TextFold # TextFold **Fold any text, from a one-screen map to every word** You read the original, not an AI rewrite. AI only folds it into levels, so you read more efficiently. 🚀 **New: [TextFold in your browser](#works-in-your-browser)!** One click on the browser extension transfers the page you are reading to TextFold.
For Chrome · Edge · Brave Python 3.9+ Runs on your computer Apache License 2.0 **English** · [简体中文](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/README.zh-CN.md) What TextFold reads: arXiv, PubMed Central, bioRxiv, medRxiv, Wikipedia, GitHub READMEs, any web page, PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, EPUB, HTML, pictures, Markdown, text, CSV and an agent's replies, folded from the full text down to a few words **Paste a link:** any web page · arXiv · PubMed Central · bioRxiv · medRxiv · Wikipedia · GitHub
**Drop files, one or several:** PDF · Word · PowerPoint · Excel · EPUB · HTML · CSV · pictures · Markdown · text
**Works with:** [Claude Code](#in-claude-code-and-pi) · [Pi](#in-claude-code-and-pi) · [Zotero](#works-on-your-zotero) · [Obsidian](#works-with-your-obsidian) · [your browser](#works-in-your-browser) **[Try the demo →](https://chenxiachan.github.io/textfold/gallery/)** or **[download the app ↓](#get-started)** · [What's new ↓](#whats-new)
A paper folding from its full text into a map of its sections, and back
## Read with less in your head Choose the level of detail you need, and lower your cognitive load. | | Level | Each paragraph becomes | In whose words | |:-:|---|---|---| | **1** | **Full** | the paragraph as written | the author's | | **2** | **Brief** | its one to three key sentences, verbatim | the author's | | **3** | **Key** | its point and the reason for it | AI, resting on the Brief sentences | | **4** | **Takeaway** | one line on the spine of its section | AI | | **5** | **Topic** | a few words; the text becomes a map of section cards | AI | ## Also for agent output Your agent writes more than you have time to read. A [Claude Code mod](https://code.claude.com/docs/en/plugins/mods/overview) folds every reply the same way, one key per level, and an extension does the same in Pi. [More ↓](#in-claude-code-and-pi) A reply in Claude Code folding from the full text to two sentences a paragraph, then one, and back, one key at a time

🚀 New feature: Works in your browser

 A button for Chrome, Edge and Brave sends the page you are reading to TextFold as you see it: signed in, past a paywall you pay for, drawn by the page's scripts. The browser finds its article the way reading views do, with its headings, figures, formulas and footnotes, and TextFold folds it. With TextFold open, its reader opens beside the page. Firefox is not supported yet. **Install it from GitHub.** The button is in review for the Chrome Web Store; until it is there: 1. **Install TextFold 0.10.40 or later** ([download](https://chenxiachan.github.io/textfold/#download)) and open it. It connects itself to Chrome, Edge, Brave and Chromium each time it starts. With the Python package instead: `python3 -m pip install -U textfold`, then `python3 -m textfold capture install` once. 2. **Get the `extension` folder.** Download the repository [as a ZIP](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/archive/refs/heads/main.zip) and unzip it, or `git clone https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold.git`. The folder is ready as it is: nothing to build. 3. **Load it.** Open `chrome://extensions` (`edge://extensions` in Edge), turn on **Developer mode**, choose **Load unpacked**, and pick the `extension` folder. 4. **Click it on a page.** Pin the TextFold button from the extensions menu (the puzzle piece) and click it on any page. A ✓ says the page is in your library. If the browser cannot reach TextFold, the button opens a page that says what to do. Keep the folder where it is: the browser loads the button from it. To update, download it again into the same place and click ↻ on the button's card in `chrome://extensions`. Once the button is in the Chrome Web Store, remove this copy before installing it from there. To see the levels, [connect a model ↓](#connect-a-model). The button reads a page only when you click it, and hands it to TextFold on this computer and to nothing else ([privacy policy](https://chenxiachan.github.io/textfold/privacy.html)). [docs/web-capture.md](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/web-capture.md) tells how it works.
