I was wondering, with all the different Lemmy clients and frontends, what/which out of these do people actually use? To answer this, I made a poll if anyone wants to fill it out, and I tried to put every client I could find.
Yeah, Eternity (the Infinity fork for Lemmy) is comparably new.
I've really been enjoying it.
I was using Boost on reddit, but their Lemmy version isn't available yet. Read about Eternity. Thus far I have no complaints. It works.
I'm loving it. Just to confirm: The last update was three weeks ago, right? I hope the dev continuous on working this.
Closing in on 10 years of Sync (Reddit/Lemmy). I'm too used to it to switch things around. The only time I'm using the mobile website is when I need to use spoilers.
On desktop, I switch between default, Photon and Alexandrite.
Memmy has been my favorite, although I wish it would go back to having updates. I understand they're taking a break though and I just need to be patient
Same here. I’ve moved to Avelon which I strongly recommend you trying out. It’s legit.
Once memmy starts getting updates again I may switch back but gotta say, Avelon may have me hooked.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
Oh look, 6 times this time. I shall leave the duplicated replies here. Coincidental proof. Only happens sometimes. Talk about the devil.
Memmy says imma make you a spammy bot. I got rate limited after that reply. The first time this happened I got downvotes for all my spammy replies, but that was before I realised this problem. Memmy trained me to clean up my mess. Thank you Memmy, no more messy.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
I'm using Memmy too, although the app sometimes repeat post reply 5 times and I had to delete the other 4. I still use Memmy anyway and don't mind waiting till this gets fixed.
My only problem with lemmy is the lack of a client. Right now, for me, memmy and voyager are the least worst, but they’re pretty bad.
I’m not even asking for an Apollo out of the gate. I’d settle for an Alien Blue. And I have no problem paying for it, either. I was an Apollo ne plus ultra user, or whatever it was called.
From an information architecture perspective, it really seems like reddit and lemmy might be close enough that a middle layer could be written that would make it easier to port user-facing apps from one api to the other. There’s obviously be some differences, but if feasible it might accelerate development of multiple client options at once.
For the record, I’ve tried memmy, voyager, mlem, lemmios, liftoff, and I am presently going to try bean. That’s approximately the order of how useable I’ve found them, but they each have their own annoyances. I don’t own an android device, but I hope the options are better over there.
In any case, I became a heavy reddit user only after Alien Blue came out. I became a very heavy user after Apollo came out. I left reddit the day external clients became unavailable.
I think lemmy has enormous potential, but the UX needs to be made easier if we’re to really make a dent in reddit usership and get the level of posts, comments, and active communities they have there.
I also suspect that the backend is going to need a better approach for handling the negative consequences of a large influx of users. I’m not talking about load - I’m talking about community management. Back in the day (by which I mean the early 90s) there was an email blacklist. Admins of important nodes in the email distribution network had a shared list of domains that had unsecured servers, and would update it based on where they saw the (then relatively recent phenomenon of) spam coming from.
I’m really interested in how the information flow network of the fediverse evolves, if it continues to grow. Are we going to find a network with community structure, with clumps of mutually federated instances that have few if any connections between them? If so, clients will have to have solid account creation and management, and the admin tools will need to be sophisticated.
Avelon is amazing. Feels like Apollo mostly. My only complaints are piddly stuff.
Thanks! Your recommendation means that I’m trying it out today.
I wish they’d support iOS 15 :(
I can't speak for iOS apps so comparing would be hard but, I'm quite satisfied with the current state (and estimated future) of the android clients. So far, I found Thunder and Eternity (fork from Infinity for Reddit) to be the most suitable for me.
I'm excited to see the progress in a year's time and which apps will be the most popular/developed by then
Yes, try Avelon OP! It’s really good. The UI is so smooth. Scrolling. And it has the ability to hide bars on scroll. It seems I’m the only one who cares about this feature haha but to me it makes content look much better without the navigation bars constantly being on display.
