Changelog

• Create an account at submerse.it. The sign-in page links to it too.
• Without a plan, an account holds 20 bookmarks. Try Pro free for 14 days from Settings → Billing, no card needed.
• Without a plan, you can share pools by email with 10 addresses a day; with a plan or the free trial, 200.
• Sign in with the same account in the Chrome extension and the iPhone app, a beta on TestFlight. If you sign up with your email, do it on the website first: the iPhone app can’t finish an email sign-up yet.
• You can leave a pool someone shared with you: right-click it in the sidebar and choose Leave.
• The waitlist is closed, and its page now sends you to sign-up.

New

• Notes: a bookmark that is just text. Choose “Note” in the + box to write one.
• Voice notes: upload or drop a recording (M4A, MP3 or WAV) and its transcript goes into the note, with the recording kept beside it. Transcription is part of Pro, and the free trial includes some.
• Notes can’t be added to a public pool or to Look yet.
• A Feed view beside List and Grid: one post after another, with its pools, labels and notes underneath.
• Search also finds bookmarks by their labels.
• Look sits under Favorites in the sidebar, above a new “Find a pool” box that narrows the list of your pools.
• PDFs saved from the iPhone app or from a link show their first page, like ones uploaded on the website.
• Unless you’ve turned AI off, a new picture is titled by what it shows instead of its file name.
• Bookmarks imported from Are.na show, in the sidebar, who posted each block, when, and where it came from.
• Limits, a new part of Help: every limit you can meet, how big it is, and what happens when you reach it.
• Ocean, the default theme, has a light sand background instead of pale blue. Midnight Mass is now called Midnight.
• The + box saves into the pool you’re in, as paste and drop do. In a pool you can only view, the bookmark goes to All Bookmarks and Submerse says so.
• Type an address without https:// (example.com, say) and the + box adds it.
• New accounts start with ten labels, such as Design and Photography, so the label picker isn’t empty on day one.
• Deleting your account asks you to type its email first.
• Onboarding and Getting Started moved under More in the app menu.

Fixes

• Editing notes no longer moves the page: the editor opens where you clicked, and the text holds still while you type or delete lines.
• Some image links that used to save as a plain link now save as the picture: when a site sends a format Submerse can’t read, it asks once more for one it can.
• A save that couldn’t go into the pool you chose says so, and names the pool.
• A new account no longer sees its library flash by before the welcome steps.
• Settings no longer breaks when your email preferences can’t be loaded; it says so instead.
• A note with quotes or lists nested very deep no longer breaks the page for everyone who opens it.
• The bookmark panel stays wide enough to use, whatever size the window is.
• Trial, plan and payment emails are always sent; the email switch in Settings now covers collaboration emails only.
• The welcome and account-deleted emails no longer greet anyone as “Anonymous,” and the account-deleted email arrives once the deletion has finished.

Safety

• Public pool pages are protected from floods of requests: someone who isn’t signed in can load them 30 times a minute.
• A public pool page shows its first 500 bookmarks, and says when the pool holds more.
• A JPEG, PNG or WebP photo you upload no longer shows where it was taken: Submerse removes the location before anyone can see it.
• Cropping a picture no longer leaves the uncropped one at an address someone could guess.
• Only web addresses can be saved as links; anything else gets a sentence that says why.
• Exporting a pool someone shared with you to Are.na sends only the labels you can see, never its owner’s private ones.
• Pool logos are stored as pictures only: an SVG logo becomes a PNG as it uploads.
• Analytics requests from the website no longer carry your sign-in cookie.

New

• The extension is in the Chrome Web Store, and it’s called Submerse now, not Submerse BETA.
• Right-click “Save image to Submerse” keeps the description the page gave the image, at the top of its notes, above the summary.
• A narrower popup, where a long pool name is cut short instead of stretching it.
• Ocean’s sand background, as on the website.

Fixes

• A save that couldn’t go into the pool you picked says so and names the pool, instead of saying it saved.
• Saving a browser page or a file on your computer says only web pages can be saved, instead of asking you to try again.

