Avid: Reading Companion
Connect ideas across books
Free · In‑App Purchases · Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS.
You read serious books. You think while you read them. And then, a few weeks later, the thinking is gone. The argument you found convincing, the objection you had at page 200, the connection to something you read last year: all of it fades. The highlights are still there. The thinking isn't.
That is what Avid is for.
Avid is where your thinking compounds across books, sources, and time. It turns reading into conversation, conversation into insight, and insight into an archive that grows more useful the longer you keep it. Avid uses AI to work with the books, highlights, notes, and questions you bring, so the technology stays in service of your reading rather than replacing it.
HOW IT WORKS
Tell Avid what you're reading. Scan a cover, search by title, or bring in highlights you already have. Avid brings your notes, highlights, and past conversations into discussions about what you're reading.
Then have a real conversation about it. Not a summary, not a quiz. A discussion that presses on assumptions, names the tension you were circling, and asks what a well-read friend would ask. Type, or talk out loud.
Over time it compounds. Avid remembers what you have discussed and surfaces connections between books you read months apart: the memoir and the philosophy text arriving at the same conclusion about identity, the history and the business book sharing a model of power you never noticed.
WHAT MAKES AVID DIFFERENT
Cross-book synthesis. Avid can connect ideas from the books, notes, and conversations in your library.
Depth instead of answers. Avid does not summarize and stop. It goes further with each exchange.
Memory that carries. A thought from three weeks ago comes back when today's book needs it.
A letter every Monday. A short piece of writing about your own week of reading, drawn from what you actually thought.
From the Margins. Books recommended from your highlights and your arguments, not from a bestseller list.
BUILT FOR SERIOUS READERS
- Import highlights from Kindle, Apple Books, Readwise, and Kobo
- Scan a cover to begin in seconds
- Voice conversations for thinking out loud
- Insight cards that keep your strongest thoughts
- Wrap-ups that capture where a conversation landed
- The Reading Year: what you read, and what it did to you
Avid is for the reader who closes a book wanting to go further into it, not straight on to the next one.
Avid is a subscription. Current pricing and terms appear on this page and in the app before anything is charged.
Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
more Having used Avid since early on, it goes beyond utility. It respects your perspective, builds real conversational depth, and helps you understand before expanding your thinking.
Developer Response Thank you so much for this. “Respects your perspective” and “helps you understand before expanding your thinking” are exactly what I hoped Avid would do for people. That you’ve felt this since early on means a lot. I’m grateful you’ve been along for the journey.
Having used Avid since early on, it goes beyond utility. It respects your perspective, builds real conversational depth, and helps you understand before expanding your thinking.
Thank you so much for this. “Respects your perspective” and “helps you understand before expanding your thinking” are exactly what I hoped Avid would do for people. That you’ve felt this since early on means a lot. I’m grateful you’ve been along for the journey.
This app has become my vade mecum! I totally love this app and use it daily
Developer Response “Vade mecum” is about the loveliest description I could hope for. Thank you for making Avid part of your daily reading life, and for taking the time to say so. It means more than you know.— Pascal, Avid.
This app has become my vade mecum! I totally love this app and use it daily
“Vade mecum” is about the loveliest description I could hope for. Thank you for making Avid part of your daily reading life, and for taking the time to say so. It means more than you know.— Pascal, Avid.
For better or worse, AI Chatbots do not have access to books and are therefore unable to actually discuss them.
For better or worse, AI Chatbots do not have access to books and are therefore unable to actually discuss them.
Hi,
Keep a line from any app you read in: select the words, tap Share and choose Avid. It goes straight into your Notebook.
Every book page now has two buttons, Begin a sitting and Talk about it, and you can start a sitting from your Lock Screen or Control Center.
Your Notebook now tells you where your letters from Avid stand, and offers to wrap up an open conversation so what you found can go into your next letter.
Ask Avid how to do something and the answer comes with a button that takes you there. Avid also works with Siri, Spotlight and Shortcuts.
Pascal
1.8.1 5d ago
Hi,
You can now give someone a month of Avid, with a note in the front. It's in Settings.