## One fold, three places - **Read.** Paste a link, drop a file, or click TextFold's button on the page you are reading in your browser. It opens as a map of its sections that you zoom into. [Get started ↓](#get-started) - **Fold your agent's replies.** One key per level in Claude Code and in Pi, with no second model. [In Claude Code and Pi ↓](#in-claude-code-and-pi) - **Plug it into your workflow.** `python3 -m textfold get` hands your agent or script a document one level at a time, and an open format lets any program read and write folded text. [For agents ↓](#for-agents-and-scripts) ## What you get - **Words that travel.** As you zoom, every word that stays slides to its new place and the rest fade around it. - **Zoom under your fingers.** Stop halfway, turn back, or open one paragraph alone. - **Beside the original.** Open a paper's or a PDF's own pages next to the text, each paragraph shown where it stands on its page. - **Ask AI about exactly what you read.** Select a passage, or ask about the whole text: the short answer comes first, and each point links to the paragraph it rests on. With **Look it up on the web**, an agent on your computer searches the web too. - **Notes that zoom with the text.** Highlight and write in the margin; what you marked stays as you zoom out, and is saved with the page. - **Your language.** Read in many languages, translated sentence by sentence, with every formula as typeset. A document's own levels are written in its own language. - **Your library, in order.** Search it with ⌘K, keep documents in folders (drag one in, or right-click it), and list it by kind, by when each came in, or by when you last opened it.
Highlights in the full text and a note in the margin The highlighted passages kept at the Takeaway level
Highlight and write in the margin… …and keep what you marked as you zoom out.
A paper at the Topic level, drawn as a mind map of its sections and their topics The paper's own PDF beside its text, the paragraph you read marked on its page
See the whole text as a mind map… …or read it beside the original source.
Highlights at the Key level: one made at Key in violet, one made at Takeaway in blue A selected passage with the bar to highlight it, write a note or ask about it
Each highlight keeps the colour of its level… …and any passage can be noted or asked about.
## Get started **[Download the app](https://chenxiachan.github.io/textfold/#download)** for macOS (Apple silicon or Intel) or Windows. Everything it needs is inside, Python included. Or install the Python package, on any system and for your own pipeline: ```bash python3 -m pip install textfold python3 -m textfold serve ``` Open `http://localhost:3017`. The first time, [connect a model](#connect-a-model); then paste a link or drop a file, and pick a language. You need Python 3.9 or newer (the one macOS ships with works). | Paste or drop | What TextFold reads | |---|---| | A paper's link or DOI: arXiv, PubMed Central, bioRxiv, medRxiv | its text as the site structures it (an arXiv paper without an HTML version is read from its PDF; another DOI needs an open full text in Europe PMC) | | Any other web page | its article, without the menus, the adverts, or the text it hides from its readers | | A page open in your browser | the page as you see it, signed in or subscribed, with what its scripts drew: click TextFold's button. [Works in your browser ↑](#works-in-your-browser) | | A Wikipedia article, a GitHub repository | the article; the README, with its pictures | | A PDF | the paper online when the PDF names one, with your file beside it; any other PDF, on your computer: read by TextFold itself, figures included, or more completely by the PDF engine (MinerU, about 3.4 GB, installed once from the landing), which a scanned PDF needs | | A Word, PowerPoint or Excel file, a CSV, an EPUB, a saved web page | the document with its headings, tables, pictures and formulas: read by TextFold itself, or more completely by the PDF engine once it is installed | | A picture | its text, read by the PDF engine | | An item of your Zotero library | its arXiv paper, else its PDF or other file, else its DOI. [Works on your Zotero ↓](#works-on-your-zotero) | | A Markdown or text file | the file as written | What you read is kept in your system's folder for app data, shared with the desktop app.
Run it from the code instead ```bash git clone https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold.git cd textfold python3 -m pip install -r requirements.txt python3 -m textfold serve ``` What you read is then kept in the clone.
