Best Paywall Bypassing Tools

PaywallBuster is a tool that helps you get around paywalls on news articles. You just paste the article link into the site, and it tries different methods to let you read the content for free. It doesn’t host anything itself—it just sends you to third-party websites that do the work. Not every method works for every site, so it opens multiple tabs using different tools, hoping one will break through. It’s free, works on iOS through a shortcut, and claims it’s legal since it only redirects you to other services. The creators say they don’t encourage breaking site terms or copyright laws, but they know people just want to read an article without hitting a wall.

Paywall Reader is a tool that helps you read articles blocked by paywalls. It doesn’t hack into sites or break paywalls directly. Instead, it sends you to archived or cached versions of the page. These versions are saved copies from places like Archive.Today, the Internet Archive, or even Google Translate. It works best with soft paywalls—those pop-ups that block the screen but still have the full text underneath. To use it, you just paste the article’s URL, pick an option from the three services, and it tries to find a version without the paywall. If one doesn’t work, you can try another. Not every paywall can be bypassed, especially if a site blocks archiving, but most major news sources work fine. It’s considered legal because it doesn’t tamper with the website itself—it just finds copies that are already available online. People use it to access news without needing tons of subscriptions or for things like schoolwork and research. The site isn’t connected to any of the archive services or news outlets, and it leaves the responsibility of use to you.

archive.is, also known as archive.today, is a website that lets you save a copy of any webpage. It works like a time capsule, taking a "snapshot" of the page as it is at that moment. This snapshot stays online even if the original page is deleted or changed. It saves both the text and images, making sure the copy is accurate. The archived page doesn’t have active elements like pop-ups or scripts, so it’s safer to view. People use archive.is for different reasons—saving articles that might get taken down, capturing price lists or job postings before they change, or keeping a record of social media posts. It’s also used to get around paywalls, since the archived copy often shows the full content without restrictions. You can use the site by entering the URL of the page you want to save. Once archived, you get a short, stable link to the snapshot. There’s also a search feature to find past snapshots of certain websites. They even offer a Chrome extension for quicker access.