Beta
Join the beta
Erling is handed out through TestFlight, Apple's service for beta testing. It takes a few minutes. Reading aloud works right away; the explanations and the questions need an invite, which you ask for in the app.
Here's how
- Check that you have the right system. Erling needs macOS 26, iOS 26 or iPadOS 26, or newer. Older versions unfortunately don't work.
- Install TestFlight. Get the TestFlight app from the App Store on the Mac, iPhone or iPad you want to read on.
- Join the beta. Open the link below on the device, tap Accept and then Install. After that, new versions arrive automatically through TestFlight.
- Ask for an invite in the app. Reading aloud works right away. The right reading order, the term explanations, the figures and the questions afterwards go through a service that costs me money, so they need an invite. On the Mac: the Erling menu → Request an Invite…. On iPhone and iPad: the gear at the top left → under Analysis service, Request an Invite…. Write your name and send.
- Wait for the invite to be activated. If I recognize the name I activate it, usually the same day. The app keeps reading as usual meanwhile, and the explanations appear automatically once the invite is activated. The invite follows you to your other devices through iCloud.
- Add a text. The plus button in the library adds a PDF, a Word document or a web page. Tap the text, then play.
Good to know
- System requirements
- macOS 26, iOS 26 or iPadOS 26, or newer. Where you are in each text syncs between your devices through iCloud, so iCloud Drive needs to be turned on. No other account is needed.
- Erling is in beta
- Most of it works, some of it doesn't yet, and in some texts something comes out wrong: a sentence read in the wrong order, a word explained oddly, a figure described strangely. New versions arrive automatically through TestFlight.
- Report a problem
- Right-click, or hold your finger on what went wrong, and choose Report a Problem. Write what you saw, or just turn on Too hard to understand if an explanation was too hard. The report includes what the app showed, so that I can see what happened. For something that isn't about one text, there is the Help menu on the Mac and Settings on iPhone and iPad. Or write to hi@iamsim.me.
- How your data is handled
- Your texts stay on your devices and in your own iCloud. To fix the reading order and explain the terms, each page is sent once, as an image and as text, to a server I run, which forwards it to Anthropic. The server keeps no copy of the page; the result is kept so that the same text doesn't have to be analyzed again. If you don't want a text sent at all, turn off analysis in the text's menu. More in questions and answers.
- The voice
- Erling uses the system's voices. Go to Settings → Accessibility → Spoken Content → Voices and download an Enhanced or Premium voice for Swedish and English, and it sounds much better.