pimReader Feature Tour
September 8, 20265 min read
pimReader is an Android reader that turns what you read into lessons, notes and flashcards. Each feature below says what it is for and links to the guide that shows it in use.
Skip to the guidepimReader takes material you would read anyway (a book, an article, a feed) and helps you keep the useful part of it. Each section below covers one feature and links to the guide that shows it in use.
One library for everything you read
Books in EPUB, PDF, MOBI, AZW3, FB2, TXT, HTML and Markdown. Web pages saved as clean text for offline reading. Feeds from RSS, Atom, OPDS catalogues, X accounts and Telegram channels. All of it opens in the same reader and turns up in the same search. Add a book from your phone with Open a file.
Why it matters: search, the dictionary and your reviews work on everything at once. → Organising Books, Articles and Notes in One Library
A translation above the word
When you read in a language you are learning, unknown words get a small translation printed right above them. Tap a word for the full dictionary entry, which opens over the page and closes back to the same place. Select a phrase and it is translated as one piece, so an idiom reads as an idiom.
Why it matters: lookups are what make reading in a new language slow. When a lookup costs nothing, you read more. → How to Learn a Language by Reading
Know which words you know
Mark a word as known and it no longer gets a translation above it. After a few weeks the page itself shows your vocabulary: the words that still have translations are the ones you still need. A frequency-based estimate gives your vocabulary size, which tells you whether a text is right for you before you start it. It opens once at setup, and you can run it again in Settings → Languages → Estimate Your Vocabulary.
→ Spanish From Zero: A 12-Week Plan to Your First Easy Novel
Tell the AI Mentor a goal, get a course
Open Ask AI on Home and describe what you want in plain words: the goal, the deadline, the time you have each day. The AI Mentor asks a few questions and then shows a plan for a course, a sequence of lessons sized to the goal (the app calls it a study). Nothing is created until you approve it, and you approve it once. You can ask for changes until it fits.
→ From Goal to Course: How the AI Mentor Works
Lessons that become real books
Each lesson can write its own material: a lesson book you read like any other book, an exercise book, a quiz, and flashcards of its vocabulary or facts. Lesson books are saved to your library. The Studies screen shows each lesson's status: Not started, In progress, Completed.
→ Studying for a Certification Around a Full-Time Job
Flashcards in one tick
Tap a word, tap its translation in the dictionary and tick Memorize, and the card is made for you with its translation. Select a passage, a table or a note and ask for a set of cards; keep the good ones from a preview. Every card is filed under the book or article it came from, one tap from the page.
→ Turn Any Article, Book, or Note Into Flashcards
Daily reviews, scheduled by spaced repetition
Due cards wait in your daily reviews (the Exercise card on Home). They are scheduled by spaced repetition, which brings each card back when you're likely to start forgetting it. Rate each card Again, Hard, Good or Easy; each button shows the interval it will set. Cards you know move out to months; cards you don't come back tomorrow.
→ How pimReader Schedules Your Reviews
Practise in sentences at your level
Recognising a word is not the same as using it. The Practice card on Home makes material from your own words at a level you choose: Develop Fluency writes example sentences, Memorize Words writes short phrases that help a word stick, Practice Dialogs runs a conversation line by line, and Exercise (build sentences) asks you to write the sentence yourself. (Not to be confused with the Exercise card on Home, which starts your reviews.) Practice sessions don't change your review dates.
→ How to Learn a Language by Reading
Speak, and be corrected
Speaking practice runs a fully spoken session: it asks about the words that are due and you answer aloud. A spoken review session does change your review dates: words you get wrong come back sooner. For a single phrase, pronunciation feedback shows what you were asked to say, what was heard, your phrase corrected, and a score.
→ Speaking Practice Without a Tutor
Summaries, questions and search by meaning
Ask for a summary or the main idea of an article before you read it, or ask a question about the page you are on. Search by meaning finds a passage across your books, saved articles and notes even when it uses different words. A busy feed can be sorted by a topic you name, and after some reading pimReader can build a recommendation list from what you read.
→ Summaries, Questions and News Sorted by Topic · Staying Current in Your Field Without Drowning
Notes that remember their source
Select a passage and save it as a note, with your own comment and tags. Notes live in folders beside your books, and any note can become a flashcard later. From the card you can go back to the page and read the sentence around it.
→ How to Remember a Non-Fiction Book (A History Example)
When there is a deadline
For an exam, give the AI Mentor the syllabus and the date and ask for a course weighted the way the exam weights its sections. Give it your written answers for feedback. pimReader has no official exam papers, so you bring the practice tests. Use speaking sessions for the oral part, and keep the last two weeks for timed practice.
→ A 90-Day Plan for a B2 Language Exam
What is free
Reading, dictionaries, the translation above the word, flashcards, daily reviews, feeds, notes, tags and sync are free, with no ads and no account. The AI features (the AI Mentor, courses and lesson books, Practice, Speaking practice, summaries, questions and search by meaning) are part of pimReader Plus. When you open an AI feature, pimReader offers Try free for a month: no card, no account, nothing renews. Tap Not now to carry on without AI.
Where to start
- Learning a language: open a book in it with translations above the line switched on, and read the first page. Then the reading guide.
- Reading to remember, any subject: save one note from the chapter you are on and turn it into a card. Then the non-fiction guide.
- Working toward a date: take a timed practice test today, then the exam guide or the certification guide.
- Too many articles: add your feeds and sort by one topic you care about. Then the staying-current guide.