HNEveryDay is a high-performance, privacy-first, AI-enhanced Hacker News client for iOS, built specifically for Geekers who live in the terminal and dream in code.
It combines the raw information density favored by hackers with the fluid, tactile experience of a modern native iOS app.
- 120fps Scrolling: Built with optimized SwiftUI lists to handle thousands of items without dropping a frame.
- Parallel Fetching: Custom networking layer fetches story metadata and comments in concurrent batches for instant loading.
- Recursive Threading: Visualizes the deep nesting of HN comments with clear, color-coded indentation.
- Collapsible Threads: Tap any comment to fold its entire subtree. Cleaning up the noise to find the signal has never been easier.
- Rich Text Rendering: Full support for HN's HTML comments (italics, code blocks, links) rendered natively.
Get the "Hacker Perspective" in seconds.
- Magic Summary: Tap the ✨ button to generate a concise summary of the Article + Top Discussion. We don't just summarize the link; we summarize what hackers are saying about it.
- BYO Key (Bring Your Own Key): No subscriptions. Use your own API Key.
- Multi-Provider Support: Built-in presets for the best Global and Chinese models:
- 🇨🇳 DeepSeek (Recommended for coding/tech context)
- 🇨🇳 Qwen (Tongyi Qianwen)
- 🇨🇳 ChatGLM (Zhipu)
- 🇨🇳 Doubao (ByteDance)
- 🇺🇸 Gemini (via OpenAI Compatibility)
- 🇺🇸 OpenAI (GPT-4o/mini)
- 🏠 Localhost (Ollama/LM Studio support)
- Hybrid Detail View: Swipe between the Web Article and the Comment Thread seamlessly.
- Haptic Feedback: Tactile confirmation for collapsing threads and AI completion.
- Pure Dark Mode: Designed for OLED displays.
- Distraction Free: Removes ads, popups, and clutter. Just the text.
- Geeker Styled: Dark mode verified; Code blocks rendered with monospaced fonts and horizontal scrolling.
- Offline Ready: Automatically caches article content for subway reading.
- Markdown Export: Share -> "Square & Arrow" -> Generates a formatted research note.
- Deep Context: Export includes Metadata, AI Summary, and Key Comments. Perfect for Obsidian/Notion.
- Read History: Automatically tracks what you've read (Gray links).
- Chinese Support: Full UI localization for Simplified Chinese (简体中文).
- Contextual AI: The AI automatically detects your language and summarizes English articles in Chinese if your system language is set to Chinese.
- Smart Retries: AI Service includes exponential backoff retry logic (3x) to handle unstable networks.
- Fail Gracefully: Improved error UI guides you to fix API keys or network issues.
- One-Stop Config: AI Provider, Language Preference, and Cache Retention all in one place.
- Onboarding: First-launch welcome screen highlighting key features.
- Bookmarks: Swipe left to save stories for later. Filter by "Saved" in the menu.
- Keychain Security: API keys are now stored in iOS Keychain (not UserDefaults).
- Skeleton Loading: Shimmer animation while the feed loads for a premium feel.
- Language: Swift 5 language mode
- UI Framework: SwiftUI (current app deployment target: iOS 18.6)
- Persistence: SwiftData with optimized "Read-Through" caching.
- Concurrency: Swift
async/await,Actorsfor thread-safe data fetching. - State Management: MVVM with
ObservableObjectand SwiftUI view state. - Networking: Custom
URLSessionwrapper interacting with Hacker News Firebase API.
- Tap the Gear Icon (⚙️) on the main feed.
- Select your Provider Preset (e.g., DeepSeek).
- The App automatically fills the correct Base URL and Model Name.
- Paste your API Key.
- (Optional) You can manually edit the Model Name to use specific versions (e.g.,
deepseek-coder). - Tap Done. Keys are stored securely on-device using iOS Keychain.
- Clone the repository:
git clone https://github.com/corlin/HNEveryDay.git
- Open
HNEveryDay.xcodeprojin a recent Xcode that supports the configured iOS deployment target. This repo is currently verified with Xcode 26.5. - Build and Run on your iPhone or Simulator.
Run the unit test target with an available iOS Simulator:
xcodebuild test -project HNEveryDay.xcodeproj -scheme HNEveryDay -destination 'platform=iOS Simulator,name=iPhone 17 Pro' -derivedDataPath build/DerivedData CODE_SIGNING_ALLOWED=NOCurrent coverage focuses on Markdown export, HTML cleanup, AI summary prompt construction, and comment tree flattening.
PRs are welcome! If you want to add a new AI provider preset or improve the comment rendering engine, feel free to fork.
MIT License. Hacking is for everyone.