Enable, add to and read Google Chrome Reading List on Android
I use the reading list on Google Chrome more and more often. When I do not, I find myself keeping too many tabs open in order to “read them later”. However, the feature seems to be missing on mobile, making it not that useful to me. But with 5 minutes of work, we can enable it on our Android phones.
Enable Reading List on Android
To add items to the reading list on your android mobile, first we need to enable it. After enabling, we can add to it from the three dots menu.
Open Chrome Flags
First step is to open a new browser tab, and type chrome://flags as the address
Find Reading List flag
In the search bar, type “Reading”. This will show the “Reading List” flag. It should be set to “Default”, meaning “turned off” (as of 11.01.23).
Turn flag on to “Enabled (with app menu item)”
Now tap the box which says “Default” and select “Enabled (with app menu item)”. This will turn on the reading list and add a handy menu item to add to it.
Add to Reading List from the “three dots” menu
To add to the list, open a page you want to add to your reading list. Then open the “three dots” menu. You will now see the option to add to the Reading List.
Read from the Reading List
Lets open a page from the list on our Android phone. First open the three dots menu, and select “Bookmarks”
The reading list is now shown in the “Bookmarks” list. Open it. Then choose something to read.
Here is shown another of my posts added to the reading list:
Remove from Reading List
To remove something, do one of these:
- Use the same menu item in the three dots menu. It will say “Remove from reading list” if the page you are on has already been added
- Remove it via the reading list in the bookmarks menu,
A warning about Chrome Flags
There are many other options in the Chrome Flags menu. I would caution you to just go turning things on and off. As you see below, some of them can be dangerous. Unless you are going for a specific feature like this, I would just as well avoid it.
