All-you-can-read app Readly has said its “performance remains strong” after its merger with French equivalent Cafeyn, despite outraged users reporting technical issues with the app.

The company said the app will not be operational on Amazon and Huawei devices for the foreseeable as a result of the merger, but that 99% of sessions have been crash-free and 97% of users successfully accessed the new app during migration.

Readly’s non-Nordic businesses were acquired by its French equivalent Cafeyn at the beginning of April, meaning Cafeyn now runs the platform in the UK, Australia, Germany and Switzerland.

The merger took Cafeyn to combined revenues of nearly €100m (around £87m), and a base of more than 2.5 million users after 350,000 Readly subscribers transferred.

Press Gazette previously reported that the merger would see an enhanced mobile app, while Cafeyn chief executive Laurent Kayser said the migration of Readly into Cafeyn’s operations would be “seamless”, “nothing will change” for publishers and the experience will be kept familiar with favourite titles and personalised recommendations.

He added that functionality developed in the French market would be “slowly” introduced, including video and AI features.

However, the transition to Cafeyn’s platform has prompted complaints that puzzle magazines are no longer interactive, data has been removed (including favourites and bookmarks), and the app is crashing or not working on certain devices.

Trustpilot reviews of Readly since the merger state difficulty in cancelling subscriptions, problems accessing back issues, the removal of new issue notifications and no separation of magazines and newspapers.

There are dozens of one-star reviews of Readly on Trustpilot including:
Peter: “What an absolute S***show. The new app is atrocious. We can no longer access puzzles. The content is all over the place, some previous titles no longer available. Tried to cancel my subscription online and it is not allowing cancellations (surely illegal).”

Steve G: “I have subscribed to this since it 1st started in the UK. Been pretty happy over that time. However, the recent update has totally ruined the experience. Don’t know who signed this off, but they need to think again. Gone from an easy to navigate app to something bordering on unusable. Very likely to cancel my subscription unless a correction is coming.”

Derek Dodds: “Have been a subscriber for many years…Have been a subscriber for many years and recommended it to many friends. Would have happily given it a 5 star rating, but now must agree with all of the negative comments. The new app that has been forced on me is an utter shambles. They need to get their act together fast and restore the previous app or cancellation will follow within the month.”

Marie-Sophie von Bibra, chief marketing officer of Cafeyn, told Press Gazette: “The new Readly app, with Cafeyn integration, introduces an updated design and enhanced digital features, including a new Games section.

“Performance remains strong, with high stability, as 99% of sessions are crash free, and a seamless sign-in experience, with 97% of users successfully accessing the new app during migration. Given the scale of both user and content migration, these results are strong indicators of the platform’s robustness.

“Puzzles within magazines remain available, while the new Games section introduces a more engaging, digital experience with daily games, hints, and progress tracking. We’re closely monitoring how this is received and will continue to refine the experience based on user needs.

“As with any major platform migration, some disruption and differences in experience are expected while we move users onto the new Readly app. We are focused on making this transition as smooth as possible for all users.

‘Especially disappointing’

Some users said there was no notice for the migration and criticised a lack of response from customer support.

Jonathan Simon, an independent media policy consultant and director of Inflection Point UK ltd, said the migration “happened overnight, without any prior notice”.

“Long-time Readly users have, over many years, built up a collection of favourite newspapers and magazines, and bookmarked dozens if not hundreds of individual articles,” he said.

“That personal metadata was meant to be migrated over to the new service, and I understand for some users that process went fine.

“But for others, myself included, it has completely failed and the new app has wiped all of my favourites and bookmarks, and there is no way to get them back.”

Simon added the old app has been “bricked”, so users cannot access their previous bookmarks and favourites to manually restore them.

“I think Readly provides an invaluable service in helping print publications survive. As such, what has happened this week is especially disappointing,” he said, adding he has not yet received a response from Readly.

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