Getting started with Accruva, built for ADHD & dyslexic readers
A five-minute setup that takes you from install to a reading session that actually fits. Written for ADHD adults, dyslexic readers, and anyone who has bounced off generic reading apps.
No card required. No expiring trial. Android live now, iOS coming soon.
Five steps to your first reading session.
Most people open a new app, poke at three buttons, get distracted, and never come back. This walkthrough is the path that gives Accruva a fair shot.
Download and open
Accruva is on Android now, with iOS coming soon and Windows in development. The free tier is fully working out of the box: five reading modes, all five accessibility features, the streak tracker, AI study tools. No card. No signup before you start.
Tip: If you’re sceptical of yet another reading app, that’s fair. You don’t have to commit to anything. Import something and try one mode.Import something to read
Tap the plus icon and bring in your text. Eight formats covered: PDF, EPUB, DOCX, ODT, plain text, markdown, HTML, and HTM. Paste from your clipboard. Or scan a physical page with the camera, which uses on-device OCR so the page never leaves your phone.
Tip: Start with something short. An article, a single chapter, a meeting brief. Get the feel of the modes before you load a 300-page textbook.Pick a reading mode
Five modes, every one of them free. Focus (RSVP) for single-word flow, Teleprompter for gentle scrolling, Chunking for dense material, Bold Flow for visual anchoring, Scroll for free reading. Not sure where to start? Teleprompter is the gentlest landing.
Tip: If you have ADHD, flip on ADHD/Zen mode in Settings > Accessibility. It pairs with Focus and strips the screen back to a single word on black.Set a speed you can actually read at
Start around 220 WPM (Brysbaert’s 2019 meta-analysis puts the adult average at 238). The slider adjusts in real time. Free reaches 400 WPM, Pro reaches 1,000. The point isn’t the number. It’s the speed at which your comprehension still holds.
Tip: If you can’t recall what you just read, drop 50 WPM and run it again. Comprehension is the only metric that matters.Turn the document into a study session
When you finish reading, the AI tools turn what you read into a quiz, flashcards, or a summary. The flashcards drop straight into SM-2 spaced repetition, so your review schedule builds itself.
Tip: Free includes 15 AI calls a day pooled across all three tools (with up to nine extra unlocked by watching short rewarded ads). You may not hit the cap, but you’ll know when you do.Which of the five modes fits?
Five modes because no single mode fits every brain or every kind of text. Pick the one that fits today’s reading.
Focus (RSVP)
One word at a time, fixed in place, with an Optimal Recognition Point marker that lands the eye where it reads fastest. A 2025 Moussaoui study found ADHD undergraduates improved comprehension by around 13% with RSVP. Neurotypical readers actually scored lower on the same test.
Best for: ADHD focus, articles, lighter fictionTeleprompter
Text scrolls steadily with the current word highlighted. Less intense than RSVP, with the surrounding lines still visible so you keep your sense of context. Set it to one, three, five, or full-screen lines.
Best for: First-time users, longer sessions, easing inChunking
Smart phrase groups that respect line and sentence boundaries. Two, three, or four words at a time. Cuts the eye-movement load that makes dense text exhausting for dyslexic readers.
Best for: Dyslexic readers, academic material, dense proseBold Flow
The leading letters of each word are bolded, giving your eye a visual anchor that pulls it through the line. Three intensity levels (30%, 40%, 50%) so you can dial it to what actually helps.
Best for: Long-form reading, reports, keeping contextScroll
Free-form scrolling with highlights, notes, and bookmarks. The closest thing to a regular reading view, but inside the same library and study system as the other modes. The document still goes through AI quizzes and flashcards when you’re done.
Best for: Deep study, annotation, anything you need to mark upADHD/Zen mode is an accessibility toggle, not a sixth mode
Zen mode is a setting you flip on in Settings > Accessibility. It applies a dark-screen, single-word overlay to whichever reading mode you’re already using (most often Focus). The reading still happens in the mode you chose. Zen just strips the visual environment around it back to nothing.
Settings > AccessibilityFour things worth knowing before you start.
A handful of small calls that make the difference between a useful tool and another forgotten install.
Start slower than you think you should
Most new users set the speed too high, get discouraged within a paragraph, and conclude the app doesn’t work. Begin at 200 to 220 WPM and creep up by 25 every few sessions. Your brain adapts faster than you’d expect, but only if you give it ground to stand on.
Different modes for different reading
There’s no single best mode. Focus for an article on the bus, Chunking for a textbook chapter, Scroll when you want to highlight as you go. Switching is one tap, so use the right tool for the page in front of you.
Generate flashcards while the reading is fresh
Right after a session is the best moment to pull out flashcards or a quiz. One tap turns the document into a study set and feeds it into spaced repetition. The longer you wait, the more you forget. That’s the forgetting curve, not a guess.
Ten minutes a day beats an hour on Sunday
Ten minutes a day is the goal that survives a bad week. Sixty minutes on Sunday is the goal that gets abandoned by Wednesday. The streak system is there to make the small daily commitment easier to keep, not to bully you into hour-long sessions.
Ready to set yours up?
Five minutes from install to a reading session that fits your brain. Five reading modes, every accessibility feature, free.
Not in a rush? Test your reading speed first, no download needed.
