Tether is now in closed testing

Tether is now open to its first group of testers on Google Play. It reads articles, RSS feeds, pasted text, PDFs, and EPUBs. Closed testing will show how it behaves on phones and files outside the development setup.

Tether isn't ready for a public release yet. The main reading flow works, but internal use only tells so much. Closed testing is the point where other people get to find the bugs, confusing controls, and device-specific problems that have been missed.

built closed testing public

The original idea is still there: hold the screen to read one word at a time, lift your finger to pause, and swipe up to see the complete article. Most of the recent work has been less novel and more necessary: importing files, saving progress, and making sure you can find an article again the next day.

Tether accepts links from the clipboard and Android share sheet, as well as pasted text, PDFs, and EPUBs. It follows RSS feeds too. The library supports collections, pins, highlights, notes, renamed titles, and a resume button for whatever you were reading last.

Recent builds also add presets for the reading settings. Each article remembers whether you last used RSVP or the full-page view. There's an optional daily goal, but it is off by default.

The closed test will stay fairly small because each tester is added manually. If access does not arrive immediately, that is probably why.

Tether doesn't have user accounts. Your library, notes, settings, and reading progress stay on your phone, and you can export a backup. Google Play does need the email address of each tester, so the form below asks for the one you use with the Play Store.

Try the closed test

Enter the email used for Google Play. Testers are added by hand, so access may take a little while to come through.

Privacy policy

If you join, please use Tether for your normal reading. The odd PDF, the feed with broken formatting, and the article you abandon halfway through are much more useful than a clean demo.