Avid also shows you how each part works, right where you'd use it.
And fixes for sharing into Avid and signing in with Apple.
Pascal
1.8.0 6d ago
Hi,
In any conversation, you can now reply to the one line that caught you, not the whole answer. Select it, tap Add to reply, and write your thought beside it. Add one passage or several before you send.
When Avid quotes your own notes or highlights, you can open them in your Notebook and come straight back to the conversation.
Your Notebook can now ask when you usually finish reading. Tell it once, and Avid will bring your reading back around then.
And new readers now get a much better start: they begin with a line they remember, and the next day Avid brings their words back with a new question.
What would make Avid better for the way you read? Email me at pascal@avid.chat, or leave a suggestion in Settings. I read every message.
Pascal
1.7.0 Oct 5
Hi,
Sometimes one line is the reason you want someone else to read a book.
You can now share a book with a line you kept, your note, or a thought from a conversation in Avid. Open a book in your Library and tap Share. The person receiving it can keep the book in Avid along with what you sent.
I’ve also been working on the small things that interrupt your reading. You can read the whole passage you’ve scanned and correct it before saving. Page numbers now follow your finger on the slider. And I’ve fixed the blank screen that could appear when opening a thread in your Notebook.
I care about getting these moments right, so Avid feels dependable when you’re trying to hold on to a thought.
What would make Avid better for the way you read? Email me at pascal@avid.chat, or leave a suggestion in Settings. I read every message.
Pascal
1.6.0 Sep 28
Tap the button in your Monday letter and Avid opens on the letter itself. A link to a conversation, a connection between two of your books, or a card takes you there too.
In Your notes, a note you have copied comes in with one tap on Paste. And words you share to Avid from another app become a note of yours when you tap “These are my words.”
If something here doesn’t read the way you expected, write to me at pascal@avid.chat, or leave a suggestion in Settings. I read every message.
Pascal
1.5.6 Sep 25
A line worth returning to, a connection between books, a thought from an earlier conversation: Avid can now bring these back through notifications, drawing on your own reading.
You choose the kinds of notifications you receive and their pace in Settings.
This update also retires the old reading check-ins. Open Avid once after updating to clear any that were already scheduled.
1.5.5 Sep 21
Back to the passage.
Open a highlight quoted by Avid when you return to an older conversation. When you ask Avid to look across your reading, its brief working note now stays separate from the answer.
Also in this update:
• If you’re new to Avid, begin your Library by choosing books you’ve read from suggested covers, with Undo if you change your mind.
• Clearer instructions for bringing in highlights, with steps for your device. Leave a source for later during setup, and Sources remembers where you meant to begin.
• Fixed a crash when opening the app and an issue that could report an empty reply after a short answer had arrived.
• Improved email sign-in layout so fields and actions stay visible above the keyboard, including with larger text.
Questions or suggestions? Write to pascal@avid.chat.
1.5.4 Sep 19
This update fixes a freeze when returning to My Books and helps recently opened books show their contents sooner. You can also keep a line directly from a book’s page by typing, pasting, scanning a page, or uploading a photo or text file.
1.5.3 Sep 15
Ask Avid
Hi,
If you’re unsure where something lives in Avid, you can now ask.
Try “Where are my saved cards?” or “Where are my past conversations?” Avid tells you where to find them and gives you a button to take you there. You can also ask how to turn off sounds.
It’s a first version, so it won’t have a useful answer to everything yet. I’ll keep refining it.
Choose your book in Chat
Tap “Change book” above the book on your desk to choose another from your Library, including one you’ve finished. From there, you can continue a conversation, look through earlier ones about that book, or start a new one.
You may also find a question from Avid about the book you’re reading. Reply to follow it into a conversation, or dismiss it.
Return to the words you kept
When a saved card appears in a conversation, tap “Read” to open its full text. Choose “Use in conversation” to bring those words into your next question. You can bring more than one card, too, if there are thoughts you want to consider together.
Keep your place
Move a book to Reading and Avid records a start date for you. You can correct it on the book’s page, to a day or a month if that’s all you remember.
