Readlang on iPhone
Is there a Readlang app for iPhone?
Short version: no, not a native one. Readlang is a web app, and its own instructions tell you to open the site in Safari and add it to your home screen. That works, and for a lot of people it is enough. This page explains how to do it, where it runs out of road, and what a native reader gives you instead.
Download Readlang Mobile for iOSFree to start. iPhone and iPad.
The short answer
Add Readlang to your home screen if your account, word list and streak already live there, if you read in a language outside Apple Translation's roughly twenty, or if you mainly use the Chrome extension on a desktop and the phone is occasional. Nothing here is a reason to abandon an account you like.
Use a native app if the phone is where you actually read. Readlang Mobile is an independent iOS app — not made by Readlang — built around the same idea: tap a word while you read, see the translation in place, keep it. The difference is that it is a real app and books come graded by level.
Side by side
| Readlang on the home screen | Readlang Mobile | |
|---|---|---|
| How you install it | Safari → Share → Add to Home Screen | App Store, like any other app |
| What it actually is | The website, full screen, without the address bar | A native iOS app written in SwiftUI |
| Where translation runs | On Readlang's servers | On the app's server (Google Translate) by default; on the device with Apple Translate if you switch to it in Settings |
| Languages | 100+ | Around twenty — whatever Apple Translation supports on your device |
| Free plan | Unlimited single words; 10 phrases and 10 AI explanations per day | 30 translations per day; phrases up to 6 words |
| Paid plan | Premium $6/month or $48/year; Premium Plus $15/month or $120/year | Premium $8.99/month or $59.99/year |
| Audio | 10 hours of audio storage on Premium | Narrated books in the library; playback continues with the screen locked |
| Your own books | Upload DRM-free EPUB and text | Upload your own EPUB (Premium) |
| Paying | Card on the Readlang website | App Store subscription, cancel in Settings |
| Updates | Instantly — it is a website | Through the App Store |
Checked against readlang.com, its pricing page and the official Readlang forum on 19 September 2026. Prices in USD.
How to put Readlang on your home screen
This is the official route, described by Readlang's founder on the project forum. On an iPhone or iPad: open Safari, go to readlang.com, tap the Share button, choose Add to Home Screen, name it Readlang. On Android the same thing lives in the Chrome menu under Add to home screen.
What you get is the site running full screen without the browser chrome. Your account, your word list, your streak — everything is the same, because it is the same Readlang. It is the cheapest way to read on a phone, and if that covers your case, you can stop reading this page here.
Where the home-screen version stops
A site pinned to the home screen is still a site. Translation goes to a server, so every tapped word waits for the network — noticeable on a train or on hotel Wi-Fi. Text selection, the reading position and the keyboard behave the way the browser lets them, not the way the rest of your phone does. There is no place in the Files app for your own EPUB, and audio lives inside a browser tab.
None of that is a flaw in Readlang — it is what the web gives you on iOS. It is simply the line where a website ends and an app begins.
What Readlang Mobile does instead
Readlang Mobile is a separate, independent app — we are not Readlang and have no connection to it. It was built for the same habit: you read, you tap an unfamiliar word, the translation appears inside the sentence, and the word is saved for later. Tap the first and last word of a phrase and the phrase is translated whole, which matters because idioms fall apart word by word.
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. The trade-off is honest: you get the roughly twenty languages Apple ships, not Readlang's hundred.
Reading starts from a library rather than from the page you happen to be on: books graded A1 to C1, some of them narrated, so you can pick something a little above your level instead of drowning in the first page of a novel.
What Readlang on the home screen does better
To be clear about what the home-screen route keeps that a native app cannot match:
- Your account stays put. Same login, same vocabulary, same streak — nothing to migrate, because nothing moves.
- Languages. 100+ against roughly twenty. For Czech, Greek, Hebrew or Vietnamese, Readlang is the answer and Readlang Mobile is not.
- The Chrome extension. Any page you are already reading becomes clickable text. That is Readlang at its best, and it lives on the desktop.
- Video. YouTube with clickable subtitles. Readlang Mobile has nothing like it.
- Spaced repetition. Proper flashcards on an SRS schedule, plus a vocabulary manager.
Plenty of people keep both: Readlang in the browser at a desk, a native reader on the phone. Nothing about the two stops you. If you want the two products next to each other feature by feature, that is on the Readlang alternative page; everything else about the product, from prices to extensions, is in the Readlang guide.
If you try the app
Readlang Mobile cannot import a Readlang word list today, so the vocabulary you have already collected stays where it is — export it from Readlang if you want a copy. What carries over is the habit, not the data. The free plan gives 30 translations a day, which is roughly a chapter, and that is enough to tell whether reading this way suits you at all.
Questions people ask
Is there an official Readlang app in the App Store?
No. Readlang is a web app with a Chrome extension. Its official instructions describe opening the website in Safari and adding it to the home screen, which runs it full screen without the address bar. There is no native Readlang app published on the App Store or Google Play.
Is Readlang Mobile the official Readlang app?
No. Readlang Mobile is an independent app made by a different developer. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to Readlang. Your Readlang account does not work in it, and it does not read your Readlang data.
Can I move my Readlang vocabulary into Readlang Mobile?
Not at the moment. Readlang can export your word list, so keep a copy if you want one, but there is no import on our side yet. Words you tap in Readlang Mobile are saved into its own vocabulary from the first tap.
Does Readlang Mobile work without an internet connection?
Partly. 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.
What does Readlang Mobile cost?
The free plan covers 30 translations a day. Premium is $8.99 a month or $59.99 a year through the App Store, and it removes the daily limit and unlocks uploading your own EPUB files.
Does Readlang work on iPad?
The same way it works on iPhone: open readlang.com in Safari on the iPad, share, add to the home screen. The larger screen suits it well, and the Safari bookmarklet route for reading other websites is described on the Readlang forum. There is still no native iPad app from Readlang; Readlang Mobile runs natively on iPad with an adaptive layout.
Which languages does it support?
The languages Apple Translation supports on your device — roughly twenty, including English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Turkish, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and Korean. For anything outside that list, Readlang itself remains the better answer.
Read one chapter and see
Whether tap-to-translate reading works for you is decided in about ten minutes of an actual book, not in a comparison table.
Download Readlang Mobile for iOSFree to start. iPhone and iPad.