Mozilla is Shutting Down Pocket
Pocket seemed to be a bit like Marmite for some people. They either loved it, or hated it. Some true hatred Mozilla got for bundling it into the browser was a bit much if you ask me. But here we are.
As of 2025-07-08, Mozilla will be placing Pocket into an export only state.
I left Pocket behind many years ago, and so far, I haven't been able to find another service that I've found quite as useful. I've used all kinds of tools and methods, but nothing has really worked for me. The current solution is a bit of a mix between far too many tabs being open across the phone and iPad, and a less than friendly experience attempting to share it into the "Links" area of Reeder. It's a bloody mess.
I have been eyeing up Readeck since hearing about it on a podcast a few days ago, though.
Back to the point. Mozilla is shutting down Pocket. Why?
What began as a read-it-later app evolved into something much bigger.
I'm seeing problem number one right here. That's all I ever wanted or needed from you. To offer me a useful, reliable read-it-later service.
we invested in building our content curation and recommendation capabilities so people everywhere can discover and access high quality web content.
Did anyone actually want this from a service that was supposed to allow us to save articles and videos that WE wanted to spend more time on at a later date? I wasn't asking you to force-feed me content that YOU thought was interesting.
Over the past eight years, we’ve:
- Expanded high-quality content recommendations to more than a dozen countries and five languages.
- Connected tens of millions of people across the world with stories worth their time and attention.
- Earned recognition including a Webby Award for “Best of Pocket: 2020” and an Anthem Award in 2023 for supporting local journalism.
- Published hundreds of curated collections on topics from fighting algorithmic bias to rethinking happiness.
Are you seeing the issue here yet, Mozilla? You turned it into something entirely different. I just wanted to be able to save articles to you so that I could read them later, possibly offline.
What's done is done, so, where are we heading next?
But the way people use the web has evolved, so we’re channeling our resources into projects that better match their browsing habits and online needs.
I'm not sure about this, Mozilla. Judging by the sheer number of alternatives, I'd say people absolutely still want a decent read-it-later service. What do you think is the way forward?
Meanwhile, new features like Tab Groups and enhanced bookmarks now provide built-in ways to manage reading lists easily. – https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/building-whats-next/
Okey-dokey then. You're suggesting I keep these 100's of tabs open in groups called "Read this later" and, "Shit, read this later later". That's the opposite of what I was hoping to do.
But I am just a single user, and this is my opinion. We all have our wants and desires. And the last part of my opinion matches precisely with a recent post from Kev on the matter (also from https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/building-whats-next/).
Holy purple nurples, Mozilla. Absolutely go home. You're beyond drunk. You're utterly wasted. I am so, so glad that Thunderbird has the autonomy it does. It would probably be replaced as a "Snapchat-email" type service, where you could only communicate with pictures if you had your way.