Yeah I really liked Memmy. The lack of updates wouldn’t bother me except there are a couple annoying bugs still. Also when I click on a community it opens in my browser. I’ve tested a bunch to find one that has everything I want. I’ve also settled on Avelon. The only thing it doesn’t have is multiple icon options and that’s not an important factor at all.
Sync gang
Honestly, its made Lemmy so much more usable for me. Shout out to LJ
I think only Summit is as good as Sync is in smoothness, I voted for Sync, Voyager and Summit as those are the ones I use more, Voyager is nice, but it is not very smooth compared with the other two (using the native app).
Almost all of Syncs business model is ads. The free version has ads and almost everyone who pays for it is doing so to remove ads. Which is just rewarding the implementation of ads. I also disagree with the concept of profiting from free user content with ads like Reddit does. Which was Reddits primary goal of preventing third party apps. They wanted the ad revenue themselves instead of third parties getting the ad revenue.
The only way this can be acceptable is to not have a free ad version and only have a paid version. That way you are paying for software and not paying to remove ads or profiting from free user content.
I paid to remove ads from Reddit Sync in 2014. 9 years went by where I continued to use the app every single day, as ljdawson continued regular improvements and updates (aside from the incident). By the time Reddit Sync went away, I felt I had vastly underpaid for what I got, and purchased lifetime Ultra as a way of supporting ljdawson.
I totally get what you're saying. But at the same time, Sync is so much more than just the content that it displays. The ads are not there to profit on free content, they're there to support the user experience that sync provides. They're also far, far less obtrusive than typical ads
The nice thing is, there's choices! Feel free to use other clients and find what works best
Same here. I used the paid version sync for reddit for years and got my money's worth out of it. When the incident happened I switched to infinity and, while annoyed, I definitely felt I got my worth out of it. When ljdawson released sync for lemmy and added the ad-free upgrade I happily purchased it and I have been very satisfied with the app and all the improvements he is continually making. This is all coming from a hardcore open source 20+ years of Linux on the desktop guy.
(aside from the incident)
???
None of that means that a person should get permabanned for disliking it.
This conversation is about how a user got permabanned for politely describing their dislike for the Sync app. You responded by saying that you like Sync. That's not a reason to permaban someone else.
I'm a sync user and pretty tired of these pointless statements. Don't want it, don't use it! I pay for ultra to support the dev and that's my choice. Again, if you don't want it, don't use it. But can you please stop this sync bashing? It's not as if the torrent of anti-sync memes forgot to cover what you are saying.
Exactly, vote with your time and/or money. If you don’t like something, don’t use it. They’ll be people that are fine with it and will use it.
Why do you care if someone doesn't like your client of choice? They have some value that is different than yours, they have every right to express why they think people using sync is harmful. You are free to disagree but don't complain because they express an opinion you don't like.
You are free to disagree but don't complain because they express an opinion you don't like.
This is such a bad take. Imagine being mad that the user has a choice for a low/no cost ad supported version and a paid version. There are other benefits too, like being able to trial the software for as long as you want before buying in.
I'm using the free version of Sync for Lemmy now, I don't see any ads. Maybe because my phone has the adguard server as my DNS server and it's just blocking them all?
How atrocious are they when not using adguard?
Yeah it's from adguard DNS.
Ads just show up semi frequently. Definitely visible but not obtrusive. Just keep scrolling.
https://i.imgur.com/8w8mUkE.png
You should still see the frequency with adguard. It's just a blank area where normally there'd be an ad.
Hmm, glad mine looks like this

Wait, how is earning revenue from having ads in your app "profiting off free user content," but charging someone directly to use the app isn't? They both do the same thing for the developer (generate revenue), the only difference is who is paying.
FYI Izzy got permabanned for stating this opinion. That's really insane.
It's not even mean. And this isn't some niche sub specifically about Sync. It's the most generic sub imaginable. Are they paid by Sync?
It's absolutely absurd to even warn somebody that Thou Shalt Not Dislike Sync. Fuck those mods. And based on this alone, Fuck Sync.
