What Are Beta Readers?

Overview

Beta Readers are AI personas that read your writing and give you targeted, detailed feedback. Think of them as a virtual writing partner that's available whenever you need it — no scheduling, no waiting, no awkward critiques over coffee.

Each beta reader has a distinct voice, specialty, and perspective. You choose one reader for your session, and they analyze your manuscript through their unique lens — pointing at specific passages and walking you through their feedback one annotation at a time.

The result is focused, personal feedback that helps you see your work through a reader's eyes — something that's hard to get from a generic AI chat conversation.

Focus Areas

Every beta reader specializes in a focus area. These categories define what the reader pays attention to when analyzing your text:

Built-in Reader Personas

Genesis Writer includes 2 built-in beta reader personas, each with a unique voice, portrait, and area of expertise. These readers are available to all subscribers.

The Architect

The Architect reads for plot structure and story logic. They analyze how scenes connect, whether cause and effect tracks, and if the story's foundation is solid. Expect feedback about plot holes, missing setups, pacing imbalances, and structural suggestions. The Architect speaks with precision and directness — they're here to make your story's bones stronger.

The Empath

The Empath focuses on emotional resonance and character depth. They notice when a character's reaction feels off, when an emotional beat needs more space, and when a scene isn't landing the way it should. Their feedback is warm but honest — they care about your characters almost as much as you do, and they want readers to feel something.

Community Readers

Beyond the 2 built-in personas, you can discover additional beta readers on the Genesis Writer Marketplace. Community members create and share their own reader personas with custom focus areas, voices, and specialties.

You can also create your own beta readers with specific expertise tailored to your genre or writing goals. Maybe you need a reader who specializes in hard sci-fi worldbuilding, or one who focuses on YA voice and dialogue. Custom readers let you fill gaps that the built-in personas don't cover.

Any reader you add to your library from the marketplace will appear alongside the built-in readers when you start a session.

The Experience

Beta reading in Genesis Writer is designed as a guided, immersive experience rather than a static report. When you run a session:

1. Choose your reader — pick the reader whose expertise matches what you need right now. Each reader is displayed with their portrait and description.
2. Watch them read — a cinematic loading experience shows your reader analyzing your manuscript.
3. Walk through the feedback — your reader sits with you and walks you through each annotation. Your manuscript is displayed on the left with highlighted passages, and the reader's commentary appears on the right — as if they're sitting across from you, pointing at your text and talking through their notes.

You can navigate through annotations using the prev/next buttons or arrow keys, click highlighted passages in the manuscript to jump directly to that annotation, and toggle a summary view to see all feedback at a glance.

Requirements

Beta readers require a Writer plan or higher. The key requirements:

• Minimum text length — your draft must be at least 100 words. Beta readers need enough material to give meaningful feedback.
• Token cost — each session uses Genesis Tokens. The cost depends on the length of your text and the AI model used.
• Genesis Tokens — you need enough tokens in your balance. Subscribers get millions of tokens monthly.

Ready to try it? Head to Getting Feedback for a step-by-step guide on running your first beta read session.