At the end of a Sitting, you can record where you got to. Depending on the book, Avid offers a page number or a rough place in the book. When you’re saving a page number, you can type it or use the camera. You can skip this step.
A few smaller things
Your Library now updates in the background when you save a book in Chat. The Notebook, Discover and My Year also refresh when you return to them. And My Year now opens for readers with books in progress, even before the first finished book.
If Avid’s answer leaves you stuck, or something here doesn’t work as you expected, write to me at pascal@avid.chat. I read every message.
Pascal
1.5.2 Sep 14
From the conversation to your shelf.
We’ve refined the way Chat and your Library work together, so keeping a book takes less of your attention.
“I’m starting Half of a Yellow Sun.” “Add Lolita to my Want shelf.” Keep the books you talk about right there in Chat.
• Clearer book cards keep the cover, title and author alongside Avid’s reply.
• Starting a book keeps Reading as the destination, even if Avid first needs to check the title or author. Books saved for later go to Want.
• Confirmations show where a book was saved. If a save is interrupted, you can check again from the same card.
• Fixed an issue that could make the Library’s + button disappear.
• More focused replies when you’re simply adding or starting a book, with room for helpful context.
COMING NEXT
I’m working on making Sittings, Avid’s reading timer, easier to find and start. It’s helped me meet my own goal of reading for two hours a day. I want it closer at hand when you’re ready to read.
Pascal
1.5.1 Sep 9
Two things in this update, and I've wanted both for a long time.
Avid is now a real iPad app, not a phone layout stretched to fill the screen. Your shelf stays beside the book you've opened, your recent pages stay beside the note you're reading, and conversations are set at a width that's comfortable to read. If you're new to Avid, getting set up is laid out for the space as well.
And a thought from last time now waits for you. When a conversation ends with something worth keeping, it's there the next time you open Avid, just under the greeting, with the book and the day it came from. Pick it up where you left it, or close it and it won't return.
Also: if your connection drops while Avid is writing, the reply is picked up rather than lost. And leaving partway through your first steps no longer sends you back to the beginning.
Pascal
1.5.0 Sep 6
I’ve rebuilt the Notebook and Library to make Avid feel more like a place your reading returns to—and less like another feed.
• Ideas across your books
Avid now notices when lines from different books are circling the same thought and gathers them into Ideas. Follow an idea from its earliest line to the latest, rename it, remove what doesn’t belong, or dissolve it completely.
• A line comes back to you
Once your Notebook has enough history, Today brings back a line you kept at least thirty days ago, along with its date and book when there is one.
• A Notebook with rooms
Swipe between Days, Ideas and Letters. Your notes, passages, conversations, reading sittings, and Kindle or Readwise imports now settle under the days they belong to.
• Search by meaning
Find a passage even when you remember the thought, but not the exact words.
• The Library became a shelf
Swipe between My Books, My Year and Discover. See your place in each book, revisit your reading month by month, and find new books through the ideas in your margins.
I’ve also started work on a proper iPad experience—one designed for the larger screen, not an iPhone layout stretched to fill it. I’ll share more as it takes shape.
If anything feels out of place, or you simply have a suggestion, write to me at pascal@avid.chat. It really is me on the other side, and I read every message.
—Pascal
1.4.6 Sep 4
Your shelf now gives you a clearer way into conversation. Avid can begin with a question that puts two of your books into dialogue, using their real covers when available. You can also return to an unfinished thread or scan the book in your hand.
Page capture is now more faithful to how readers actually mark: drag through the words you want, keep separate passages intact, and capture highlights and underlines more accurately.
Chat has also been refined throughout, with calmer guidance, clearer actions, stronger accessibility and a more considered reading experience.
As always, feel free to write to me if you have any thoughts: Pascal@avid.chat
1.4.5 Sep 1
Point the camera at a page you've marked up. Avid now finds your highlighter and your pencil lines and selects them for you; tap away the ones you don't want. It reads the page number off the page. And beneath every captured line there is a margin: one quiet line for what made you stop. The photograph stays on your phone, and only there.
YOUR COPY, ANNOTATED
Every book's page now opens into all your kept lines, in page order, with your notes beside them the way you'd find them in your own copy. Notes from Readwise and Kindle make the crossing too. Edit a note anytime; a line captured without its book waits under Loose pages until you file it.