Yeah, developers shouldn't make money unless granted a benevolent donation.
There are plenty of other developers, new ones that were happy to work on integrations and apps for the fediverse. While sync is great, it's like a giant Walmart moving into the area, displacing other viable alternatives.
You can pay one time to remove the ads, or sign up for Sync's Ultra subscription which provides additional features like OCR in images and text translation.
Once you do so, the ad library is not invoked at all.
Then pay for the ad free version, and you're letting them make money without ads.
If you just want to steal people's labor, then nah.
If people line up around the block for it, maybe it does actually add value? You can hate ads, I do too. But if people willingly look at ads to visit a website (Lemmy) that does not have any in its original version, then for those people the app obviously adds enough value to make it worth it, don't you think?
The app is really nice.
Or have a free version to lurk only. Want to participate? Buy the full version.
Every time I see comments like this I imagine that Reese meme from Malcom in The Middle saying "Wah Wah, too bad!" Or whatever the English translation of that is.
I was considering trying sync. thanks for the info. never gonna touch it now. there are too many good free browsers now to even bother. I'm still trying narrow down between the last three out of five different iOS ones I downloaded. they are all so good and Apollo like
I get like, 1 ad per 5 pages or so. That commenter is kinda goofy.
I've not found anything I like more than Voyager. It has native apps for android and iOS, but I prefer the progressive web app version.
I recently switched from Voyager to Avelon. Voyager is great and I’m keeping it because it’s always been so reliable, but I just really like Avelon. It has a nice explore tab for finding new communities, and it’s SwiftUI, so it has that clean native iOS look to it. They’re very similar otherwise.
Thank you for this. One big feature that was missing as autoplay and embed vids. And now I have it again.
For me, it runs faster and smoother/more consistantly than the native Android app. I've not actually used the iOS one. Also, the updates come in faster.
LemmyUI is great. I've using it until recently I settled on using Eternity.
I've noticed that all the Sync users are polite and never bash any other Lemmy client. Maybe because they know that we have a choice and they do too. I've got money to spare I will spend it on arguably the best app for Lemmy . You guys can use your FOSS . I never complained . Why are you??? Enjoy your clients. There are many. We have got an array of choices. That's awesome. Lemmy wins.
-Happily posted via Sync Ultra
Liftoff is fantastic. I think updates are slow, but it's in a good place.
Same here.
Still on liftoff. Works good enough for now though it's true ghat updates are scarce right now.
I tried a bunch of Lemmy clients and they all have some issues; some annoying, some catastrophic. The interesting thing is that the pros and cons complement each other, which has lead me to use Bean as my primary client and lifoff as the secondary one.
Bean is good for browsing, reading, commenting etc. When you get a reply in a long thread 4 layers deep, it’s the time for Liftoff to shine.
I liked Thunder well enough to join the dev team. We're preparing for another update, available on both android and iOS.
It's already out on both stores, the update just wont hit for another day or two.
Same
I use Connect. I like it. Seems to do what I need and I've used the customize settings to set font colors, etc.
I'll definitely be checking out Boost when the dev gets it set up. He's a one man show and tries hard to get things running 100% before releasing updates, so, I'm guessing a new app might take longer.
Same! I'm wondering though at this point how much longer? I understand it's a big job but I've gotten really settled in with Connect at this point.
Yeah, i hear ya. Rueben really tries for "perfect" before he did updates on Boost Reddit. So, I imagine he's trying to make the best 3rd party app that will work without a hitch and give lots of custom options.
That's a pretty nice endorsement for sync though, BTW can you embed polls into your app (assuming there's an API for straw poll)?
I'm surprised more of you aren't using my mom, she gets around
She'll pay for your Uber, it's a good deal!
Sync for Lemmy Ultra on mobile. Switching between photon and alexandrite on desktop.
Good poll. I've been using liftoff. Tried jerboa, just didn't feel right. Liftoff has been solid experience for me.
