ReadingRate · What's new · 2026-11-11

Read classics in ReadingRate's own editions

ReadingRate now publishes its own editions of classics in the public domain. Each is set in one typeface with pages fixed at 250 words, so a page number means the same thing on every screen and at every text size, and each has a period illustration on its cover. They are free to read in ReadingRate's reader and free to download as EPUB. Twenty-seven are live, from Hamlet and the Iliad to Middlemarch and Mrs. Dalloway.

Available on web.

The point of a fixed page is that the log stays honest. A reading log counts pages, and an EPUB whose page count changes with the font size gives a different number on every device. In these editions page 120 is page 120 everywhere.

The texts and their markup come from Standard Ebooks, which dedicated them to the public domain. ReadingRate sets and paginates them.

Every edition has its own page with the book's literary regard, word count, page count and hours at 250 words a minute, a Download the EPUB button and a Read it here button. The editions are also a row on Discover, and a book that has one says "Read the ReadingRate edition" on its own page.

What it can't do

  • This is on the website. The iPhone doors to the editions are built but are not in the App Store release that is live today.
  • Twenty-seven books so far.
  • Downloading needs no account. Reading in the browser needs a free one, because the reader logs your pages as you go.
  • The translations are the public-domain ones Standard Ebooks carries, so they are older translations.
  • Asking the Companion about a passage is part of Reader, the paid plan. Reading is not.

Questions people ask

Does ReadingRate have free books to read?
Yes. Twenty-seven classics in the public domain are published as ReadingRate editions, free to read in the browser with a free account and free to download as EPUB without one.
Why are the pages fixed?
So that a page number is the same on every screen and at every text size. Pages are fixed at 250 words, which keeps a reading log comparable from one night and one device to the next.

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