Explorer

You Should Be Using An RSS Reader

Mar 1, 2025

Is your internet browsing experience… unpleasant? Ads? Clickbait? Constantly trying to find the quality content amongst all the low-effort garbage? Important stuff getting buried by The Algorithm? Spending hours checking all your different bookmarks? What if I told you there was a tool from the ’90s that could solve (almost) all of your problems?

As I’ve mentioned before, I struggle with ADHD. It is way too easy for me to lose myself down internet rabbit holes, get sucked into the YouTube recommendations algorithm, spend hours reading random article after random article. Being able to curate and control my, for lack of a better term, feed is incredibly helpful. RSS let’s you do just that.

Wayback Machine

Let’s roll back to the late ’90s. Back then, if you wanted updates, you had to manually visit every website you liked. Inefficient, to say the least.

Enter RSS (Really Simple Syndication). It was a simple but brilliant idea: websites would publish a standardized feed, kind of like a constantly updating “what’s new” list, that you could pull into a single app called a feed reader. One dashboard, all your favorite sites, updated automatically.

By the early 2000s, RSS was booming. Google Reader, launched in 2005, took it mainstream. Serious internet users swore by it. And then social media took over. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter promised excitement and connection but also started deciding for you what you should see. RSS usage began to decline. When Google shut down Reader in 2013, it sparked outrage. Petitions. Think pieces. A genuine sense of loss. Many believed that was the end of RSS.

But RSS never really went away, and now it’s having a bit of a resurgence, especially among people tired of algorithm-driven feeds.

Escape The Algorithm

Today’s platforms don’t show you posts chronologically or fairly. They show you what keeps you scrolling: anger, outrage, clickbait. Even if you follow someone, there’s no guarantee you’ll actually see their posts. It’s all about keeping your eyes glued to them as long as possible.

RSS cuts through the noise. No algorithms. No ads stuffed between updates. When you subscribe to a feed, you get everything they publish, in the order they publish it. And with most readers, you can sort, tag, and organize those articles however you want. Usually in a nice, clean, easy to read interface. Total control.

Save Time

RSS isn’t just more honest, it’s also way more efficient.

No more hopping between tabs to check favorite websites.
No more newsletters cluttering your inbox.
No more checking each YouTube channel individually to see if they have anything new.

Everything you care about — articles, podcasts, videos, newsletters — flows into one clean dashboard. You skim the headlines, open what matters, skip what doesn’t. Done. It’s faster, more organized, and (let’s be honest) way less rage-inducing than doomscrolling X for hours a day.

RSS Today: It’s Not Just for Blogs Anymore

While originally intended for text-based content, modern RSS can pull almost anything into your feed:

Podcasts: Most podcast apps are glorified RSS readers.
Newsletters: Some readers let you subscribe to newsletters directly.
YouTube Channels: Follow channels without dealing with YouTube’s flaky “recommended” algorithm.
Public Social Feeds: Track public Facebook pages, Telegram channels, even Bluesky posts.
Job Listings: Monitor new postings from Indeed, Glassdoor, etc.
Custom Web Alerts: Some readers can generate feeds from sites that don’t even offer them.

Bottom line: if it updates online, you can probably pull it into your feed.

How to Get Started

You’ll need a feed reader. I’ve tried most, but I currently use Inoreader.

With Inoreader, you can:

Add RSS feeds manually or search for sources inside the app.
Organize feeds into folders or tag articles for easy filtering.
Subscribe to newsletters, YouTube channels, and even scrape websites without native feeds.
Set up rules and automations to keep your dashboard tidy.

Finding an RSS feed link is usually pretty simple:

Look for the classic RSS icon on a site. . It often links directly to the feed URL.
If you don’t see an icon, try adding /feed or /rss to the end of a blog’s URL.
Some modern browsers or extensions can automatically detect RSS feeds (Innoreader’s Chrome extension is pretty good at this).
Worst case? Just Google “[site name] RSS feed.”

Almost all blogs (including this one) and most news websites, from TechCrunch to The New York Times, have them.

Subscribing to Podcasts: Podcasts usually offer a direct RSS link. Paste it into your reader, and you’re set. I haven’t really tried this too much yet, since I mostly listen to podcasts on the go with YouTube Music (RIP Google Podcasts), but if you consume a lot of podcasts this could be really helpful.

Subscribing to YouTube Channels: YouTube doesn’t make it super obvious, but every YouTube channel has an RSS feed. Just take the channel’s ID and plug it into this format:

https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=[channel_id]

Paste that into your reader, and you’ll get updates every time they post.

Automation and Advanced Uses

This is where RSS gets really interesting.

Rules and Output Feeds: Inoreader can automatically tag, organize, or trigger actions based on incoming articles.
Automation Tools: Link your feeds to services like IFTTT, Make.com, or Zapier to automatically:
- Save articles to Pocket or Notion.
- Cross-post new articles to social media.
- Log new posts into a spreadsheet.
- Fire off Slack notifications when a new post drops.
Monitoring and Alerts: Track specific keywords, brand mentions, or niche topics without relying on flaky email alerts.

With a little setup, your RSS feed can become a full-blown personal information network.

AI Summaries

Recently, some RSS readers like Inoreader have added AI-powered article summaries. The idea is simple: instead of reading an entire article, you get a quick AI-generated summary to decide if it’s worth your time. In theory, it sounds amazing. Who wouldn’t want to save even more time?

Personally, I’m a little skeptical. AI summaries can miss important nuance, misinterpret points, or just butcher the original tone. If you’re just looking for headlines and bullet points, it might be fine. But if you’re trying to stay genuinely informed, especially about complex topics, there’s no substitute for actually reading good journalism yourself.

That said, it can be a handy tool when you’re pressed for time or trying to skim large volumes of information quickly. Just… maybe don’t use it as a replacement for deep reading.

Closing Thoughts

Start slow. It’s easy to get excited and subscribe to everything that looks interesting. But if you do that, you can end up with an overwhelming mess of a dashboard. When I first tried Innooreader I made this mistake. I connected it to my YouTube account and had it import all of my subscriptions and it was just way too much. I trimmed it down and only use it for the channels where it’s legitimately imporant that I get timely updates when they post something new.

Take your time. Add a few sources at a time. Think about how you’ll tag and organize them.

RSS should ultimately save you time and reduce your screen addiction. Spending hours scrolling through Inoreader is probably better than hours on social media, but it’s still not ideal. Use it to curate what’s truly important to you, not as an excuse to consume even more content.