New

• Notes: Add → Note writes one, and Add → Voice note turns a recording into one. Transcription is part of Pro, and the free trial includes some.
• On iOS 26.2 and later, share a recording from Voice Memos (Share, then SubmerseShare) to save it as a voice note.
• A voice note plays in the app, with a scrubber and 15-second skips.
• Look is a pool in the app: its posts are in All Bookmarks, it sits under Favorites, and you can leave it from the pool’s menu. submerse.it/look links open it in the app.
• Ocean has a sand background, and the Reading View follows your theme. Midnight Mass is now called Midnight.
• A link in the notes opens when you tap it; a tap anywhere else still edits them.
• Bookmarks imported from Are.na show who posted them and where they came from.
• Paste URL saves into the pool you’re in. In a pool you can only view, it goes to All Bookmarks and says so.
• Share text with a link in it (“Check this out https://…”) and the link is saved.

Fixes

• The pool picker says why when a pool refuses a bookmark.
• Share Pool shows Done until you type an address, then Cancel and Share.
• A bookmark opens only if its address is a web page; anything else says “This link can’t be opened.”
• Very long or deeply nested notes, and big tables in them, no longer crash or freeze the app.
• A page built to freeze the Reading View can’t any more.

Behind the scenes

• An unexpected sign-out reaches us once, with its reason, so we can fix it.

• Install it with brew install godspeedsys/tap/submerse, and update it with brew upgrade submerse. It runs on Apple silicon and Intel Macs.
• Sign in through your browser with submerse auth login, then save, search, file and label bookmarks from a terminal or a script.
• Every command is listed in its README.
• There are no Linux or Windows builds yet.

• Look shows the pictures and pages we keep coming back to; each one opens on its own page you can share.
• The blog’s old addresses now lead to Look.
• There is a feed: submerse.it/look/rss.xml for feed readers.
• Signed in? Look is a pool in your Submerse: its posts are in your All Bookmarks, and you can leave it from the sidebar.

New

• Ocean is now the default theme. Browsers and accounts that already use Communion keep it.
• A new look for the public site: paper-tag navigation, a theme menu on the logo, a redesigned homepage, and a Help page that matches the app.
• Import from Are.na: channels become pools, in the browser. Export to Are.na: pools become channels, and it can run again without making duplicates.
• Right-click a bookmark to add it to a pool, and right-click a picture to copy or download it.
• Select several bookmarks and put them into, or take them out of, a pool in one go.
• The reading view opens full screen, with a close button and your notes in the sidebar.
• New accounts get a starter allowance of 20 bookmarks without a plan.
• Settings and Themes were tidied up: tabs, toggles and small dashboards.
• CSV import keeps the file’s order and every line of a note, and imported bookmarks show up in All Bookmarks. Export CSV now works with libraries past 4,000 bookmarks.
• Summaries and labels arrive about 40% faster.
• This changelog.

Fixes

• A very large pool no longer crashes the app.
• Search checks again before it tells you there are no matches.
• A note you type while a summary arrives keeps both, and edits no longer overwrite each other.
• A failed summary is offered back next to Notes, so you can retry it. A dead link is titled by its address instead of its error page.
• Saving a page again keeps a title you typed, and saving after a trash brings back your newest copy.
• Public pools keep showing notes, and now say so.
• A picture that is still processing says so, instead of “Not found.”
• A pool that fills itself by label remembers when you remove a bookmark from it.
• Moving several bookmarks to the trash reports each one. Empty Trash says how many were really deleted if it stops partway.
• Error messages are plain sentences, not internal codes, and the waitlist form no longer shows raw errors.
• Uploads: a file that isn’t a real image or PDF gets a clear note, and someone at their limit hears how many files fit.
• Dropping a bookmark on a pool at the bottom of the sidebar lands on the right pool.
• Editing follows your own right to edit, and a revoked share takes the bookmark back.
• The settings switch for pasting a link to save it now turns it off.
• “Delete Everything” now deletes the account too.
• If sign-in can’t load, every page says so instead of showing you as signed out.
• The Billing page and Help no longer describe things that don’t exist, and the trial copy says one thing: no card to start, add one before the 14 days end to keep Pro.
• The lists redraw less when you tick a checkbox, so they feel smoother.

