Reading and extraction
Reader mode
Also called Reading view, Reader view
Reader mode is a display mode that strips a web page down to its article — headline, byline, and body text — and re-renders it in a single readable column with controllable type, width, and theme. Navigation, sidebars, ads, and related-story modules are removed.
What reader mode actually changes
Reader mode is a rendering decision, not a network one. It takes the document the browser already has, decides which part of it is the article, and throws away the rest. Typography, line length, and contrast come from the reader instead of the publisher's stylesheet.
Because it depends on identifying the article correctly, reader mode fails in predictable ways: liveblogs, image-heavy features, and pages that assemble their body from scripts often come out empty or truncated.
Beyond the browser's version
Browser reading views are per-page and disposable. Dedicated readers keep the article: they store it for later, allow highlighting and export, read it aloud, and let a reader ask questions grounded in the text.
In smry
smry is a reader mode with the article kept as the grounding context — the same clean column, plus summaries, chat, text to speech, highlights, and export around it.
Common questions
Does reader mode work on every page?
No. It needs a recognizable article structure. Liveblogs, galleries, and pages that build their body in JavaScript often produce partial or empty results.
Is reader mode the same as an ad blocker?
No. An ad blocker prevents requests. Reader mode changes what is rendered from the page the browser already loaded.