Readlang on Android: no app, but two ways that work

Where Readlang stands on Android

Readlang is a web application: a reader at readlang.com, a browser extension, and a server that does the translating. The founder's own instructions for phones, posted on the Readlang forum in June 2024, say to open the site and add it to the home screen, and that instruction covers Android and iPhone alike. Native apps come up on the forum regularly, in threads such as "Native mobile app?" from June 2025 and "Readlang App possibility" from March 2026. As of September 2026 there is no app, and no date for one.

What did change is the browser side. Since November 2025 Readlang has a separate Firefox extension, and it works in Firefox for Android, which is the one mobile browser that runs desktop-style extensions. That single fact makes Android a better place to use Readlang on the open web than an iPhone is. The rest of the picture, including offline, is the same as everywhere else: no offline mode, despite forum requests in November 2024 and October 2025.

For the full guide to the product, plans and reviews, see the Readlang page. For every platform on one table, see Readlang app download. This page stays on Android.

Route 1: pin readlang.com to the home screen in Chrome

This is the official instruction, and it gives you the whole site as a full-screen icon.

1. Open Chrome, go to readlang.com and sign in to your account.
2. Tap the three-dot menu in the top right corner.
3. Choose Add to Home screen. On recent versions of Chrome the item may be labelled Install or Add to home screen; either works.
4. Keep the name or shorten it, then tap Add.

The icon opens Readlang without the address bar. Everything your account has is there: the shared library, texts you pasted, EPUB files you uploaded, your word list, flashcards, streak and settings. Reading works the way it does on a desktop: tap a word for its translation, select a phrase for a phrase translation, and the words you looked up go into your review queue.

Where this route stops is at the edge of readlang.com. To read something that is not already in your Readlang library, you bring it in the usual way, by pasting text or uploading a DRM-free EPUB. The shortcut does not make other websites clickable. For that you want the second route.

Route 2: Firefox for Android with the Web Reader extension

This is the one the Readlang forum recommends, and for reading news sites, blogs and web fiction in your target language it is the better of the two.

1. Install Firefox for Android from Google Play and open it.
2. Go to the Readlang Web Reader listing on addons.mozilla.org and tap Add to Firefox. Confirm the permissions it asks for.
3. Open readlang.com in Firefox and sign in once, so the extension has your account.
4. Open any page in the language you are learning, tap the extensions button in the Firefox menu and choose Readlang Web Reader.
5. Tap a word. The translation appears in place and the word is saved to your Readlang vocabulary, the same as on a desktop.

The extension is the same one Readlang published for desktop Firefox in November 2025. It is a small project by any measure, but it is maintained; the listing was updated in September 2026. Once it is installed, the combination of Firefox plus Readlang is close to what desktop Chrome users get, which is why the forum describes it as by far the easiest method on Android.

Nothing stops you using both routes. Many people keep the Chrome shortcut for their own library and books, and Firefox for whatever the web puts in front of them.

What each route gives you, and where it stops

Checked against readlang.com, its pricing page and the Readlang forum on 14 September 2026.

Both routes share the same three limits, because both are the website. Every tapped word is a request to Readlang's servers, so a slow connection shows up as a pause before each translation, and with no connection there is no translation at all. Text selection uses the browser's handles, which on Android means the drag-and-adjust routine rather than a tap on the first and last word. And the reading position, the keyboard and the fonts behave the way the browser lets them, not the way the rest of your phone does.

None of this is a flaw in Readlang. It is what a web page is on a phone, and Readlang does more within those limits than most sites. Free is genuinely free here: unlimited single-word translations, ten phrase translations and ten AI explanations a day. Premium at $6 a month or $48 a year removes the phrase and explanation limits and is bought on the website, not through Google Play.

The APK question

There is no Readlang APK

An APK is an Android app package. Readlang has never built an Android app, so there is nothing for an APK to contain. Any file called "Readlang APK" was assembled by someone other than Readlang. In practice such files are one of two things: a shell that loads readlang.com inside a web view with the packager's own code around it, or an unrelated app with the name changed. Neither is better than the two free routes above, and both put a stranger between you and your account.

"Premium", "mod" and "unlocked" APKs

Readlang Premium is a subscription tied to your account on Readlang's servers. The phrase limit and the AI-explanation limit are enforced there, when the server answers your request. A modified app cannot change that answer, so a "premium unlocked" APK cannot deliver what its name promises. What it can do is collect the Readlang password you type into it, show its own ads, or install something you did not ask for. If it stops working there is no one to update it.

If cost is the reason for looking, the arithmetic is worth a moment. The free plan already gives unlimited single-word translations. Premium is $6 a month. A file from an unknown site that asks for your login is a bad trade against either.

ReadLang WatchLang is something else

Searching Google Play for Readlang turns up ReadLang WatchLang. It is a product from a different developer, not connected to Readlang and not connected to us; it also appears in the App Store. The shared name is a coincidence, or a choice, but not a relationship. The reliable check is that readlang.com links to no app store and the only Android instruction Readlang publishes is the home-screen shortcut.

If you also have an iPhone or iPad

This is the part of the page where we talk about our own app, so read it with that in mind. Readlang Mobile is a native reader for iPhone and iPad on iOS 18 and later. It is an independent product, not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to Readlang, and it does not accept a Readlang login. It was built for the same habit: tap a word while reading and the translation appears inside the sentence; tap the first and last word of a phrase and the phrase is translated whole; the words you tapped are kept for review.

The differences from a website on a phone are the ones a native app can offer. By default, translation comes from Google Translate through the app's server; in Settings you can switch to Apple Translate, which runs on the device. Without a connection the app switches to Apple Translate, which translates on the device if the language pack for your pair is downloaded; a book has to be opened online once. Books come from a library graded A1 to C1, some narrated with the current word highlighted, and playback continues with the screen locked. Your own EPUB files can be added on Premium. The free plan is 30 translations a day; Premium is $8.99 a month or $59.99 a year through the App Store.

Now the plain statement: there is no Android version of Readlang Mobile. If your only device is an Android phone, the two routes above are your answer, and they are good ones. We are not going to promise an Android app on this page, because a promise without a date is the kind of thing this page criticises APK sites for.

Where Readlang stays ahead on any device: a hundred-plus languages against Readlang Mobile's roughly twenty, the extension that makes the whole web readable, YouTube with synchronized transcripts, spaced-repetition flashcards and a CSV export for Anki. The iPhone side of the same question is on the Readlang on iPhone page, and the two products sit feature by feature on Readlang vs Readlang Mobile. For the desktop extensions in every browser, see the Readlang extension page.

Questions people ask