NetNewsWire

Feedbin ($5/month) and Inoreader (Pro $9.99/month) are cloud RSS services with web UIs, rules engines and team-sharing features. NetNewsWire is a local-first reader app — it can sync with Feedbin or iCloud as a backend, but it stores everything locally and works fully offline. It is free and open-source (MIT license, github.com/Ranchero-Software/NetNewsWire). Use NetNewsWire as a free client on top of an existing Feedbin or iCloud account; pay for Feedbin/Inoreader directly if you want web-based access on machines where NetNewsWire is not installed.

Yes — NetNewsWire is 100% free and open-source under the MIT license. There is no premium tier, no in-app purchase and no subscription. The app is maintained by Brent Simmons and a community of contributors. If you sync via iCloud or local CloudKit, the backend is also free (covered by your Apple ID storage). If you sync via Feedbin, you pay Feedbin $5/month for the backend — but NetNewsWire itself never charges you. Donations to the project are voluntary.

Reeder 5 ($9.99 one-time) is the most polished RSS client on Apple platforms with stronger gesture UX, themes and read-later integrations. NetNewsWire is free, open-source and has 70% of Reeder's polish for $0. Both support the same sync providers (Feedbin, iCloud, FreshRSS, BazQux, Feedly). Reeder wins on UI craft and customization; NetNewsWire wins on price, openness and the comfort of knowing the project survives indie founder turnover (Reeder is one developer; NetNewsWire is a community).

NetNewsWire as a native macOS/iOS app is fully offline-capable. The PWA listing on pwa.directory represents the web-installable wrapper / progressive RSS reader experience the project ships for browsers, where article bodies are cached after first fetch. Once articles have been downloaded by a refresh cycle, you can read, mark-as-read and star them offline; the changes sync when you reconnect. Full-text search and starred items work entirely on local data.

NetNewsWire is one of the most-recommended RSS readers in the Hacker News, Daring Fireball and Six Colors communities, and is the daily reader of many tech journalists (John Gruber, Federico Viticci, Jason Snell publicly use it). It is also widely used by researchers and academics who follow blog feeds and arXiv RSS. Its longevity (2002-present) and open-source status make it the safest long-term choice — a paid service can disappear (Google Reader, 2013); a MIT-licensed indie app stays available even if the maintainer steps away.