Every blog has unique technical characteristics that affect how we can display its content. Understanding these four indicators helps you know what to expect when reading.
For security reasons, browsers enforce CORS (Cross-Origin Resource Sharing) policies. This prevents websites from making unauthorized requests to other domains—protecting you from malicious scripts.
However, most blog feeds don't explicitly allow cross-origin requests. This means your browser blocks direct access, even though the content is public. Our status indicators tell you exactly which blogs have this restriction.
Browser security blocks the direct request
Can we fetch the RSS/Atom feed directly from your browser?
The feed has CORS restrictions. We need to fetch it through our server proxy, which adds the feed to the request on your behalf.
The feed allows cross-origin requests! Your browser can fetch it directly, which is faster and more private.
What this means for you
Does the RSS feed include complete articles, or just summaries?
The RSS feed includes complete article content. Once we fetch the feed, you can read everything—no additional requests needed.
The feed only contains excerpts or summaries. To read the full article, we need to fetch the actual post URL.
This is the key indicator
When fetching the actual post content, can we do it directly?
This indicator only matters when has_full_content = false. If the feed already contains full articles, we don't need to fetch post URLs.
Post URLs have CORS restrictions. Extracting content requires our proxy or the extension.
Post URLs allow direct access. We can fetch and extract article content in your browser.
Combined with feed access
Can we display the original blog post within our reader?
An iframe is like a window into another website. When possible, we use iframes to show you the original blog post with its intended design—fonts, images, and layout exactly as the author created them.
However, many sites set security headers that prevent embedding. This is a legitimate security measure—sites like Substack, Medium, and most major platforms block iframe embedding.
Without the extension
For blogs in our curated directory, we've identified which ones have "open access"—meaning they either allow direct fetching (no CORS restrictions) or include full article content in their RSS feeds.
For these blogs, we absorb the server costs as a free service so you can read without needing the browser extension. This is especially helpful on mobile, where extensions aren't available.
Look for the Open badge in the directory
Our extension bypasses CORS restrictions entirely, fetching content directly from your browser. This makes all four indicators irrelevant—and takes the load off our servers.
Here's what determines your reading experience:
Feed has full content OR everything is CORS-free
Best experienceFeed works but posts need proxy or may open externally
Extension helpsRequires proxy and may open posts in new tabs
Extension recommendedYou can test any blog's accessibility from the blog settings or by adding a custom blog.