MORE WAYS TO THE PAGE
Capture from your Lock Screen, from the Library's plus, or from inside a sitting with "Keep a line." There's a light for reading in bed. When a save lands, you'll hear it land.
THE SITTING, WITH YOUR BOOK ON IT
Begin a sitting and the page is the book: the jacket, the clock counting down, the time it rings at. Put the phone face-down and the screen goes dark on its own. On the Lock Screen the band carries the cover and the title; Settings can keep the cover private.
YOUR PORTRAIT, STAMPED
Your Portrait now keeps an album. Seven stamps, each struck for something you actually did: the first line you keep, the first conversation you see through, the week you come back, the day two of your books connect. Earn one and Avid presses it in front of you. Every stamp says plainly what earns it, but what it looks like stays a secret until it is yours. Share an earned stamp and it carries the date it was struck.
WRITE TO ME
If anything in Avid feels less than it should, that's the letter I want: pascal@avid.chat, or the suggestion box in Settings. I read everything.
Pascal
1.4.4 Aug 24
The Sitting now lives everywhere your book does.
• Begin a sitting from the blank chat page, from any book's page, or straight from your Lock Screen — add the new "Begin a Sitting" control (it works from the Action Button too). Tell Avid how long you have, put the phone face-down, and read. One ring when time's up.
• Close the book, hear your library. End a sitting with one line — what stayed with you? — and it's kept as a card on the spot. When that line touches something you kept in another book, Avid shows you the thread: at the close, or waiting on your desk the next time you come in. Every connection now has a page of its own — the two lines, why they touch, and the questions they open.
• The book remembers. Your desk notes the morning after ("Yesterday — 40 minutes with Middlemarch"), each book keeps a quiet ledger of its sittings and kept lines, and your Reading Year now counts the hours you actually spent with the book.
• The shelf hears you. A book's status is one menu on its page, and telling Avid you're reading something lands it on your shelf. Connections wear their new mark — the reef knot.
Write to me: pascal@avid.chat. I read everything.
1.4.3 Aug 21
What you make stays yours
Avid's terms have changed, and not for you: if you are already reading here, your Avid is exactly as you left it. Everything you have made stays open, as it always has — your library, your cards and notes, your threads, every Monday letter. What changed is how Avid meets a reader who is only just arriving.
A first week that asks for nothing
A reader arriving now gets their first week whole: everything open, nothing counted, no payment details asked for. The week starts at their first conversation rather than at the download, so a quiet fortnight costs them none of it. Afterwards their library, cards, notes and letters stay open, and new conversations are Plus.
When Avid asks
It asks by showing them their own reading: a connection it found between two of their books, a line from the letter they read on Monday, a card they kept from a conversation. Never a counter, never a countdown. And if Avid is holding nothing of theirs worth showing, it has not earned the question, so it does not ask.
Write to me
Keep the notes coming. pascal@avid.chat opens a draft right from here, or use the suggestion box in Settings. I read everything.
Pascal
1.4.2 Aug 18
Two books, one card
When a conversation runs across two books, the card you share at the end now says so: both titles, with the authors beneath, joined by one thread. A conversation about an idea rather than a book carries its subject across the top.
Two books from the first line
Once your shelf holds two books, the blank page offers to open with where they disagree, your own titles in the line. Take it, and both books are in the room before you type a word.
Your library, under your name
If you signed in with Apple or Google, nothing changes for you: your library is already yours on any phone. If you have been reading as a guest, Avid will ask you to sign your card before you go in, so your library is kept under your name too, on any phone, and your letters know where to find you. Everything you have made stays exactly as it is.
Avid keeps its place
Your session renews itself in the background, and the page you are on stays exactly where you left it, mid-conversation included.
One copy of each book
Add a book that is already on your shelf and Avid keeps the one copy.
Keep the notes coming: pascal@avid.chat, or the suggestion box in Settings. I read everything.
Pascal
1.4.1 Aug 17
Avid has hands now.
