Reader and Highlights are different purchases
Readwise’s pricing page lists Full Readwise at $9.99 per month billed yearly, Reader-only at $7.99 per month billed yearly, and Highlights-only at $7.99 per month billed yearly. Reader-only excludes Highlights; Highlights-only excludes Reader. Check that distinction before comparing a feature or subscription total (official pricing).
KnowMan Free costs $0. Pro costs $12.99 a month or $99 a year. Compare equivalent billing periods and the features you need. A lower entry price or a free plan does not establish that every paid configuration is cheaper.
AI is a shared comparison point
Reader’s Ghostreader supports automatic summaries and automatic tagging, enabled in preferences. Global Ghostreader answers across the library with citations on web and desktop; mobile supports individual-document chat. Those capabilities deserve a direct test against the questions you want answered (Ghostreader FAQ, Global Ghostreader).
KnowMan answers from saved reading with citations. Free includes five Ask questions daily, while Pro removes that daily limit and includes AI article summaries. Use a question that requires evidence from your own sources, then inspect the passages behind the answer.
Test the search surface you will actually use
Reader’s full-text search covers Library documents, including content, titles and authors. Feed documents are not indexed until moved into Library. Readwise’s MCP separately combines full-text and semantic search; that does not establish identical behavior in the ordinary Reader search box (search documentation, MCP documentation).
KnowMan includes full-text search on Free, covering saved material, highlights and notes. Pro adds search by meaning; Free falls back to keywords. Try both an exact phrase and a question whose wording differs from the original source.
Make room for decisions and their reasons
KnowMan Memories keep what you decided and why, beside the reading behind it. That gives you a concrete workflow to evaluate: gather references, ask a question, check its sources and keep the resulting decision. Later, return to the reasoning rather than reconstructing it.
Connected Claude, Codex, Cursor and your own MCP agents can read the same knowledge base. KnowMan exposes six tools: kb_search, kb_get_item, kb_ask, kb_memories, kb_recent and kb_save. Agents can read Memories and save new links, but cannot write Memories.
Check reading habits and export needs separately
Reader lists RSS and newsletter support. Its export documentation covers Library CSV, feeds OPML, full-content ZIP, annotations in Markdown or plain text, and Send to Kindle. If one of those steps is central to your reading routine, include it in your evaluation (pricing features, export documentation).
KnowMan Pro includes feeds, newsletters, ingestion rules and export to Obsidian, Logseq and EPUB. Choose the destination you actually use, then check whether a sample export supports your next step. Similar feature labels do not establish identical output or synchronization behavior.
Use the trial to answer a practical question
Readwise advertises a 30-day trial. Its documentation describes an Obsidian workflow through Readwise Highlights, so verify the qualifying subscription rather than assuming Reader-only includes it. Plan boundaries matter as much as the presence of an integration (pricing, export documentation).
KnowMan starts every new account with 14 days of Pro and no credit card. Afterward, you can stay on Free and keep your saves. KnowMan lists Readwise as an import source, but this page does not promise a particular CSV or API workflow, annotation coverage or a complete transfer. Keep originals and verify a representative sample.
Sources and review date
Last checked 2026-11-05. Official sources: pricing, Ghostreader, Global Ghostreader, search, MCP, exports.