## Connect a model TextFold uses a model you already have, and there is no account to create. It looks for one when it starts; if it finds none, the first page offers the ways in. | You have | What to do | |---|---| | Claude Code, Codex, Pi or WorkBuddy | Nothing. TextFold finds it and uses it. WorkBuddy (experimental) brings its models, on your WorkBuddy sign-in; CodeBuddy's own CLI works too. | | A ChatGPT plan | Click **Use my ChatGPT plan**. A small bridge starts on your computer and signs in with your account (needs Node.js). | | Nothing yet | Click **OpenRouter in one click**. Authorize once, and free models are ready. | | An API key | **Settings › Add provider**: Anthropic, OpenAI, DeepSeek, Qwen, Zhipu GLM, Kimi, MiniMax, Google, Ollama, or any OpenAI-compatible endpoint. | Your questions can go to a stronger model than the one that writes the levels: **Settings › Models › Answering questions**, with how hard it reasons. ## In the reader | Do | To | |---|---| | Pinch, or ⌘ / Ctrl + scroll | zoom around the pointer | | `1` to `5` | jump to a level | | **Cards** or **Map**, beside the levels at Topic | the sections and their topics as cards, or as a mind map | | Click a paragraph | open just that paragraph | | Click a figure | see it enlarged | | **Original**, at the top | read beside the paper's PDF | | **Save**, at the top | keep the page as one file, as Markdown at the level you read, or only your notes | | **Aa**, at the top | light or dark, the default or paper style, the text's size, serif or sans-serif, the line spacing, the column's width, and which margins show | | `F` | focus: the text alone, the bars back at the screen's edge | | **Full screen**, in **Aa** | the window fills the screen (⌃⌘F on a Mac, F11 on Windows) | | Select text | highlight, write a note, or ask | | **Ask the paper**, bottom right | ask about the whole text (**Look it up on the web**, beside the question: an agent on your computer searches the web too) | | `L` | next language | | `⌘F` (Ctrl+F) | find words in the text: at the level you read, and in the author's words that level leaves out (the paragraph opens at Full while you are there); Enter and ⇧Enter step through them | | `⌘K` (Ctrl+K) or `/` | search your library | | ⌘ / Ctrl or Shift + click in the sidebar | pick several documents, to move into a folder or delete together | | The pin, at the top of the sidebar | keep the sidebar open beside the text | ## Works with your tools Bring a text in from your Zotero library, link what you read to your Obsidian notes, and fold your agent's replies where you work. (Your browser: [above ↑](#works-in-your-browser).) ### Works on your Zotero Click **Zotero library**, under the drop zone, and your library is there as Zotero shows it: your collections, your group libraries, a search. **Read** opens any item. - **An item on arXiv** opens from arXiv. Any other opens from its PDF, with the PDF beside the text, or from the EPUB, saved web page or Word file it holds. An item with only a DOI opens from Europe PMC. - **It keeps what you entered in Zotero:** the title, the authors and the citekey. - **It stays on your computer.** TextFold asks the Zotero app you already run, the way citation plugins do: no account, no key, nothing sent to Zotero's servers, and nothing in your library changed. To turn it on, in Zotero 7: **Settings › Advanced › Allow other applications on this computer to communicate with Zotero**. ### Works with your Obsidian [TextFold Bridge](https://github.com/adalach/obsidian-textfold-bridge), an Obsidian plugin by [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach), links your notes to what you read in TextFold, the way Zotero and its citation plugins work together: TextFold keeps the documents and what you wrote on them, and your notes keep links into them. - **Your own notes, folded.** Read a note at TextFold's five levels inside Obsidian, its words travelling as in the reader. After an edit, **Refold** asks the model only for the sections that changed, and your highlights find their passages again. - **Drag from the reader into a note.** A paragraph, a whole section, a selection, a card of the Topic map or one of your notes goes in as a callout, with its title, its section and a link back. - **Links that open at the place.** A `textfold://` link opens the document at its paragraph, note or level. Hover it in Obsidian to read the passage. - **Your TextFold notes beside the note.** A sidebar lists the passages the note cites, and your highlights and questions on the documents it refers to. Import them as a note of their own, and update it later without losing what you wrote in it. **Set it up:** 1. **Install TextFold:** [download the app](https://chenxiachan.github.io/textfold/#download) for macOS or Windows, or install the Python package ([Get started ↑](#get-started)). 2. **Open TextFold** (the app, or `python3 -m textfold serve`), and keep it open while you use the plugin. It needs TextFold 0.10.18 or later, and the plugin talks to it on 127.0.0.1 only. 3. **In Obsidian:** **Settings › Community plugins › Turn on community plugins › Browse**, search for **TextFold Bridge**, then **Install** and **Enable**. 4. **With the desktop app,** set **Settings › TextFold Bridge › Links › Open links in** to **TextFold app**. By default, links open in your browser. ### In Claude Code and Pi TextFold puts the five levels on every reply in Claude Code and in Pi. Press 5 for the answer in one sentence, 3 for the point of every paragraph, 1 for every word (in Pi, hold Alt). Nothing is paraphrased, so at every level you read exactly what the model said.