Say “add that to my list” mid-conversation and it lands on your shelf—with the book’s cover, a receipt in the chat, and Undo a tap away. Nothing happens unless your own words ask for it.
The Sitting
Tell Avid you have forty minutes—or pick a length from any book’s page—and put your phone face-down. The Lock Screen counts down privately, with one ring when time’s up.
Ask your own archive
Questions can now search across your highlights, cards, and threads, showing where each answer came from.
Continue actually continues
Return to the real conversation, right where you left it.
A proper desk
The blank chat page has grown up. Notes keep your words, and Import can now scan a book cover.
Much of this came from your notes. Keep them coming at pascal@avid.chat or through the suggestion box in Settings. I read everything.
Pascal
1.4.0 Aug 13
A note with this update:
Your reading now earns stamps: real artworks from museum collections, pressed into a portrait of how you read. Each one is revealed the moment you earn it — tap it to see it full screen.
The goal has always been simple: every moment you spend in Avid should be worth it. Toward that — Avid now recognizes any book you mention while chatting, even in passing, and connects the conversation to it. Sessions holds your full history, back to your very first conversation. And letters, like this one, now arrive right inside the app, not just your inbox.
Much of this came from your notes to me. Keep them coming: pascal@avid.chat.
— Pascal
1.3.2 Aug 12
Subtle improvements to how new readers perceive Avid.
Stability and bug fixes are included in this version, so Avid should feel more thoughtful, robust, and polished.
As always, feel free to let me know if you've got suggestions, feedback, or proposed feature updates: Pascal@avid.chat or use the settings > send feedback> create.
Thank you!
1.3.1 Aug 6
Saving a passage now holds together from page to shelf. Avid can suggest the
book already in your conversation, find Set Aside titles, and continue with an
existing copy instead of asking you to add it again.
Cover and barcode scanning have been rebuilt as one calm, full-screen camera.
And your weekly Letters now have a shelf of their own, so earlier editions stay
within reach after a new week arrives.
1.3 Aug 4
Your ideas now have a quieter place to land.
Notes open in a focused, full-screen writing space, with a more consistent experience across Chat and Notebook. Your Reader’s Card can now show your preferred name—tap it anytime to update how Avid addresses you.
1.2.9 Jul 31
Meet Notebook—a calm new home for the ideas you don’t want to lose. Capture a Note from Notebook, a book’s Your Copy, or a reading conversation, then revisit your thoughts alongside saved Passages and Avid Insights.
Notes work offline and sync when you reconnect. Avid can also bring meaningful Notes back in your Weekly Letter, turning quick observations into ideas worth returning to.
This update also includes a refined Reader Card, thoughtful visual polish, and reliability improvements throughout the app.
1.2.8 Jul 30
A quiet release. Nothing about how you read has changed; a few things that used to wobble now hold.
• A voice session that cannot start now says so and stops, instead of retrying a connection that was never going to answer.
• Your subscription details survive a full close and relaunch, so the first screen you see is the right one.
• Assorted fixes to how conversations, letters, and your library hold their state between visits.
1.2.7 Jul 29
Bug where Library tends to close quickly after adding a new book has been fixed.
In addition, some neat delightful updates to improve user experience within Avid:
• Refreshed ink-drawn animations throughout conversations, cards, connections,
and earned moments.
• A clearer cue after your opening conversation helps you continue what still
feels unresolved.
• Cleaner, more accessible replies when Avid draws on your saved passages —
internal archive markers no longer appear on screen or reach VoiceOver.
• More reliable conversation context, region-correct share cards, and clearer
tab contrast.
1.2.6 Jul 25
Hi,
Keep a line from any app you read in: select the words, tap Share and choose Avid. It goes straight into your Notebook.
Every book page now has two buttons, Begin a sitting and Talk about it, and you can start a sitting from your Lock Screen or Control Center.
Your Notebook now tells you where your letters from Avid stand, and offers to wrap up an open conversation so what you found can go into your next letter.
Ask Avid how to do something and the answer comes with a button that takes you there. Avid also works with Siri, Spotlight and Shortcuts.
Pascal
more Version 1.8.1 5d ago
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