Notes & writing
BetterReads Blog
A Reading Taste Profile Is Not a Genre Cloud
How BetterReads models a lifetime shelf — ratings, time, drift, and named interests — drawing on Netflix Prize research and later recommender-system work.
BetterReads Is Now on macOS
A native reading space for your bookshelf, EPUBs, PDFs, and audiobooks—now available on Mac alongside BetterReads on the web and mobile.
Why Semantic Annotation Needs a Domain
The same highlighted sentence can mean different things in literature, technology, or research. BetterReads now lets annotations carry that context, including custom categories.
A PDF Reader for Research, Not Just Reading
BetterReads brings contents, search, notes, semantic annotations, figure capture, and page-grounded AI into one web PDF reading workspace.
Inline Glossary Highlights: Color-Coded Help in the Text
BetterReads now underlines unfamiliar words right in the chapter—teal for archaic English, gold for nautical terms, coral for whaling—starting with Moby-Dick on web and mobile.
Your Highlights Deserve a Second Life: Introducing BetterReads Study
BetterReads Study turns glossaries, notes, and annotations into short, spaced reviews that help ideas stay with you after you close the book.
Smarter Annotations: Glossary Lookup, Visual Explain, and Instant Recall
BetterReads on web and mobile now looks up unfamiliar words in context, shows images when Explain needs them, and surfaces saved glossary and AI notes on hover or tap—without leaving the page.
Epic Chapter Lens: Line-by-Line Help for Homer
How BetterReads reads verse epics with scroll-synced line helps, chapter framing, and context—starting with the Odyssey, with more poems to come.
Stage Lens: Reading Plays Beat by Beat
How BetterReads follows dramatic structure in theatre—scroll-synced line helps, beat chips, and stage picture, starting with Agamemnon, with more plays to come.
Stay With the Text: Explain, Ask Follow-Ups, and Save What You Learn
How BetterReads turns a difficult passage into a short, contextual conversation—and preserves the useful answer as an annotated note.
Read Anywhere: BetterReads on the Web and Mobile
Start a book on your phone, continue in a web browser, and keep your library, reading position, highlights, notes, bookmarks, and reading activity together.
Semantic Annotation: When to Use Each Category
A practical guide to Character, Scene, Theme, Idea, and Quote in BetterReads—what to tag, with short examples from real reading.
Reading Pathways: The Full Catalog
Every curated sequence in BetterReads today—what it contains, the order we chose, and why those books belong together.
Reading Pathways: How to Read Classics Without Getting Lost
A better way to move through classic literature—structured, thematic, and designed to keep you going.
Reading Trends and Habit Building: Why Seeing Your Pattern Matters
How tracking reading over time supports consistency, goals, and identity—grounded in research on habits, self-monitoring, and goal setting.
Structured Annotation for Deep Reading
How structured notes improve memory and comprehension while reading complex literature.
Stay inside the book
Preview a free chapter in your browser—no account needed. Same calm reading experience on the iOS and Android apps.