In Claude Code: install it, and see what each level gives you
A reply in Claude Code folding from the full text to two sentences a paragraph, then one, and back, one key at a time It needs Claude Code 2.1.287 or later, in the terminal or in the Code tab of the Desktop app. ```bash claude plugin marketplace add chenxiachan/textfold claude plugin install textfold@textfold ``` | Key | Level | What you get | |:-:|---|---| | **1** | **Full** | every word Claude wrote | | **2** | **Brief** | each point, with the reason behind it | | **3** | **Points** | just the points, at a glance | | **4** | **Outline** | the map of a long reply: its sections, and what each one says (a reply without headings shows its points) | | **5** | **Gist** | the answer, in one sentence | Type the digit while the prompt is empty, or pick a level in the row above the prompt. Short replies stay whole: one under about 80 words, or one a fold would barely shorten, always shows as written. **Start folded.** A session starts at Full. To start at another level, run `/config` and set **Starting level**; in the session, the row above the prompt and the keys 1 to 5 still change it. **Why you can trust a fold.** TextFold asks Claude to lead with the point: the answer first in every reply, the key sentence first in every paragraph. A fold keeps what Claude put first. There is no second model and no summary, so a fold costs nothing and takes no time. More in [plugins/textfold](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/plugins/textfold/README.md).
In Pi: install it, and see it fold
A coding turn in Pi, its thinking and its reply, folding a level at a time until each is one sentence, by key and by a click on the row An extension puts the same five levels on every reply in [Pi](https://pi.dev). It needs Pi 1.2.0 or later, on Node 22.15 or later. ```bash git clone https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold.git pi install ./textfold/plugins/pi-textfold ``` Hold Alt and type the digit, click a level in the row above the prompt, or type `/fold` and a level: `/fold 3`, `/fold points`, `/fold off`. Every reply folds in place, the earlier ones too, and so does the model's thinking, so a long coding turn reads in a few lines. The level stays with the session, and `/fold calibrate` teaches the keys on any keyboard. On a Mac, let the terminal send Option as Meta, or Option+1 types ¡. It folds with the mod's own engine, so a reply reads the same at each level in Claude Code and in Pi. More in [plugins/pi-textfold](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/plugins/pi-textfold/README.md). Contributed by [@jlamweil](https://github.com/jlamweil).
## For agents and scripts `python3 -m textfold get` gives a document one level at a time, coarsest first, so an agent reads the map before it spends its context on the whole text: ```bash python3 -m textfold get https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.23916 # the map: every section's topic python3 -m textfold get 2512.23916 --level key --section 3 # one section: its points, each with its reason python3 -m textfold get report.pdf --json # the whole document, in the TextFold format ``` A document not folded yet is folded first, with the model you connected. Every line a model wrote is marked as such and anchored to the author's sentences it rests on: [docs/format.md](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/format.md) describes the format, for any program that reads or writes folded text. A running TextFold (the app, or `python3 -m textfold serve`) says where it is in `server.json`, in its data folder (`~/Library/Application Support/TextFold` on a Mac, `%LOCALAPPDATA%\TextFold` on Windows, `~/.local/share/textfold` on Linux, the clone when run from one): `{"format": "textfold/server", "version": 1, "url": "http://127.0.0.1:", "port": , "pid": , "textfold": "", "started": ""}`. The file goes when the server stops; one left behind (a server ended outright) names an address that answers nothing. An agent in a browser that offers WebMCP, a draft web standard (tried in Codex's own browser), finds TextFold's own operations on its pages as tools: it reads the passage you are reading or selected, and, when you ask, saves a note on an exact passage, imports a file or a Zotero item, or sorts your folders. Nothing changes in a browser without it. [docs/webmcp.md](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/webmcp.md) lists the tools. Contributed by [@peitianyi23-sudo](https://github.com/peitianyi23-sudo). ## Save a page **Save**, at the top of the reader, keeps a page as one HTML file that opens anywhere without a server: its levels, the notes you choose and, if you like, its original PDF to read beside it. It can also keep the whole text as Markdown at the level you are reading, your notes under their paragraphs (at Topic, an outline that a mind-map plugin draws), or only your notes, as a page, a PDF, Markdown for Obsidian or JSON. From the command line, the page without your notes: ```bash python3 -m textfold export 2512.23916 ``` TextFold is a tool, and its license covers its code. When you share a file, follow the terms of the original text, shown under its title. ## What's new - **October 28, 2026:** a button in your browser. - **October 27, 2026:** a label stays a label. - **October 27, 2026:** WorkBuddy 5.8, progress that moves, and saved pages read whole. - **October 26, 2026:** questions answered from the whole text, a web page's footnotes kept apart, and downloads tried again.
