Dark Reader for Safari for PC and Mac

Software Reviews and Criticism

• By Patrick Botros

  Works great for most websites, so...

  This is part a review and part feedback. Dark Reader in dynamic mode works great for about 9 out of 10 websites. For those that don't look great, often times, switching from dynamic to filter mode fixes everything. Obviously, that's why they added the "set up a custom theme for current website" option. I wish, though, that the community of users could submit the custom theme to a list of websites that benefit from a settings change, so that over time Dark Reader could adjust the settings on behalf of users. I'm not sure if it'd raise a security issue to have an extension sending browsing information back to the extension's developers, but it would definitely make the extension a lot more seamless, or if it's possible to anonymize that data. In an ideal world, users should barely have to touch the Dark Reader options. Additionally, I wish the settings were adjustable from within the Windows app, rather than just in the toolbar. I'm just tired of having a bunch applications for extensions that don't do much cluttering up my applications folder.

  
  
• By wingdo

  Would be perfect with one addition

  Overall this app is awesome. I love how you can disable it on websites which don't play well with the extension. What is lacking though, is the ability to use dynamic mode vs filter mode on a site by site basis. I use dynamic mode as the look is much more consistent, but on several sites it renders the page blank but filter mode works just fine. I'd like to be able to set these sites to use filter mode as opposed to having to disable the extension for the site which then renders this one bright white website with all others being a nice dark mode. For me, it's the only thing holding this back from 5 stars.

  
  
• By Riegelstamm

  Works about 80% of the Time

  I estimate that Dark Reader for Safari works for about 80% of the websites I visit. There are 2 main modes, Dynamic and Filter. Dynamic is supposed to look better and Filter is faster. However, I don't find that Dynamic usually looks better, so I've been using Filter. On some websites, Dark Reader inverts everything, including photos so that they look like negatives, which is not good. On other websites, fonts become unreadable because they are the same color as the background. I contacted the developer about this but he has not responded. Lastly, the free Chrome extension contains more options than the paid Safari version, which makes no sense. The developer's website says "Most of the features will be ported soon," but who knows when that will be.

  
  
• By tinyapps

  Works well, but requires extensive permissions

  Update: Have removed another star in light of the developer's disingenuous response. The warning text I quoted in my original review below comes from Dark Reader's own preferences pane in Safari! The issue is not whether or not the developer is currently exploiting these permissions, but that they *can* be exploited, unlike Content Blocker extensions (e.g., Wipr, whose preference pane reports that it "does not have permission to read or transmit content from any webpages." The developer's contention that "Every update passes manual review by Microsoft" is hardly adequate assuagement; here are a few headlines from September 2018 that a quick search turned up: "Windows App Store apps are stealing user data", "More malicious apps found in Windows App Store that are stealing user data", and "Top-grossing Windows App Store app steals users’ browser histories". Original review: The Windows App Store should really list the required permissions for apps. Dark Reader works beautifully, but requires full access to webpage contents ("Can read sensitive information from webpages, including passwords, phone numbers, and credit cards on all webpages") and browsing history ("Can see when you visit all webpages"). If this were disclosed before purchase, it would be a 5 star app.

  
  
• By darukaru

  Essential quality of life extension

  I have a vision issue which causes dark text on light backgrounds to be difficult to read at times. I’ve used Dark Reader on desktop browsers for some time, but on iOS and iPadOS I needed to use Safari’s Reader mode or system-wide Invert Colors. They worked, but each method has its own drawbacks. I’m very happy to see this make its way to Safari in iOS 15, and also that my purchase of the Windows version carried over to the iOS version. (I was prepared to pay the full price again without hesitation.) This version is somewhat less configurable than the desktop extensions (replacing the static/dynamic/sepia filters with a palette of color themes) but the core function works just as well. My only complaint is that if any other extensions are active, it takes extra taps to activate Dark Reader (once to call up the extension menu, then again to change Dark Reader settings), but I assume that’s an OS limitation.

  
  

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