Fixes

• Saving an image from a site that blocks cross-site reads now works: the extension asks for access to that site when you click.
• Saving a page again keeps a title you typed, and saving after a trash brings back your newest copy.
• A dead link is titled by its address instead of its error page.

• Delete Account in Settings.
• The pool’s logo sits next to its name in the header.
• Opening a bookmark no longer loses your place in the list or the pages you’ve loaded.
• The bookmark list loads in pages, and says why it’s empty.
• A failed summary is said on the bookmark’s screen, with a Retry button, and the screen updates after a retry.
• Pool pickers only list pools you can add to, say when they’re loading or failed instead of “in no pools,” and stop spinning when a change fails.
• A photo that is really HEIC but labelled JPEG is converted instead of refused.
• A refused upload says why, and someone at their limit hears how many files fit.
• Notes and titles no longer overwrite each other, and edit buttons follow your own right to edit.
• Messages in the label sheet show inside it.

New

• A new app icon, and Ocean is now the default theme.
• A welcome screen at first sign-in: pick your interests and get starter pools.
• If sign-up is invite-only, a clear message says so.
• Report a bug from Settings → Help.
• Delete Account in Settings.
• A trial countdown (“N days left”) in the sidebar and in Settings.
• The pool’s logo sits next to its name in the header.
• The Share sheet uses the theme you chose in the app.

Fixes

• Paste URL no longer freezes the app.
• Favorites no longer shows every bookmark.
• A pool shared with you, or made on another device, appears without restarting the app.
• The list refreshes when you come back to the app, and an empty pool can be pulled to refresh.
• A pool fills in live after you add labels to it.
• Pool pickers only list pools you can add to, and edit buttons appear only where you can edit.
• New Pool tells you if its labels didn’t save, and auto-populate can’t be turned on without a label.
• Notes and titles no longer overwrite each other, even while a summary is arriving.
• A save that finishes after you leave the screen is confirmed, and a failed one keeps your text.
• Bookmark details show “Enriching…” while a page is processed, and say when it failed, with a Retry button.
• A pasted link is summarized once instead of twice.
• A picture that is still processing shows that instead of a broken image, and the full-screen viewer matches.
• A refused upload says why, and a file that isn’t a real image or PDF gets a clear note.
• A free account at its bookmark limit is told before an upload starts, not after.
• Uploads no longer repeat after a dropped connection, and ones waiting in the queue survive an app update.
• The Share sheet says why a share was refused.
• A list that failed to load shows an error instead of looking empty.
• The search field and the logo follow theme changes.
• Sheet titles no longer run under their buttons at large text sizes.
• The app no longer reloads everything every 50 seconds, work at sign-in no longer holds up the screen, and signing out fully ends the session.

Behind the scenes

• Crashes and errors reach us with more detail, so we can fix them faster.

• Sign in through your browser with submerse auth login: no password in the terminal.
• Add, list, search, edit, move, label and trash bookmarks, with the same pools and labels as the apps.
• Every sign-in is a key you can see and revoke in Settings → CLI access, and each new key emails you.
• Separate keys for CI and agents, so a script never borrows your laptop’s login.
• Works from a script: every command can print JSON.

• Enter a pool’s share code, or paste its link, to open it. No sign-in needed.
• A gallery of the pool’s images, with the pool’s name and its code at the top.
• A full-screen slideshow that advances every few seconds, fading between pictures. Use the remote to go back and forward, pause and resume, or leave.
• Pools you opened recently are one click away, and the last one is already filled in.
• Midnight look, with its own app icon and Top Shelf image.