Each update in full, and earlier ones - **October 28, 2026: a button in your browser.** In Chrome, Edge or Brave, one click sends the page you are reading to TextFold as you see it, signed in or subscribed, with what its scripts drew, and its reader opens beside the page. The article is found in the browser the way reading views find it, with its headings, figures, formulas and footnotes: a paper on ScienceDirect keeps its 32 headings and 9 figures. The app connects itself to the browser each time it starts, and the button is on its way to the Chrome Web Store. Each section of a paper also knows whether it is part of the appendix, from the paper's own marks. Thanks to [@minatomugino864-lgtm](https://github.com/minatomugino864-lgtm). [Works in your browser ↑](#works-in-your-browser) - **October 27, 2026: a label stays a label.** A line that is not part of the text's argument, such as "Keywords:", a heading the PDF engine read as a line of text, an author's address or a date, keeps its own words at every level. The model used to write a sentence about it, longer than the line itself ("Section one is the Introduction."); now it leaves the line as written. A document already folded reads so once you choose **Regenerate** in its language menu. - **October 27, 2026: WorkBuddy 5.8, progress that moves, and saved pages read whole.** WorkBuddy 5.8 brings a smaller copy of CodeBuddy, which TextFold now runs as WorkBuddy does. That copy keeps WorkBuddy's sign-in to itself, so when TextFold cannot use it, it says so and what to do: install CodeBuddy on its own and sign in there, and TextFold takes that one. A generation counts each section as it comes back, so one slow section no longer holds the count at 0. A saved web page whose only `
` is an advert, or whose comments are longer than its article, is read as its article. Numbered list items keep their numbers when a list folds. Thanks to [@HamiltonZeng](https://github.com/HamiltonZeng), [@Yanksi](https://github.com/Yanksi), [@Nombah501](https://github.com/Nombah501) and [@minatomugino864-lgtm](https://github.com/minatomugino864-lgtm). - **October 26, 2026: questions answered from the whole text, a web page's footnotes kept apart, and downloads tried again.** A question about a passage, or about the whole text, is answered from all of it: the model is given the text in full, not only the passage's paragraph and the few others that share the question's words, so it can draw on a part far off that says the same thing in other words. A text too long for that is asked about as before. A web page that shows its footnotes and references when you point at their numbers keeps them as footnotes, under the page's own marks, instead of running their words into the sentence: its Full level reads as the page does. A download that breaks off, or a busy server, is tried again, and after five tries TextFold says which site it could not reach, with **Continue**. "Drop it here" goes as soon as the file leaves the window. Thanks to [@RocStone](https://github.com/RocStone), [@QZGao](https://github.com/QZGao), [@minatomugino864-lgtm](https://github.com/minatomugino864-lgtm) and [@QAbot-zh](https://github.com/QAbot-zh). - **October 25, 2026: formulas and tables as Typora shows them.** A Markdown document's formulas are drawn by KaTeX, in TeX's own type and spacing, and its display formulas are numbered on the right, (1), (2), as Typora numbers them: `\tag{A}` gives a formula its own number, `\notag` and a starred environment give none, and `\eqref{…}` shows the number of the formula `\label{…}` names, as a link to it. A formula of several lines (`aligned`) keeps its lines. A paper's formulas are set in Latin Modern Math, the type of LaTeX. A table from Markdown, a web page or a document has every cell ruled and every other row shaded. A formula set apart from the text can be selected like words, to highlight it, write a note on it or ask about it, and dragged out by its handle, as a paragraph can, with its number and a link back to it. A Markdown document already in your library shows them so too, with its levels and notes as they were. - **October 25, 2026: a text in its own language, questions looked up on the web, and Thai.