Every book
has a voice.
Drop in a PDF or paste a link. Unknown reads it aloud in a lifelike voice, lights up every line in time with the audio, and answers questions about what it just read. All of it on your Mac.
7 days free on yearly and monthly · macOS 14.1 or later
No download needed: try the web reader in your browser, up to 2,000 pages a month. The Mac app has no limits.
NewiPhone and iPad app on the App Store · Coming soonApple Watch · Apple TV · Windows · Android
Press play.
Watch it read.
That is not a recording of a person. It is one of Unknown's 28 narrators, produced by the same engine that runs inside the app - and it lights up as it goes, exactly the way your own documents will.
This is what your books will sound like. Drop in a PDF and press play. Unknown reads it aloud in a lifelike voice, and lights up every line in time with the audio. Nothing is uploaded. The voice you are hearing is running on the Mac in front of you. Twenty-eight narrators. Every book you own. Ready in seconds.
In the app this runs on any document you own, at any speed, with the paragraph you are hearing lit up on the page.
Twenty-eight voices.
Each one has a face.
Every voice and character below comes straight out of the app. Click one to hear it read. Give each document the narrator it deserves.
Everything a document should
have been able to do.
Read-along highlighting
The page lights up paragraph by paragraph, locked to the audio. Look away, look back, and you have not lost your place.
Chat with your documents
Summaries, meanings, answers - about the page you are on, the whole document, or your entire library. The conversation stays on your Mac.
PDFs, EPUBs, Word files, links
Textbooks, novels, scans, Word and text files - or paste a link to any article, arXiv paper or X post, or share it from Safari. Images and charts come along. If you can open it, Unknown can read it.
Mind maps in one click
Turn any document into an AI-drawn map of its big ideas and how they connect, then rearrange it however you think.
Highlights, notes, bookmarks
Mark a paragraph, save a line, keep notes per page or per document - right on the page, while it reads.
A shelf nobody else sees
Lock private documents behind Touch ID. They vanish from the library, and from the AI's view, until you unlock them.
Nothing leaves your Mac.
Most reading apps ship your documents to a server and rent you the answer. The Unknown Mac app does not. Every page is read, narrated and reasoned about by the machine in front of you - no upload, no data centre spinning up on your behalf, no bill in watts.
The voice is local
The neural voices run on your own hardware. Your documents are never uploaded, streamed, or processed in the cloud - and after a one-time sign-in, none of it needs the internet at all.
Your library stays yours
Converted documents live on your disk. No server-side copies, no sync you did not ask for, nothing to lose in someone else's breach.
No one watches you read
What you read, when you read it, how far you got. None of it is a product here. It stays on your machine, where it belongs.
Using the web reader, or the iPhone or iPad app without a Mac? Those convert in the cloud: your document is sent over an encrypted connection to our servers, kept only until your devices download it (up to 90 days, or until you remove it), never read by a person and never used to train AI. For anything private, use the Mac app. Privacy policy
Your library,
in your pocket.
Every document your Mac narrates appears on your iPhone and iPad automatically, with the same lifelike voice. The real pages render on screen while the current paragraph lights up in time with the audio. Pause on the Mac, resume on your iPhone or iPad: progress, bookmarks, notes and mind maps sync both ways through your own iCloud, so no server of ours sees the documents your Mac narrates. No Mac? The app can convert documents in the cloud instead.
- Background audio with lock screen controls, adjustable speed, 15-second skips
- Search arXiv from your iPhone or iPad, read any paper instantly, or queue it for your Mac to narrate
- Free, with a sample document included so you can try it right away
Requires iOS or iPadOS 17 or later · No Mac? It converts in the cloud, up to 2,000 pages a month
Seven days free.
Then pick your pace.
Every plan includes all 28 voices, unlimited private conversion on your Mac, and up to 2,000 cloud pages a month on the web and iPhone. Start a free week on yearly or monthly and cancel anytime before it ends.
- All 28 voices, read-along highlighting at any speed
- On-device AI chat & mind maps
- The free iPhone and iPad app, synced through your own iCloud
- 100% on-device and private on your Mac
Unknown, in one table.
