Circling back to this as this is a blocker for full roll out on mobile given we have lots of engaged users using the watchlist as a reading list.

I think the easiest way to handle these users is to add a tab "export" that exports to a reading list.

The current experience is this:

After removal that page it would look like this:

or this:

We could add a tab to those pages

or a message box at top of page

When clicked it would open this dialog:

And after hitting the button you'd be redirected to:

This could also become a useful tool for editors who may have benefits (and want to go in the other direction in future)

Thanks so much for raising this, Jon! I'm liking both approaches, but I'm wondering: if we use the terminology "as reading list" in the tab or "where your reading list went" in the banner, are these users already familiar with the concept of reading list already? in the existing mobile watchlist, I don't really see "reading list" verbiage used anywhere.

I think a one time exporting of the watchlist to reading list default list would be a fine idea; but wondering how much engineering work that might entail? I don't think it's a throwaway work, since this functionality may become useful again in the future as you said for users who want to add items from one list to the other, but just wanted to gauge what the tech investment might look like.

I'll ping this as a task for Sneha to check out when she's back for 2 days early next week, to get some design input.

Per conversation, we'll not invest much time here (discussed with @Sneha and @HFan-WMF) We are assuming that the people who want reading lists on mobile are going to be happy enough to have them available, that they won't immediately be annoyed at having past items that aren't in the new reading lists feature.

Two options, with sequencing which might look like..

With banner:

• Add a banner to the Special:EditWatchlist pointing users to reading lists beta feature.
• Change watchlist link in menu to point to editor view to show that we are deprioritizing the "reading" view.
• Drop the watchlist card view altogether.

Without banner:

• Ship reading list feature to all users
• Change watchlist link in menu to point to editor view to show that we are deprioritizing the "reading" view and help train them to use reading list
• Drop the watchlist card view if no complaints after say 1 month