I like JSON Feed

Recently, I implemented JSON Feed support for my static site generator, Lifer. My impression is that, in 2026, JSON Feed is still not widely used, while people continue to rediscover RSS1 thanks to the indie web resurgence and an appetite for re-decentralization. Bluesky supports RSS; Mastodon supports RSS; Substack supports RSS; even Reddit supports RSS2—but none of them support JSON Feed. It makes sense for JSON Feed to be less popular than RSS: it’s not nearly as old or entrenched; it was created at a time, pre-Twitter implosion, in which feed reading had been subsumed by Twitter; and it doesn’t offer much new or different over RSS, so why bother. That said, after looking at my implementations of RSS 2.0 and Atom versus my implementation of JSON Feed, I found lots to like about JSON Feed. The rationale provided by the authors of the spec isn’t written in a persuasive way: We—Manton Reece and Brent Simmons—have noticed that JSON has become the developers’ choice for APIs, and that…