| What it does | Turns PDFs, EPUBs, Word files and web links into interactive audiobooks: narrated aloud, highlighted in sync, ready to answer questions |
|---|---|
| Platform | macOS 14.1 (Sonoma) or later · free iPhone and iPad companion app on the App Store (iOS and iPadOS 17 or later), synced through your own iCloud · Apple Watch, Apple TV, Windows, and Android versions coming soon |
| Formats | PDF and EPUB (scans included, via built-in OCR), Word, RTF, OpenDocument, Markdown, text and HTML files, plus links to web articles, papers and X posts |
| Voices | 28 neural voices, American and British |
| AI | Chat with a document or your whole library, AI mind maps - on-device, Apple silicon |
| Reading tools | Highlights, bookmarks, per-page notes, hidden shelf behind Touch ID |
| Where it runs | Mac: 100% on-device - no uploads, no cloud, works offline. Web reader, and iPhone without a Mac: in the cloud |
| Footprint | Energy-efficient by design - Apple silicon instead of power-hungry cloud AI |
| Free trial | 7 days free on the yearly and monthly plans, all voices included |
| Pricing | $49.99 yearly (unlimited), $4.99 monthly (3,000 pages/mo), or $2.99 weekly (500 pages/wk, no trial) |
Questions, answered.
What is Unknown?
Unknown is a macOS app that turns PDFs, EPUBs, research papers and web articles into interactive audiobooks. It reads your documents aloud in 28 lifelike neural voices that run entirely on your Mac, highlights each paragraph in time with the audio, and includes OCR so scanned pages work too. You can also chat with your documents and turn them into AI-drawn mind maps, all on-device, so on a Mac nothing is ever uploaded. Without a Mac, the web reader and the iPhone and iPad app can convert documents in the cloud instead.
Does Unknown have AI features?
Yes. You can chat with your documents - summarize a page or the whole document, ask about anything from the page you're on to your entire library - and turn any document into an AI-drawn mind map of its ideas. The AI runs locally on Apple silicon Macs, so your documents and questions never leave the machine.
Do I need to download an app?
No. The web reader works in any browser with nothing to install: upload a document or paste a link and it is converted in the cloud, up to 2,000 pages a month and 500 pages per document. The iPhone and iPad app converts in the cloud with the same limits when you have no Mac. The Mac app on Apple silicon converts on your own Mac with no limits, works offline, and your documents never leave it.
Does Unknown work offline?
Yes. Narration runs on your own machine, so after a one-time sign-in you can convert and listen to documents with no internet connection at all. On a Mac there is no server doing the work, and your documents never leave it. The web reader, and cloud conversion on an iPhone or iPad without a Mac, need an internet connection.
What file formats does Unknown support?
PDF and EPUB files, Word (.docx and .doc), RTF, OpenDocument (.odt), Markdown, plain text and HTML files, plus links: paste a web article, an arXiv paper or an X post, or share a page from Safari, and Unknown turns it into a document, images and charts included. That covers textbooks, research papers, novels, reports, and the articles you meant to read. Scanned PDFs work too, because OCR is built in - Unknown reads the text off the page image before narrating it.
How does Unknown turn a PDF into an interactive audiobook?
Drop a PDF or EPUB into Unknown, or paste a link, and press play. The app narrates it in a lifelike neural voice and highlights each paragraph in sync with the audio - an audiobook that reads along with you and answers your questions as you listen.
Does the narration really happen on my Mac?
Yes. In the Mac app the neural voices run locally, on-device. Your documents are never uploaded, streamed, or processed in the cloud, and no one tracks what you read. A document only reaches a server when you choose the web reader, or use the iPhone or iPad app without a Mac.
Can Unknown read scanned PDFs?
Yes. OCR is built in, so scanned pages and textbooks work alongside digital PDFs, EPUBs, papers, and novels.
Is Unknown free?
Unknown starts with a 7-day free trial on the yearly and monthly plans, with all 28 voices included - cancel before the trial ends and you won't be charged. After that it is $49.99 a year for unlimited pages or $4.99 a month for 3,000 pages a month. A weekly plan is $2.99 for 500 pages a week, without a trial. The iPhone companion app is free.
What does Unknown run on?
Unknown is a native macOS app and requires macOS 14.1 (Sonoma) or later. A free iPhone and iPad companion app (iOS and iPadOS 17 or later) is on the App Store: every document your Mac narrates appears on your iPhone and iPad through your own iCloud, with progress, bookmarks, notes and mind maps in sync. Apple Watch, Apple TV, Windows, and Android versions are coming soon.
Is Unknown eco-friendly?
Yes. Narration and AI run locally on Apple silicon, which is built for performance per watt - not on racks of power-hungry GPUs in a data center. No cloud compute is spent on your reading, and nothing travels the network.
Which voices can narrate my documents?
28 lifelike voices, American and British, warm and bright. Preview each one, pick a narrator per document, adjust playback speed, and resume exactly where you left off.
The documents you never got
around to reading are
about to start talking.
7 days free on yearly and monthly · macOS 14.1 or later
NewiPhone and iPad app on the App Store · Coming soonApple Watch · Apple TV · Windows · Android