I'm using Liftoff as well right now I wanted to take a look at Eternity a while ago but it just never came to that for some reason. Probably cause my main is kbin idk. Might as well just try it now that I'm reminded by the poll, I guess.
Edit: Well, Eternity doesn't seem to handle logging in from lemmy.blahaj.zone yet. Or something else's wrong with my credentials idk.
Liftoff doesn't work with beehaw right now but seems to work with other lemmy instances.
Yeah I'll probably check out the other open source lemmy apps. Sync doing the ads is a no go for me. I do really like lemmy so not sure really what I'm looking for.
I tried like 10 different clients and ended up sticking with Liftoff. I just want it to implement spoilers, though.
Liftoff, though I kinda like the layout of Jerboa more, but it's scroll is too laggy.
You don't necessarily need it as a builtin option in Lemmy, actually. You'd just need someone to hand-roll it. Before GitHub had forums with surveys, there used to be a third party provider that offered inofficial surveys that could be added to comments as embedded SVG images. The only drawback was that you could vote even as a non-registered user (but that's true of Strawpoll as well). I sadly both forgot the name and think the company/people behind that tool may have stopped providing it.
Am I weird for still just using Firefox? I don't see the need for a standalone client.
Well you still use a UI; do you use the default web UI or something like photon?
The only reason I use a client is on mobile just because it integrates better, and I still flipflop between a photon PWA and Sync/Liftoff
Default UI, just on dark. Might look into photon though.
I have four installed on Android: Sync, Jerboa, Connect and Voyager. Five if you count Firefox which is the only one that does all the admin tasks I need. I switch between them because as admin I find myself testing the user experience frequently.
I have Memmy on iOS, but really only use iOS for testing purposes. I don't browse with it.
I default to Sync for most browsing and commenting because the Dev is very active and it's the only client I know of with any mod tools at all. It is the most polished of the clients at the moment.
Google Playstore
I was on Memmy but it seems to be abandoned so I switched to Avelon. It’s great!
Eternity is one my favorite client
Sync on my phone and Photon on desktop.
theres so many lemmy clients i guess thats one of the benefits of lemmy being licensed under agpl and has a free api
Would love to see an, at least, 3-way struggle for dominance. Keeps them scrappy and competing for our attention :D
I'm using a mix of Sync and Eternity. I was using Infinity for Reddit before the migration.
Because Sync came first, it's still my default way to navigate Lemmy but Eternity is slowly growing on me. I prefer to alternate between a few apps to stay up to date on the alternatives, and to ensure I don't become dependant on a single app/interface.
I've also tested a few times Photon, great web UI which can be installed as a PWA.
Jerboa. Came up when I was searching on F-Droid
For me when I was looking for an Android client via https://join-lemmy.org/apps .
To be honest I was extremely skeptical about Sync because I didn't use it for Reddit and I thought that the default web-ui is pretty neat even on my mobile phone. But curiosity got me and I installed it, even though it's not FLOSS and it has ads in it which are two no-goes for me. Still I'm using it on the phone predominately, but I hate myself for it.
been using wefwef since the start and didn’t hear about voyager until this poll, love it :) is it made by the same person that did wefwef?
oh sick! thanks
Love Voyager's UI.
Just an interesting note, I see a lot of talk about Avalon in the comments being amazing but not as many votes as other clients. It seems pretty new, but already has a loyal userbase. Wish it was on Android so I could check it out!
Which one though ? There's literally 4 forks of infinity called Eternity coming up on obtainium
I use Connect. Ive not had any issues.
Im not a power user either though, so maybe theres some features not here, you may want. No idea
But theres custom themes. You can pick your own colors for the different elements.
I use Connect too and I consider myself as bit of a power user(have 6 clients installed my phone). Connect has all the features or even more than any other client. The horizontal swipe to navigate the posts is my favourite and probably only client that has this feature.
I’m glad to see Voyager so high. I was hooked on Memmy for a while, even though I had been trying wefwef and a few other interfaces occasionally. But now the app version of Voyager is just about perfect for me.
