---
id: readable-content
version: "0.1.2"
license: MIT license
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: abandoned
---

# readable-content — Collect actual content of any article, blog, news, etc.

License: permissive · Maintenance: abandoned · Downloads: 84.0K/mo

## What it is and what it does

readable-content is a lightweight HTML parser that extracts the main article text from web pages, filtering out navigation, sidebars, and other boilerplate. It accepts either a URL (which it fetches directly) or a pre-fetched HTML string, returning the core content as a string. The package has no runtime dependencies, making it simple to integrate into web scraping pipelines or content processing workflows.

The package is in Alpha status and has been abandoned since its single release on 2020-05-24. It was last tested against Python 3.7 and 3.8. While the MIT license is permissive, the lack of maintenance means you are responsible for any fixes, compatibility patches, or adaptation to changes in web page structures. It is suitable only for projects where you can tolerate or work around potential issues without upstream support.

Use it for:

- Extract article text from news sites for content aggregation or archival systems
- Parse blog posts or long-form content in web scraping pipelines where boilerplate removal is needed
- Pre-process HTML before feeding it to NLP or text analysis tools to isolate readable content
- Build a simple content extractor for personal research or offline reading tools
- Filter main text from pages fetched via requests or other HTTP libraries before further processing

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

Extracts the main article content from web pages, handling both direct URL fetching and pre-fetched HTML strings to isolate readable text from web articles, blogs, and news sites.

No. The package is abandoned (no maintenance since 2020-05-24), marked Alpha, and offers no advantages over maintained alternatives. The lack of runtime dependencies is a minor plus, but cannot offset the risk of unaddressed bugs, compatibility drift, and no support for modern web structures. Install only if you have a legacy codebase already using it and cannot migrate.

## Install

pip install readable-content
uv add readable-content
poetry add readable-content

## Installing readable-content

Before you install: High install friction: the package is abandoned (last release 2020-05-24), marked Alpha status, and has received no maintenance for many years. No runtime dependencies, but the lack of ongoing support means bugs and compatibility issues are unlikely to be addressed.

License in practice: MIT license (permissive) places no restrictions on use, modification, or distribution in your own projects, but the abandoned status means you accept all maintenance risk yourself.

Quickstart:

from readable_content.parser import ContentParser
parser = ContentParser("https://example.com/article")
content = parser.get_content()
print(content)

# Or with pre-fetched HTML:
parser = ContentParser("https://example.com/article", html_content)
content = parser.get_content()

Package classifiers list Python 3.7 and 3.8 only; compatibility with newer versions is unverified.

Verify before relying:

- Whether the content extraction logic handles modern web page structures and JavaScript-rendered content
- Compatibility with Python versions beyond 3.7 and 3.8 despite those being the only listed classifiers
- How the parser behaves with sites that block automated access or require specific headers

## Package facts

- License: MIT license (permissive)
- Python support: unspecified
- Install friction: high
- Maintenance: abandoned
- Downloads: 84.0K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

extract article content from web pages, parse article text from HTML, web scraping content extraction, remove boilerplate from web pages, get main text from URLs, article body extraction, content parser for web scraping, web-scraping, content-extraction, abandoned

[View on SkillFed](https://skillfed.io/packages/readable-content) · [View on PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/readable-content/)