** A document's levels are written in the language it is in, and the language menu calls them by it: a Chinese document reads as 简体中文, and reading it in Chinese no longer has the model translate it into Chinese again. English is a translation like any other. Beside a question, **Look it up on the web** has an agent on this computer (Claude Code, Codex, CodeBuddy, or Pi with a web extension) search the web and open pages for the answer, with the pages it drew on as links; it changes no file. A library folder chosen in Settings is kept at once. Thai joins the languages a text can be read in. Thanks to [@mingrath1](https://github.com/mingrath1), [@MacMillan1225](https://github.com/MacMillan1225), [@RocStone](https://github.com/RocStone) and [@QAbot-zh](https://github.com/QAbot-zh). - **October 25, 2026: find in the text, diagrams drawn, and the library in a folder you choose.** ⌘F (Ctrl+F) finds words in the text, at the level you read and in the author's words that level leaves out: a step to one of those opens its paragraph at Full, in place. A diagram written in Mermaid, in a Markdown file or on a web page, is drawn, light or dark as the page is. In Settings, **Library folder** copies the library into another folder and uses it there, or opens a library already in a folder. TextFold switches when it next starts, and the library it was copied from stays as it was. Thanks to [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach), [@Yanksi](https://github.com/Yanksi) and [@kvistgaard](https://github.com/kvistgaard). - **October 24, 2026: highlights in shades, and Hindi read as Hindi.** A highlight keeps the colour of the level it was made at, in a shade of it: light, medium or deep. Pick the shade from the dots beside **Highlight** in the bar over a selection, or change it in the note. In **Aa**, each level's colour can be any of eight. A Topic card dragged into a note carries the summary under its title. Hindi words stay whole, and a Hindi sentence ends at the danda. The words of a formula's `\text{}` read as written (50% off, not `50\% off`), and the normal text of a Word formula no longer breaks it. A Markdown document's front matter gives its authors as Quarto writes them, without their affiliations. The Python package starts again on Python 3.9, 3.10 and 3.11. Thanks to [@vcdim](https://github.com/vcdim), [@Pharex38](https://github.com/Pharex38) and [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach). - **October 23, 2026: links that keep landing, and WorkBuddy on Windows.** A paragraph and a section keep their ids for the life of their document: after an edit, a new conversion of a PDF, or a later TextFold. So a link to one, from Obsidian or from a note, still opens it. A link to a paragraph that is no longer in the text opens the section it was in, and says so. On Windows, WorkBuddy 5.8 is found again, wherever it was installed. Thanks to [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach) and [@LyotoDS](https://github.com/LyotoDS). - **October 23, 2026: a highlight lights what you selected.** A highlight made at Key or Takeaway lights every word you selected, the model's too. Before, only the words that came from the author's text lit up, and none when you had selected only the model's. Each level has its own colour: yellow for Full and Brief, violet for Key, blue for Takeaway. The levels no longer light each other's highlights, and **Keep my highlights** still brings the author's passages up to Key and Takeaway. In a note, Enter keeps it and closes it, and Shift+Enter starts a new line (on a phone, Enter starts a new line). Opening another document no longer downloads the app's scripts and styles again, which helps most when you read from a server, on a phone. Thanks to [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach) and [@LumenYoung](https://github.com/LumenYoung). - **October 22, 2026: an accurate conversion keeps your languages and notes, and phones read better.** A PDF converted again accurately is read again in every language it had, and your notes on it find their passages in the new text. A translation of the fast conversion's text no longer lands on the new one, outdated and on the wrong paragraphs. An outdated translation has **Update** at the top of the language menu. On a phone, the button that opens the sidebar no longer covers the logo, and a wide formula scrolls in its own box. A long formula in a Markdown document or a converted PDF keeps its box on every screen, and in a list it is shown. A `textfold://` link to a later part of a split paragraph opens it. Thanks to [@LumenYoung](https://github.com/LumenYoung) and [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach). - **October 22, 2026: figures as TeX drew them, and full screen.