ReadCube Papers overview

What is ReadCube Papers? We are on a mission to make the world of research more accessible and connected - serving researchers, publishers, academic and commercial organizations. Papers offers a robust cross-platform suite of reference management & discovery tools that can dramatically improve the way researchers find, access, organize, read, annotate, share, and cite research literature.

Search + Download

Built-in search engines
Personalized recommendations
Related article feeds
Institutional proxy support
Web importing via browser
1-click PDF downloads
Advanced search filters

Stay Organized

Easy importing tools from your desktop/other reference managers
Auto article metadata matching
Full text library search
Advanced sorted & filtering
Manual & smart collections
#keyword tagging, labels & article ratings
File management & watch folders

Read & Annotate

Enhanced PDF viewing
Hyperlinked inline references, high-res figure browsers & auto-fetched supplements
Advanced article metrics (incl. citations, field & relative citation ratio, and Altmetric)
Inline and sticky notes, highlighting and drawing tools
Text to speech tool

Share & Collaborate

Up to 5 private shared collections (PDFs/references)
Collaborate with up to 25 Papers user per collection
Share references, PDFs, notes, tags and PDF annotations
Article discussion group

Cite Faster

Insert references from personal / shared libraries or use built-in search engine.
8000+ citation styles supported. Customize & import your own
Quick-copy of citations in bibtex, ris
Export reference list for use in third party citation tools like EndNote and Overleaf
Supports Word 2016+

Sync Across Devices

Unlimited cloud storage for your personal library
Sync your entire library including notes, lists, annotations, and highlights across all of your devices
Supports Desktop (Mac/PC), mobile (iOS/Android) and Web.

What’s new in version 4.37.2374

Improved scrolling performance in large libraries
Updated the platform framework for improved performance and security
Various bug fixes and performance optimizations

View older ReadCube Papers versions

What users say about ReadCube Papers

By sauros on Feb 16 2023 for v.4.23.4

Value: 1.0

As with most reviews, I am also a long-term user of Papers (since version 2) who is disappointed by the changes in the current version. All functions are clunky, and most of the great features from Papers v2 and v3 were abandoned. The redCube help is useless, and their support do NOT listen to the user community. I continued to use Papers v3 until I could, but after a macOS update, it stopped working due to lack of support and forced me to use redCube. The reasons for my frustration include, but are not limited to: - Even if I chose my entire library to be "available offline", anytime I ask to open a file, it retrieves it from the cloud (why not use the local copy?....). This means that if I make notes or highlights in my PDFs (using mac's Preview), these will be gone the next time -- unless I make the notes inside redCube, but their annotation system is very limited. This is my most hated backward-feature -- I've lost most of my notes and highlights with this..... - Searching is much worse, and on has to use search tricks to find what one's looking for. Also, being unable to select the sources of our searches is a major step backwards - Matching is horrible, and meta-data often has to be entered manually - Annual Subscription rather than 1-off payment -- what a cheap corporate move - When you apply a nested label, the nesting labels "above" it are not added -- it should inherent the "upper categories", as Papers 2 and 3 did

Other user ratings:

Ease of use | 1.0

Features | 1.0

Reliability | 1.0

Customer support | 1.0

2.5

(159 Reviews of ReadCube Papers)

Comments
User Ratings

sk4036

Jul 1 2023

4.36.2283

0.0

Version: 4.36.2283

I created an account to write a review on this app. Yes, really. This app is unbelievably horrible. I have never known any paid service (or even free) that is this bad. It cannot recognize pretty much anything that is not in the most standard journal format, e.g., book section, proceedings, conference paper, you name it. It doesn't even recognize Google scholar references properly. Something is seriously wrong with this product. I wouldn't consider this product if it was free. Can't believe this charges $60 per year and is still in business. I kept using it because I already paid for a yearly subscription but it has constantly amazed me how bad a paid reference program can be.

nkostin1

Oct 5 2022

4.23.4

1.0

Version: 4.23.4

The once GREAT and BEST Papers 3 app is ruined. I cannot believe people could do it, and others let them do it and even paid for it...

tehidy

Mar 18 2022

I switched from the original Papers, which I had used from Papers 1, with some trepidation. I have now used ReadCube Papers for almost a year, and have been very happy with it. Other reviewers have complained about the matching being clunky, but I use the document doi which works well. The citation manager works well for manuscripts, and my large >7k library is fine. The help desk is helpful and prompt.

DanH1826

Dec 2 2021

Like pretty much every other reviewer I've read, I also despair at the change from Papers 3 to Readcube Papers. I used to like Papers 3 - it did what I needed it to do, and I built up a database with it. I tried out Readcube Papers but even after testing for 15 minutes, many drawbacks were evident. It just doesn't have a lot of the functionality of Papers 3. Even something as simple as setting document type - Papers 3 had a lot more options to chose from, which are missing in the new version. Papers 3 allow browsing via thumbnail mode, the new app does not. The list goes on! Oh and the move to a horrible subscription model! They have massacred a good app which is now no longer supported and constantly crashes with the latest OSX. Shame on them.

cagosta

Nov 5 2021

I have been struggling with the upgrade for a year now. After many emails with ReadCube I have essentially given up. The upgrade ruined what was a great reference manager. I am beyond figuring out how to fix it. What else is out there to take its place?

kom

Jul 26 2023

2.0

john-1234

Jun 30 2023

3.0

sauros

Feb 16 2023