Look, it isn’t good news. But you have to make the best of a bad situation. On Wednesday night, Google announced it would be shutting down its Reader product as of 1 July 2013. With the loss of Google Reader, a serious problem emerges. What will users use as an alternative reader?

Step 1 – Find a new RSS reader

An RSS reader is the mechanism by which Google Reader subscribes to web sites, luckily it is not the only one. There are two categories:

• Web-Based News Readers

If you’re looking for an RSS feed to read in more than one place, try NetVibes. Apparently it’s the most popular web reader, and rocks a user interface very similar to Google Reader.

NewsBlur is another option. With Newsblur you create your own account, subsrcibe to your favourite sites, and read them on any computer. Another plus is that they have Android and iOS apps that will sync your feeds, too.

Feedly is very different to Google Reader in terms of user interface, rolling with a newspaper layout for the more visually-inclined. You would need to download a browser extension for Chrome or Firefox before getting going with Feedly, but by the time you’re up and running, you’ll be able to sync your feeds between browsers and view them on the Feedly mobile app.

• Desktop-Based News Readers

FeedDemon is a great desktop news reader for Windows, while Mac users need to check out Reeder.

Step 2 – Import Your Google Reader Feeds

After you’ve found your new reader, you need to import your Google Reader feed, or you’ll have to manually re-subscribe to ever feed.

• Go to Google Takeout’s Reader page and click the Create Archive button. All your feeds, from the people you know, to starred items will be pulled into a file.
• Once you’re prompted, click the download button.
• Open the Zip file you just downloaded. Inside the Reader folder, there should be a file named subscriptions.xml. Pull that to the desktop.
• Open your new reader feed of choice, go into settings and find the Import option. Select it and choose the subscriptions.xml file. All your feeds should appear in your new folder.

[Source: Forbes, Lifehacker]