** In an arXiv paper, a drawing whose words the browser sets itself (a TikZ picture) can have them run out of its boxes, on arXiv's own page too. A button under such a drawing takes the paper's figures of that kind from its PDF, as TeX set them, and another puts them back; nothing is downloaded until you press it. **Full screen** in **Aa** fills the screen, and the Topic map opens beside the original pages too. At Brief, the words that go on to Key stand out by a step, not a jump, and the paper style keeps the default's text colours. - **October 22, 2026: lighter on your disk.** Pictures are kept as WebP as they come in: an arXiv paper's figures take a fifth of the space or less, and download four at a time, so a new paper opens sooner. Pictures already in your library stay as they are. The app's copy of the pictures and PDFs it showed stays under 32 MB, and a downloaded update is removed once it is installed. A deleted document stays in papers/.trash for 30 days, then it is erased. At Key and Takeaway, a figure of several panels shows them side by side, no longer one under another and cut off. - **October 21, 2026: a reader to stay in.** **Aa** has light or dark (or your system's) and a paper style, quieter than white, for either; and the line spacing. A text opens where you left it. `F` leaves the text alone on the screen. The sidebar can be pinned beside the text. - **October 21, 2026: tools for an agent in your browser.** In a browser that offers WebMCP, an agent finds TextFold's own operations as tools: it reads the passage you selected and, when you ask, saves a note on it, imports a file or a Zotero item, or sorts your folders. [The tools](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/webmcp.md). Thanks to [@peitianyi23-sudo](https://github.com/peitianyi23-sudo). - **October 21, 2026: Topic as a mind map.** At Topic, **Map** beside the levels draws the sections and their topics as a mind map: click a topic to read its paragraph, click a section to fold it. Headings stand apart more clearly, **Aa** can hide the margins (the links, the AI answers, your notes), and **Save** keeps the whole text as Markdown at the level you read. On Windows, the installer asks where to install. - **October 20, 2026: your type, and several documents at once.** **Aa** at the top sets the text's size, the column's width and serif or sans-serif, for every text. In the sidebar, ⌘-click (Ctrl-click) or Shift-click picks several documents to move into a folder or delete together, and a delete can be undone for a few seconds. - **October 20, 2026: several files at once.** Drop or choose several files together: they are read, and their levels written, one after another while you go on reading, and the sidebar shows each. - **October 20, 2026: TextFold and Obsidian.** [TextFold Bridge](https://github.com/adalach/obsidian-textfold-bridge), an Obsidian plugin, links your notes to places in TextFold: a paragraph, a section, a note. Drag a paragraph, a section or a selection from the reader into a note and it keeps a link back to where it came from. A note of your own folds at the five levels inside Obsidian, and after an edit it folds again in place, its comments found again in the new text. Thanks to [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach). - **October 20, 2026: Pi folds the thinking too.** In Pi, the model's reasoning folds with its reply, so a long coding turn reads in a few lines. Click a level in the row to fold, keep your level when you resume a session, and teach the keys once with `/fold calibrate` on any keyboard. Thanks to [@jlamweil](https://github.com/jlamweil). - **October 19, 2026: more languages to read in.** Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Dutch, Polish, Czech, Ukrainian, Turkish, Indonesian and Vietnamese join the languages a text can be read in. Where the interface has no words for a language, it is in English. Thanks to [@Kullenej](https://github.com/Kullenej). - **October 15, 2026: Pi's replies fold too.** [An extension for Pi](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/plugins/pi-textfold/README.md) puts the five levels on every reply, with the same fold as in Claude Code. Thanks to [@jlamweil](https://github.com/jlamweil). - **October 15, 2026: PDFs open without the engine.** A PDF with its own text, as most papers have, opens at once, its figures cut from the page; only a scan still needs the PDF engine. An arXiv paper with no HTML version is read from its PDF. Thanks to [@sylvainHellin](https://github.com/sylvainHellin). - **October 15, 2026: your library, and your questions.** Search the library, keep documents in folders, and list them by when they came in or were last opened. A question has its own send and stop, any turn of a conversation can be deleted, and questions can go to a stronger model than the one that writes the levels. Thanks to [@suhyungJang](https://github.com/suhyungJang). - **October 14, 2026: an app for Mac and Windows.