Read Books, Articles Faster Using This Speed Reading App & Extension

It doesn’t matter if you’re an English speaker who reads from left to right, an Arabic speaker reading from right to left or know a character-based language like Chinese which reads top to bottom. One thing that’s common between all three is the reading pattern which requires the eyes to move laterally or vertically. Speed reading, on the other hand, moves text around a certain area and always keeps the word at a medial position which saves a lot of time since the eye doesn’t have to move at all and can focus on the same area. This saves a lot of time for the reader especially if you’re someone who is a slow reader or have a tight schedule which keeps you from daily reading. Reedy is an Android app & Chrome extension which will help you read books, articles faster.

Speed Reading App & Extension to Improve Reading Time

After using multiple speed reading extensions and apps, Reedy was chosen as one of the better alternatives due to its non-obstructive UI and extensive feature set. Furthermore, the service is available as both an Android app and Chrome extension so there’s less confusion when picking a service. It’s free and relies on donations for future development.

Chrome Extension: Reedy [Free]

Once the extension is installed, triggering the speed reading mode is simple as pressing Alt-S (which can be customised) and selecting the piece of text you wish to read. Doing so opens up a full-screen UI where the Reedy overlays words one by one according to your reading speed.

Pressing the spacebar will pause the flashing of text and bring up options to change the following things:

• The font size
• Placement of text
• Reading speed in words per minute (wpm)
• Navigate the passage
• Change transparency
• Switch between light and dark modes

Additionally, the extension provides more options when you right icon the extension icon.

 

One of my biggest gripes about Reedy is the process of having to select the text without automatically identifying the body of the article. If it’s a deal breaker for you then Spreed is another great speed reading extension which opens the UI in a separate window.

Android App: Reedy [Free]

Although there are a lot of options in Android for speed reading apps, Reedy proved itself to be the most reliable and distinguishes itself by offering the ability to speed reading books as long as they’re in the ePub, txt or Fbz format. This means you can read books that you’ve been putting off too by selecting it from the file manager.

You can get the app to speed read content by doing the following actions:

• Opening a file
• Pasting text or URL
• Opening a link through the share menu

The app will automatically launch into a full-screen mode where it’ll start flashing the words as soon as you tap the screen.

While the app is really simple to use and also includes a lot of features to control the reading interface, the ability to sync up data to the cloud is a feature I sorely miss and wish future updates would include.

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