A reading workflow

You’ll install the Ensō Chrome extension, save an article from your browser, find it in Reading with its offline copy, sort your saves into lists, and mark them read. About 15 minutes.

What you’ll need

• Google Chrome (version 116 or newer)
• An Ensō account — sign up at https://app.ensoapp.io if you haven’t

1. Install the extension

The extension isn’t on the Chrome Web Store yet, so it’s loaded as an unpacked folder. Full details in Chrome extension; the short version:

1. Download the extension .zip from the download page and extract it. (Desktop app users: in Reading, click Browser extension in the header — it opens the folder for you and shows these steps.)
2. Open chrome://extensions and switch on Developer mode (top right).
3. Click Load unpacked and select the extracted folder — or drag the folder onto the page.
4. Pin the Ensō reading list button to your toolbar.

Tip

After an Ensō update, click the extension’s Reload on chrome://extensions to pick up the new version.

2. Sign in to the extension

Click the Ensō toolbar button. A side panel opens with Email and Password fields — enter your Ensō account and click Sign in. You stay signed in until you choose Sign out.

3. Save a page

1. Open an article you’d like to read later.
2. Click the Ensō button. The panel shows the page title and a Save to list — Inbox to begin with.
3. Click Save page. You’ll see Capturing…, Uploading…, then Saved.

The extension captures a full offline copy along with the link. If a page can’t be captured (heavy or cross-origin pages sometimes refuse), click Save URL only to keep just the link.

Tip

No connection? Saves queue in the extension — the footer shows N queued — and upload when you’re back online.

4. Find it in Reading

Open Ensō and go to Reading (Ctrl+Space, r, Enter). Your Inbox list shows the new page with its site icon. The header counts N unread · N total.

Each row has:

• A round toggle on the left — Mark read
• The title, which opens the live page in your browser
• (Offline) — the saved copy, which opens in a new tab and works without a connection

You can also add a link by hand: type into Add a URL and press Enter… at the bottom. Hand-added links keep only the URL, no offline copy.

5. Organize into lists

1. At the bottom of the sidebar, type into New list… — Long reads — and press Enter.
2. Drag a page from the main pane onto Long reads in the sidebar, or right-click the page and pick the list under Move to.
3. Right-click a list for Rename, Tags…, or Delete list.

Back in the extension, Save to now offers your new list and remembers the last one you used.

Tip

Tag a list (Tags…) and every page in it inherits the tag, so the view filter can narrow Reading to, say, #work — see Tags and filters.

6. Read offline, then mark read

1. Click (Offline) to read the saved copy — on a plane, on the train, wherever.
2. When you’re done, click the round toggle (Mark read). The row is struck through, lingers a moment, then moves into Completed (N).

Marking a page read clears its offline copy to save space; save the page again from the extension if you want it back. You can also mark pages read from the extension panel (Mark as Read), and see everything you’ve saved there with Show archived / Hide archived.

7. Tidy up

Hover a row for Archive page (tucks it under Archived (N) — toggle Show archived in the header to see it) or Delete page. Finished reads also show up in your Agenda under Reading → Finished on the day you completed them.

Where next

• Reading — the module in full
• Chrome extension — options, troubleshooting, the extension’s own list view
• Sync and offline