** Download TextFold for macOS (Apple silicon or Intel, signed and notarized by Apple) or Windows, with everything it needs inside. It finds Claude Code, Codex or Pi on your computer, and updates itself when you say so. [Download ↑](#get-started) - **October 14, 2026: your Zotero library.** **Zotero library**, under the drop zone, shows your library and its collections as Zotero does, and opens any item in a click: from arXiv when it is there, else from its own PDF. Thanks to [@adalach](https://github.com/adalach). [Works on your Zotero ↑](#works-on-your-zotero) - **October 14, 2026: arXiv pages, read more safely.** What could run script in a page is taken out before the reader draws it, and its figures stay as they were. Thanks to [@neil-patel77](https://github.com/neil-patel77). - **October 13, 2026: save a page as one file.** **Save**, at the top of the reader, keeps the page as one HTML file, with your notes and its original PDF if you like, or only your notes. [Save a page ↑](#save-a-page) - **October 13, 2026: Word, PowerPoint, Excel, e-books and more.** Drop a Word, PowerPoint or Excel file, a CSV, an EPUB or a saved web page, and it opens at once, formulas included, with nothing more to install. - **October 13, 2026: whole figures, and a guide.** A figure the PDF engine cut into pieces now comes out whole, cut from its page. A short guide opens on your first visit, and again from **How it works**. - **October 9, 2026: PaperFold is now TextFold.** The same reader, named for everything it folds: papers, web pages, PDFs, READMEs and your agent's replies. Links to the old repository lead here, and your settings move over by themselves. - **October 9, 2026: any web page, and PDFs.** Paste any web page's link and read its article at five levels, without the text the page hides from its readers. Drop a PDF: when it names a paper that can be read online, that version opens with your PDF beside it; any other PDF is converted on your computer. - **October 9, 2026: for agents.** `python3 -m textfold get --level topic` prints a document's map, and `--section` unfolds the part that matters. [More ↑](#for-agents-and-scripts) - **October 8, 2026: any GitHub README.** Paste a repository's link and read its README at five levels, with its logo, badges and GIFs as on GitHub. - **October 8, 2026: read beside the original.** **Original**, at the top of a paper, opens its PDF at the left and shows each paragraph on its page as you read. A new paper opens as soon as it can be read, while its levels are written. - **October 7, 2026: your agent's replies fold too.** [The Claude Code mod](#in-claude-code-and-pi) puts the five levels on every reply. Press 5 for the answer in one sentence, 1 for every word. - **October 6, 2026: more than arXiv.** PubMed Central, bioRxiv, medRxiv, Wikipedia in any language, and your own Markdown files.

## Contributors @neil-patel77 @adalach @suhyungJang @sylvainHellin @jlamweil @lamegoat @Kullenej @666xz666 @peitianyi23-sudo @mcardZH @momoko-sketch @Knoety @LumenYoung @LyotoDS @Pharex38 @vcdim @Yanksi @mingrath1 Contributions are welcome: start with [CONTRIBUTING.md](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md).
**If TextFold helps you read, ⭐ star it so others can find it.**
---
Built on [trafilatura](https://github.com/adbar/trafilatura), which finds the article on a web page, [Defuddle](https://github.com/kepano/defuddle) and [Readability](https://github.com/mozilla/readability), which find it in your browser, [pdf-inspector](https://github.com/firecrawl/pdf-inspector), which reads a PDF's own text, [PDFium](https://pdfium.googlesource.com/pdfium/) by way of [pypdfium2](https://github.com/pypdfium2-team/pypdfium2), which cuts its figures, [MinerU](https://github.com/opendatalab/MinerU), the PDF engine, and [mammoth](https://github.com/mwilliamson/python-mammoth), which reads Word files; PDFs are shown with [PDF.js](https://github.com/mozilla/pdf.js) and formulas with [KaTeX](https://katex.org), set in [Latin Modern Math](https://www.gust.org.pl/projects/e-foundry/lm-math). Thanks to their authors. [Apache 2.0](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/LICENSE) © 2026 Xia Chen · [Development](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/DEVELOPMENT.md) · [Format](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/docs/format.md) · [Contributing](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md) · [Security](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/blob/main/SECURITY.md) · [Feedback](https://github.com/chenxiachan/textfold/issues)