Cat Reader
Cat Reader's cat: a black cat in a top hat, holding a book by its corner in its mouth

Your ebooks, read aloud.

Natural voices that live on your phone. Offline, private, no account, no limits. Open a book, tap a sentence, and listen.

Join the early test What it does

Coming soon to Google Play, for Android

A reader that reads to you

Cat Reader is an ebook reader first. When your eyes are tired, or your hands are busy, it picks up where you were and keeps going out loud.

  • Voices that sound human

    28 English voices, American and British, from the Kokoro model. They run on the phone itself: nothing is sent anywhere to be spoken, and there's no limit on how much you listen.

  • Follow along

    The sentence being read is highlighted and the page turns with it. Tap any sentence to start reading from there. Keeps reading with the screen off, with controls on the lock screen and your headphones.

  • Never loses your place

    Every book remembers where you stopped, whether you were reading or listening. Browse around, and one tap brings you back.

  • Audio made ahead

    Prepare chapters as audio before a long trip or a run. They play at once, keep the highlight in step, and follow whatever speed you pick.

  • Notes and highlights

    Five highlight colours and notes on any passage, all searchable in one list. Export them to share or keep them with your other notes.

  • Collections and series

    Group books into your own collections. Series are picked up from the books, in order: "Book 2 of 5".

  • Dictionary

    Long-press a word and choose Define. The dictionary downloads once and works offline after that.

  • Names read properly

    Romanized Chinese, Korean and Japanese names, quoted nicknames like “Rat”, Roman numerals, years and money are read the way a narrator would. When a name still comes out wrong, teach it once.

  • Tuned to your ear

    Speed, pauses between sentences and at commas, phrasing, and recommended settings for each voice. Every change sounds exactly as it will in your book.

  • Opens the books you already have

    Covers, titles and chapters are picked up automatically. DRM-free books only.

    • EPUB
    • PDF
    • MOBI
    • AZW3
    • FB2
    • DOCX
    • HTML
    • Markdown
    • TXT

Free, with a few quiet ads

Cat Reader is free to download and has no limits: every voice, every feature, as many books and hours as you like. It's paid for by a few ads, kept out of your way.

If you'd rather have none, a single Remove ads purchase takes them away for good. No subscription.

  • Never while you read or listen. Ads only show at natural breaks, like going back to your library.
  • Never over the player, never with sound while you've been listening, no banners on the page.
  • Your books stay yours. What you read, your notes and your place in each book stay on your phone. See the privacy policy.
Google PlayComing soon

Be one of the first readers

Cat Reader is in a closed test on Google Play. Send us an email and we'll add you, then you can install it from Play like any other app.

Email to join the test

Write from the Google account you use on Play, or tell us which one. We only use it to add you to the test.

Good to know

Which phones?
Android 8 or newer, on a 64-bit phone (most phones from the last several years). Reading aloud needs about 1 GB of free memory.
Why is the download big?
The voices live on your phone, so the app is about 370 MB. That's what lets it read offline, privately and without limits.
Which languages?
English books, for now. Cat Reader tells you when a book is in another language.
Do I need an account or the internet?
No account, ever. Reading and listening work offline. The internet is only used for ads, the one-time purchase and downloading the dictionary.