So whats the consensus for ios apps right now? I know mlem was one of the first when the reddit crisis begun, I personally use memmy at the moment but few new alternatives came out with different levels of maintenance. What is the community opinion on different alternatives for ios?
Glad to see eternity is up there
Have tried out quite a few of the apps (was stuck the longest with Voyager, it's awesome) - but I tend to come back to Jerboa ever so often - may be because it is the oldest Android client for Lemmy, so probably the most tried and tested.
I kinda like the vintage look of Jerboa (and the cool icon) - so as soon as Jerboa gets its search feature enhanced (right now it just searches for communities, not posts or comments - but I hear that work is in progress) - Jerboa will become the best Lemmy app out there, at least for me.
Jerboa is on Fdroid, but it's not good I'm afraid. The keyboard bug is maddening.
Arctic is pretty good
I don’t think so unfortunately. I find myself trying to collapse sometimes and it’s just not there. Hope they add it soon.
They added it in the latest update along with an option for the iPad layout!
Pretty happy with voyager, it's a pretty solid choice despite being styled entirely for iOS. I'll probably look into a more Android designed / focused app going forward.
same here, using Voyager until Eternity gets more developed
Never even saw that one, looks great now!
I mostly use Jerboa, and then a bit of Liftoff, I have installed Sync, Connect and Infinity just to have plenty options at hand.
I just tried Sync again and can see why people like it, with that polished fancy look.
But prefer Jerboas larger font and don't mind having vote/reply buttons at every comment.
And settings > comments > always show comment actions for the other issue mentioned.
Good to know!
Changed font size, and I found out you can also disable animations, much better.
Curious what sync users find about it worth paying for above say Jerboa or whatever? Would appreciate comments.
I used sync on Reddit and was kinda sad to see the dev didn't grandfather people into Sync for Lemmy - especially given the high price of sync and the reuse of work that I'd already paid for. Obviously the guy should get paid, but I think £18 is excessive, especially for existing users.
I got close to a decade off a $5 purchase. (Or however much it was) I can't think of a single other thing I've used daily for that long that cost so little. $20 now is no biggie to pay for a major update to switch to lemmy.
Actually I like the very fact that it is paid. Supporting the developer, and some sort of accountability.
Also, after trying connect, liftoff, jerboa (all perfectly good apps), etc I find that sync is most smooth and customizable.
Yeah I have no problem with it being a paid app - just disappointed that it's so expensive and that existing users of sync didn't get any kind of offer. No hate...I'm just expressing my feelings.
I didn't realise how much I missed image peek (long press a post to popup the thumbnail image) until I switched back from jerboa to sync when it first came out. Especially since I mostly seem to be reading webcomics.
I don't comment much, but sync's draft feature feels very solid.
Otherwise I did feel jerboa was good and would have gotten used to it.
Peek means that as long as you're touching the thumbnail, you see the zoomed in image (after a short delay). When you release, it snaps back to the front page. Without peek you would touch, view the image, and then gesture 'back' to go back to the main page.
This works on articles and gifs too, not just images. So if the thumbnail is informative you can save a lot of time and steps and get a quick gist of what the article is talking about
Tesseract is essentially a fork of Photon with native video playing and a few more features, you can find a public instance for photon here and can sign into your normal account, a tesseract instance is here
Is there some kind of comparison between these clients? Ideally, I'd want a web client with more customizability than the default one - in particupar, I'd like to be able to set the default view to show subscribed communities instead of the local ones. As I'm running my own instance, I don't have much in terms of local content
What you want is Photon
Here is the link for the web version hosted: https://phtn.app
Here is the link to self host: https://github.com/Xyphyn/photon
That looks pretty good. May have to try this one.
I stuck with thunder from the start it is great
Was first using Memmy but it felt unfinished and abandoned. Then I switched to Bean. It’s much better but still needs a lot of work. I was not aware there are so many Lemmy clients already. I’m trying Voyager now and it seems very good. As a former Apollo user I feel right at home.
