🦦 otter.news Help & Guide Updated for build 371

otter.news β€” Help & Guide

Everything you need to get the most out of otter.news: a fast, clean news reader that learns what you like, surfaces what's trending, and lets you follow any site on the web.

✦ Getting started

Open the app and your feed loads instantly. There's nothing to set up β€” but a few minutes of tuning makes it yours.

  1. Browse the home feed β€” the lead story sits up top, with the rest below as cards.
  2. Tap any story to read it. Pull down to refresh anytime.
  3. Swap to For You for a feed ordered around your interests, or Latest for newest-first.
  4. Open Categories to dive into a topic, or Settings β†’ Add Feed to follow your own sites.
otter.news LEAD STORY The day's top headline Title bar β€” search & For You / Latest Hero β€” the curated lead story Story cards β€” tap to read Pull down to refresh
Anatomy of the home feed. (Swap this diagram for a real screenshot anytime.)

β˜… Your feed & For You

otter.news quietly learns from what you open and tilts your feed toward it β€” no setup, all on your device.

  1. For You reorders stories around the topics and sources you read most. It becomes the default once there's enough signal.
  2. Prefer a straight timeline? Switch to Latest for newest-first.
  3. The more you read, the sharper For You gets β€” give it a few sessions.
Your reading history stays on your device and is only used to rank your own feed.

πŸ“– Reading & bookmarks

Read comfortably, save for later, and keep articles offline.

  1. Tap a story to open it. Use Reader Mode for a clean, distraction-free view when available.
  2. Bookmark anything to find it later in your Bookmarks.
  3. Turn on offline bookmarks to keep saved articles readable without a connection.
  4. Adjust reader text size and toggle a cleaner web view in Settings β†’ Reading.

οΌ‹ Adding feeds

Follow any website, blog, or RSS/Atom feed β€” otter.news finds the feed for you.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Add Feed.
  2. Paste a website address (e.g. example.com) or a direct feed URL.
  3. otter.news auto-discovers the feed if the site has one, then adds it to your sources.
  4. New stories from it start appearing in your feed and its category.
Some sites (like Reddit) limit access from outside their own apps, so those feeds may not load reliably.

πŸ—‚ Managing your feeds

See everything you've added β€” and remove anything in a tap.

  1. Open Settings β†’ Your Feeds (it appears once you've added at least one).
  2. Each feed is listed with its name and site.
  3. Tap the trash icon next to a feed to remove it β€” its stories leave your feed right away.
  4. Use Remove All Feeds to clear every added feed at once (with a confirmation).
3 ADDED FEEDS Daring Fireball daringfireball.net πŸ—‘ Six Colors sixcolors.com πŸ—‘ Your blog example.com πŸ—‘ Tap to remove this feed
Settings β†’ Your Feeds. The trash icon removes a single feed instantly.

🌐 Categories & the Japan section

Jump straight to a topic, or open a regional section on demand.

  1. Open Categories and tap any topic for a full, curated view of it.
  2. The Japan section is opt-in: it isn't mixed into your main feed β€” tap Categories β†’ Japan to read Japanese sources.
Opt-in sections show no count until you open them β€” that's by design, not a bug.

βš™ Sources & filters

Shape what shows up with follows, mutes, and keyword filters.

  1. In Settings β†’ Feed Personalization β†’ Sources, mute a source to hide it, or follow ones you love so they rank higher.
  2. Add blocked keywords to keep stories about a topic out of your feed.
  3. Toggle optional feed cards (like β€œOn This Day”) on or off.
Muting a built-in source hides it without removing anything. To delete a feed you added, use Your Feeds instead.

πŸ”” Breaking-news alerts

Optional pushes for the rare, genuinely big story β€” never spam.

  1. Turn on Breaking news alerts in Settings and allow notifications when asked.
  2. Alerts fire only for major stories several outlets are running at once.
  3. Built-in rate limits and de-duping mean no floods and no repeats.
  4. Tap an alert to jump straight to the story.

↻ Staying fresh

otter.news works to be up to date the moment you open it.

  1. With Background Refresh on (in Settings), the app quietly updates while closed so it's fresh on open.
  2. Your home-screen widget stays current too.
  3. Pull to refresh anytime; if a refresh can't reach the server, the app tells you instead of showing stale stories.
iOS decides when background refresh runs, so timing varies β€” the app always refreshes on open as a backstop.

☁ Settings & backup

Your setup follows you and is easy to move.

  1. Your categories, sources, added feeds, filters, and bookmarks save automatically (iCloud).
  2. Export your added feeds as OPML from Settings β†’ Sync & Backup to back them up or move them to another reader.
  3. Personalize Appearance (theme, layout) to taste.

? Troubleshooting

A story or thumbnail looks wrong

Pull to refresh. Thumbnails load from a fast image service; an occasional miss falls back to a placeholder and resolves on the next refresh.

The feed looks stale after an update

The first launch after an update does a one-time refresh. If our server was idle it may take a few extra seconds to populate, then it's instant.

A red badge on the app icon

Open the app once β€” the badge clears on open and won't come back.

A feed I added isn't appearing

Make sure its category is selected, and check it still exists under Your Feeds. Some sites block outside access and can't be read reliably.