optional upgrade gets you newer features, and the ones you have keep working.

• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro
• Price: $9.99 once, with an optional $4.99 yearly upgrade
• Best for: Apple users who don't want another subscription

Matter: the best for listening

Matter is a polished reading app for iPhone, iPad, Mac and the web, known for its natural-sounding text-to-speech. It handles articles and newsletters, and its highlights and notes are pleasant to use.

The free version works, while Premium unlocks the better voices and unlimited highlights. Matter has no Android app.

• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Mac and web
• Price: free, with a Premium subscription
• Best for: people who listen to articles as much as they read them

Wallabag: the one you can host yourself

Wallabag is open source. You can run it on your own server for free, or pay a small fee for wallabag.it, its hosted version. It has apps for iPhone and Android and imports from most read-later services.

Running a server takes some effort. The hosted version takes none, and it's cheap.

• Platforms: web, iPhone, Android, browser extensions
• Price: free to host yourself, or wallabag.it for €11 a year after a 14-day trial
• Best for: people who never want to lose their library to a shutdown again

Bundle: the best for remembering what you read

Bundle is the app I make. It's a read-later app for iPhone with a clean reader that works offline, highlights, and a voice that reads articles to you. Each article you save is filed under a topic, with a short summary.

The difference comes at the end of each article. Bundle asks a few questions about what you just read, and you keep the good ones as cards. Each card comes back right before you'd forget it, using spaced repetition, so a few minutes a day keeps what you read from fading.

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SkipKeep card

Bundle imports Pocket's export: open Settings, then Import, then Pocket, and pick the ZIP or HTML file. It reads exports from Instapaper, Readwise Reader and Raindrop.io too.

• Platforms: iPhone (iOS 26 or later) and a Chrome extension. An app for Android e-ink tablets like Boox is on its way to Google Play.
• Price: 14-day free trial, then $7.99 a month or $49.99 a year
• Best for: people who read to learn and want to remember it

Pocket alternatives compared

If you still have your Pocket export

Look for a file named something like pocket.zip in your downloads from 2025. Inside are one or more CSV files with the title, link, date saved, tags and read status of every article. Older exports are a single HTML file instead.

Don't unzip it. Most apps, Bundle included, take the ZIP as it is. Keep a copy somewhere safe too, because it's the only record of your Pocket library now.

If you never exported, the saves are gone. You can rebuild part of your list from your browser history, and from any Pocket links you shared in email or notes.

Which one should you pick?

If you want Pocket back as it was, use Instapaper. If you read a lot and want your highlights in your notes, use Readwise Reader. If you mostly kept links, use Raindrop.io. If you're on Apple devices and don't want a subscription, buy GoodLinks. And if you saved articles to learn from them and forgot most of them anyway, try Bundle.

Most of these have a free plan or a trial, so import your Pocket export into two of them and use both for a week. The one you keep opening is the right one.

Questions about Pocket alternatives

Is Pocket coming back?

No. Mozilla shut Pocket down on 8 July 2025 and began deleting accounts and data on 12 November 2025.

Can I still export my Pocket data?

No. Exports closed on 12 November 2025, when Mozilla also turned off the Pocket API.

What is the closest app to Pocket?

Instapaper. It saves articles the same way, has a similar clean reader, works on iPhone, Android and the web, and has a free plan.

Is there a free Pocket alternative?

Yes. Raindrop.io and Instapaper both have free plans, and Wallabag is free if you host it yourself.

What happened to Omnivore?

Omnivore, a free and open-source read-later app that many people moved to, shut down in late 2024 when its team joined ElevenLabs. Its code is still on GitHub, and some people run it themselves.