Lemmy clients.
(I don't know either)
Tesseract is essentially a fork of Photon with native video playing and a few more features, you can find a public instance for photon here and can sign into your normal account, a tesseract instance is here
Need Arctic to be added to the list. I personally use Thunder because of its unique UI, unlike most other apps that just look like different variations of Apollo. Special mention to Arctic and Avelon because they can embed and play gifs/videos instead of opening an in-app browser. Arctic can also scrub gifs which is cool. Artemis has a unique UI too but I’m not on kbin so I’ll have to wait for lemmy support to fully use it.
Is anything similar Apollo? I'm on Android, but if there was one app that made me miss the few months I spent with a borrowed iPhone... It's Apollo.
Many of them are visually Apollo clones
I’m on iOS using the Voyager app. It’s nearly identical to Apollo, missing just a few features
You can try the web app here: https://vger.app/posts/lemmy.world/all
I used to like LiftOff but it started to get buggy after a while, then i switched to Eternity since i used Infinity when i was in Reddit but i didn't like it so i ended up using Voyager which is preety good so far.
I'm trying Voyager but how do you switch to only subscribed communities?
I'll go for boost now. I keep back and forth between boost, sync and eternity but the end I feel home with boost.
I hope jerboa (OG client) will be better.
I'm using the standard UI on web and Jerboa on mobile, but I'm going to try alternate web UIs like Photon and Alexandrite and find a good one that also works as a PWA so I can use the same client both on my computer and on my phone. I'd much prefer to use the same client across computer, tablet and phone.
The one thing I don't like about Thunder is the lack of a swipe back to previous screen, but that's pretty minor and otherwise it's quite slick. Not sure enough about it to settle down yet, though, there are so many other apps and most are also great
Yeah, Thunder is weird about their swipe to go back gesture. It works if you're doing it over the post itself or if you're scrolling through the comments (so while the comments are moving, swipe to go back).
Could you do us a favor and send all info about this to info@lemmy.world? I would like to have a look at what's going on. This is ridiculous if true.
Thanks!
Which have push notifications for iOS paid or free?
Is /kbin an app?
Hah, good point
Kbin is a different server software entirely that can communicate with Lemmy, but isn't Lemmy
Artemis is an app which talks to Lemmy to display the posts
This is a really bad explanation, but it's kinda like comparing Outlook and Gmail vs Email and IRC or SMS
Lemmy-UI and Mlmym with tampermonkey script lemmy-keyboard-navigation
Firefox.
Mr. "I only access Lemmy via cURL & jq" over 'ere.
I heard a rumor you can look at the usernames who dislike a post or comment on a specific app. This is what I want: help taking the trash out.
How dare you. Now I'm going to remember your username. I will hunt down your IRL identity, and ... send you sugar free gummy bears in the mail.
Seriously, though, haven't you looked at a comment with up or downvotes and thought to yourself, "If I block every idiot that did that, my timeline would be a little less stupid"?
Your timeline would almost certainly be a little less stupid if you did that with gusto, but people who've disagreed with you can also post things beneficial to you or post insights you hadn't thought of or post advice you'd find useful. I was a heavy RES tagger on reddit and I'd often come across well-meaning or useful posts and comments from people who'd been marked for saying jawdroppingly stupid shit about some other subject.
Yes, it is a power that should be used responsibly. Just as one shouldn't block every stupid commenter, only the egregious ones, the likes and dislikes should be saved pretty much for the bigots outing themselves.
Way too many Lemmy users don't care about running Free and Open Source Software.
As a Sync user myself, why should I switch? I've been using Sync for years on Reddit, I love the interface, and I don't mind if the dev makes a bit of money from it with the occasional and minimally intrusive ads or paid ad removal.
@lemmy.ml
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I'm a bit sad that my favorite (Infinity/Eternity) isn't that high up. Loved it since my Reddit days. Tried different clients: Lemmy, thunder, liftoff, sync,... still like this the most!
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