Stanza for Mac

Stanza for Mac is an e-book reader for Mac OS and iOS devices. Available from the App Store, the basic Stanza for Mac is free for a trial period, then must be updated to unlock all the features. Stanza for Mac installs easily.

The Stanza for Mac interface is clean. A list of your downloaded content appears when it's launched (and can be sorted several ways), and clicking on a book opens a clean reader interface. Downloadable content can be accessed from almost every source. Whether you're reading a book, magazine, or other digital publication, Stanza for Mac makes it easy to move around the pages and chapters. There are multiple layout views possible, which is useful on larger screens for MacBooks and iMacs, including larger print versions with horizontal and vertical scrolling. We could import audiobooks, too, although there's nothing special about them in Stanza for Mac.

We used Stanza for Mac to access several document formats including PDF, Amazon Kindle, EPUB, and others, and each opened fine. We had a couple of minor issues with Stanza for Mac locking up while reading a book, but this will likely be fixed in a maintenance release. There's a lot of competition in the reader market, but Stanza for Mac is worth a look at the trial version to see if it suits your needs.

Editors' note: This is a review of the trial version of Stanza 1.0.0b18.