The read.cv alternative that's still alive

The short answer.

Folio is the closest read.cv alternative in 2026: a free, designed profile page for designers and developers, built around your work rather than a feed, with a private password-gated way to get paid on top. What you won't get back is read.cv's structured CV timeline or the posts.cv community, and it's worth being upfront that nothing has really replaced those.

What happened to read.cv.

read.cv was the profile tool design Twitter actually loved. A clean, typographic page for your experience, projects and writing, free, with a taste level most portfolio tools never reached. In January 2025 Perplexity acquired the company and the team moved over. The product was wound down over the following months and shut down in May 2025, taking posts.cv, its small social network, with it.

That left a very specific crowd homeless: designers and developers who wanted one calm page that said who they are and what they've made, without turning it into a content channel. If that's you, you're exactly who Folio was built for.

First, recover your old page.

If you didn't export before the shutdown, the Wayback Machine at web.archive.org usually has a snapshot. Search for read.cv/yourhandle, open the latest capture and you'll have your old bio, project list and links in front of you while you rebuild. Ten minutes of copy-paste beats reconstructing your own history from memory.

Where read.cv was genuinely better.

Honesty first. read.cv's typographic CV format, a real timeline of roles, side projects and writing, was a genuinely great idea that Folio doesn't replicate. Folio is a grid of blocks, so your history lives in text blocks rather than a structured resume. The community mattered too. posts.cv felt like a small, kind corner of the design internet, and Folio is a profile tool, not a social network. If the timeline format is the thing you miss most, LinkedIn covers the structure and a Folio covers everything LinkedIn makes look corporate.

What Folio does differently.

read.cv answered one question beautifully: what has this person done? A client deciding whether to hire you asks two more. What does the work actually look like, and how do I pay this person? Folio is built around all three. Your page is a bento grid where portfolio images and video sit next to your links, socials and contact, so the work leads instead of a text list describing it. It's free with no paywall, and the page is designed enough that designers use it without wincing, which was always the read.cv bar.

The part read.cv never built is Pay-Me. Your payment details, bank, PayPal or Wise, live behind a password on your page. When a project wraps, you send one link and one password instead of pasting your IBAN into a DM. Folio never touches the money and takes no cut, you keep 100%. read.cv treated getting hired as the finish line. For a freelancer, the finish line is getting paid.

Rebuilding takes an evening at most.

1. 1

   Claim your handle

   Grab folio.link/yourname on the homepage. Free, no credit card.

2. 2

   Pull up your old page

   Open the Wayback snapshot of your read.cv and copy your bio, roles and project list across.

3. 3

   Let the work lead

   Upload your best projects as portfolio blocks and put them first. Your history can live in a text block below.

4. 4

   Add Pay-Me

   Put your payment details behind a password, so the next client who says yes can pay you without an awkward DM.

The honest take.

Nothing will be read.cv again, the moment passed and the community scattered. What you can replace today is the useful part: one designed page that makes a client trust you in ten seconds. Folio does that, adds the payment step read.cv never touched and costs what read.cv cost, which is nothing.

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