What’s new in v1.23

Released September 8, 2026

This has been one of our busiest stretches on the reading app, and it all adds up to a version that simply feels better to use. Sharing a verse with a friend now sends something worth looking at. Search finally works the way you’d expect. You can fall asleep listening to Scripture and the app takes care of the rest. The phone layout has been rebuilt around the way you actually hold your phone. And we’ve done a careful pass to make the whole app easier to use for people who navigate with a keyboard or a screen reader.

Here’s a tour of the highlights.

A shared link to John 3:16, showing the reference, the verse text, and the IQ Bible mark on a clean card — Share a verse now and this is what your friends see — the reference, the words, and a clean card instead of a blank box.

When you share a link to a passage — in a text message, on Slack, in a group chat, anywhere — it now unfolds into a proper card: the reference as the heading, the verse text, and a simple IQ Bible design. Before, a shared link showed almost nothing. Now it invites someone in.

A search that actually finds it

The redesigned Verses search panel, with match modes, testament and book filters, chapter and verse-range fields, a field for words to leave out, and a sort control — The redesigned Verses search — match modes, book and testament filters, chapter and verse ranges, words to leave out, and sorting, all in one place.

Search got a thorough rethink. You can now choose how your words are matched — all of them, any of them, an exact phrase, or the start of a word — leave certain words out, limit the search to the Old or New Testament or to specific books, narrow it to a range of chapters or verses, and sort the results. The words you searched for are highlighted right in the text.

A “Searching in” option lets you search one translation while you read another, with a single tap to switch over if you open a result that isn’t in the version you’re reading.

There’s a new People tab, too. It searches the Bible’s named people rather than the text itself — so looking for “Lot” the person no longer buries you in verses about a “lot” of something. When you search a name on the Verses tab, the app gently points you to the People tab.

The app also remembers your recent and saved searches. And if a search comes back empty, it can offer to check every other version in the same language, showing you its progress as it goes.

Listening to Scripture

Narration settings, including continuous play and an option to mark a chapter as read once you finish listening — Narration settings, including continuous play and the option to mark a chapter read once you've listened all the way through.

Continuous play keeps the narration going from one chapter to the next — and now across the seams between books, so the end of Malachi flows straight into Matthew. It stops only at the very end of the Bible.
A sleep timer lets you set narration to stop after 15, 30, 45, or 60 minutes, or at the end of the current chapter. The volume eases down gently rather than cutting off.

The sleep timer on a phone, offering Off, 15, 30, 45 minutes, 1 hour, and End of chapter — The sleep timer — drift off to Scripture and the audio fades out on its own after 15, 30, 45, or 60 minutes, or at the end of the chapter.

If you’d like, the app can mark a chapter as read once you’ve listened all the way through it. It’s off unless you turn it on, and chapters that play while a sleep timer is counting down don’t count.
When a translation only has audio for part of the Bible, the player now tells you plainly that narration isn’t available for that chapter instead of quietly getting stuck.
The mobile player got a batch of small fixes — the controls stay put on the smallest phones, they fade in and out nicely, and the page no longer jumps when you pause.

The round audio button sitting in the phone’s bottom control row — Tap the round audio button in the bottom row (left) and the full player opens right where you are (right) — a scrubber, play and pause, and a voice picker.

The audio button expanded into the full player in place, with a scrubber, play and pause, and a voice picker — Tap the round audio button in the bottom row (left) and the full player opens right where you are (right) — a scrubber, play and pause, and a voice picker.

Reading on your phone

We rebuilt the phone reading screen around one idea: the things you reach for most should sit where your thumb naturally rests. There’s now a single row of controls along the bottom — previous and next chapter as a pair, one “Book Chapter” button that opens the navigator, and a round audio button that appears when the chapter has narration and opens the full player right there.

The rebuilt phone reading screen, with a bottom row of controls for previous and next, the “Book Chapter” navigator button, and a round audio button, above the four-tab bottom navigation — The new phone layout — everything you reach for sits in a row along the bottom, within easy thumb reach.

The bottom navigation is four steady tabs — Read, Discover, Notes, and More — with Explore and Study Tools tucked into the Discover sheet. The translation name moved up next to Search, and the text-size and day/night controls are now one “Aa” button that opens a display panel.

Turning to the next chapter on a phone is a real page turn now — the next chapter slides in under your finger before you let go. And just under each chapter title is a small row of icons showing what that chapter holds: places, people, prophecy, timeline, and background.

mob swipe 1 — A sideways drag pulls the next chapter in from the edge (left) and carries it across as your finger moves (right) — drag the other way for the previous chapter. Let go to land on it, or slide back to stay put.

mob swipe 2 — A sideways drag pulls the next chapter in from the edge (left) and carries it across as your finger moves (right) — drag the other way for the previous chapter. Let go to land on it, or slide back to stay put.

Finding your place

The book list and chapter list are one panel now. Pick a book and its chapters appear in place, with a back arrow to return to the list; books with a single chapter open straight to the text. When a book has an introduction, an “Intro” row sits above the chapter numbers.

Built to be comfortable for everyone

The new Accessibility page, describing the standard, what has been tested, the known gaps, and how to report a problem — The new Accessibility page — the standard we follow, what's been tested, where the gaps still are, and how to tell us about a problem.

We spent real time this release making the app work well for people who don’t use a mouse. There’s a “skip to reading” link, a clear outline showing where you are as you move through the page with a keyboard, verse numbers and references you can tab to and open, list rows and pickers that respond to Enter and Space, an audio progress bar that announces the time, proper handling of pop-up panels, spoken announcements for status messages, better colour contrast in both light and dark themes, and full respect for your system’s “reduce motion” and high-contrast settings.

There’s also a new Accessibility page — linked from the side navigation, the About page, and Help — that lays out the standard we follow, what we’ve tested, where we know there’s still work to do, and how to tell us about a problem.

Pages load faster

Chapter illustrations now load a small, efficient image sized for where it appears on the page, rather than a large original, so chapters come up quicker and the text no longer shifts around as pictures arrive. Opening an illustration full-screen still loads a crisp large version.

Little things that add up

The desktop reading view, with the side navigation on the left, the reading column in the middle, and chapter context on the right — The desktop reader — navigation on the left, your passage in the middle, and chapter context on the right.

Translation picker: star a version to keep it in a favourites row that stays put no matter how you’ve filtered the list below it. The language filter is one clear button showing the current language, and the audio filter is a plain labelled checkbox.
Chapter navigation now matches on desktop and phone — both the fixed arrows at the edges and the named “Previous / Next” buttons at the foot of the chapter show up everywhere, instead of each having only half.
The desktop side navigation now expands to show the sections inside Explore, Study Tools, and My Library, and My Library shows a live count next to Notes, Bookmarks, and Highlights.
If your API key is refused, the app now says so clearly instead of showing a code that looked like no key was set at all.
Commentaries now lists only the sources that actually have something to say about the chapter or verse you’re on. References to books like 1 Maccabees and Sirach preview their text even while you’re reading a 66-book translation.
Less shifting around — headers, section titles, and illustrations no longer appear a beat late and nudge the text down.
Books without artwork on file show a small lettered tile, and Book Icons has a new “Lettered” style alongside the illustrated set.

The IQ Bible app is free and open source. If you’d like to look under the hood or help make it better, you’re welcome to — everything is on GitHub. Thanks for reading with us.