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55 best book apps to do bookish things on the go (2024).

For all the bookworms, collectors, book flippers, and self-development geeks with reading as part of their daily routine, the app marketplaces are brimming with options to satisfy your every need possible. The world of book apps is vast and thrilling, from e-readers to audiobook platforms and book recommendation apps to book tracking tools.

In this blog post, we’re thrilled to share a handpicked list of 55 best book apps for reading and book aficionados like yourself. So, get ready to explore an enthralling digital universe crafted to enrich your lifestyle!

Best Book Tracking Apps

Best ebook reader apps, best book scanner apps, best book cataloging apps, best story writing apps, best book club apps, best book summary apps, best reading apps for kids.

6. Storygraph

7. AIReader

8. Aldiko Next

9. Amazon Kindle

10. Apple Books

11. Audible

12. Google Play Books

15. Moon+ Reader

17. Project Gutenberg

18. Amazon Seller App

19. BookScouter

21. Profit Bandit

22. Scan Power Mobile

23. ScoutIQ

24. Scoutify 2

25. Scoutly (FBAScan)

26. Seller Mobile

27. BookBuddy

30. LibraryThing

31. Commaful

33. Poetizer

34. Wattpad

35. Book Club (by Book Movement)

36. Bookclubs

37. Bookship

Fable shines in celebrating diversity, hosting virtual book clubs for every taste—be it timeless classics, YA hits, or BookTok sensations. You can mingle in lively large groups or cozy small circles, all steered by a vibrant mix of moderators. With Fable, you get the community vibe minus the fixed schedule of face-to-face meetups, tailor-made for readers juggling a tight calendar.

39. Goodreads

40. Reese’s Book Club

42. Blinkist

43. Four Minute Books

44. GetAbstract

45. Headway

46. Instaread

47. Mentorist

48. ReadinGraphics

49. Shortform

50. Sumizeit

51. Children’s Storybooks Online

53. International Children’s Digital Library

54. Planet eBook

55. Reading IQ

Final Thoughts

We’re confident these top 55 book apps will transform your habits. They’ll help you find your next favorite read, keep your collection organized, and even help make money on books . With these nifty apps, you can weave any book-related routine into your day. Amidst life’s hustle and bustle, let these apps nurture your passion.

Alison Bailey

Alison is a recent college graduate. Since college, she’s especially been interested in creating interesting stories and exploring different topics to write about. Writing for BookScouter gives her incredible pleasure and satisfaction. Alison considers content creation as an addictive hobby she puts her whole soul into. She’s also passionate about traveling, reading fiction, stretching, and playing the piano. The greatest stress-reliever for Alison is to pet her cat named Cupcake and listen to his soothing purring.

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Last Updated on March 27, 2024 by Olivia Smith

Independent Book Review

A Celebration of Indie Press and Self-Published Books

The 17 Best Book Apps for Every Kind of Reader

Which book apps are you using? Check out some of our most recommended options for reading, social media, logging, kids, and more.

by Jaylynn Korrell

Technology and books: Friends or enemies?

If there’s one thing that book lovers love, it’s books! More of them. No matter how they find them. Ebooks, audiobooks, paperbacks. The more chances to read the better. And with the right book apps, they can be totally free!

You don’t have to worry about feeling like you’re betraying your beloved paperbacks! Think of these apps as an extension of your love of literature or a portal into even more literary engagement!

But not all of these book apps are simply for reading books.

There are apps that allow you to browse & buy brand new titles, read reviews, log your reading, track your patterns, and even keep your kid reading. The options are all endless so long as you have the right digital resources.

So check out these awesome book apps !

(everything on independent book review has been selected by a very picky group of people. as affiliates we may earn a commission on items you purchase through our links.).

There’s no better place to start than my absolute favorite cheap & free eBook app! BookBub’s got unbeatable deals with author updates, handpicked recommendations, and truly some of the best indie & big-five books available. If you haven’t tried BookBub yet…you’re welcome.

• Amazon Kindle

The Kindle is definitely one of my favorite e-readers , but it’s also a great app to have on your phone or iPad. Not only can you find & download nearly every eBook on the internet, but it’s extremely readable as well. You’ll always have access to your favorite books with the Kindle app, and the app will keep track of where you left off on a different device and save it in the cloud so you’ll never lose your place.

Ummm…you’ve heard of Goodreads already? No surprise! This is the world’s largest site for readers and book recommendations. Readers can search their database of books to find people’s honest reviews before buying anything. Or, they can join the conversation and write their own reviews !

• Serial Reader

Classic books are classics for a reason. People have loved reading them forever. But a lot of people find them difficult to get through, even if they end up loving them. Serial Reader gives readers a more digestible way to read Classic books by dividing them up into 20 minute sessions. You can read an unabridged 20 minute portion of these books daily with this free book app, and slowly but continuously check some classics off of your “to be read” list.

Find yourself too busy (or homebound) to take a trip to the library? Check out this extensive digital document library! Book apps like Scribd provide readers with access to over 170 million documents, while also allowing people to upload their your own documents. It allows readers to keep a number of useful audiobooks and ebooks in one place: a truly great learning and sharing resource for readers and writers.

Finding this app was a game-changer for me. If you’ve got a library card, you’ve probably got access to Hoopla (or Libby ). Hoopla allows you to access books found in your library’s database, as well as audiobooks, comic books, and even movies. So much free content!

Looking for somewhere to read original works of fiction ? Wattpad has over 90 million subscribers who are reading and uploading fiction works and connecting with other readers and writers. This may just be the place to find your next favorite author before their writing career takes off. These are not always published books like you’d find on Kindle, so you’re finding some real hidden gems here.

Love poetry? Check out these gifts for poets & poetry lovers !

There are ways to read books without opening your eyelids or flipping a page. Audible the dominant force in audiobooks. This app offers monthly membership subscriptions or individual purchases so that you can listen to new, old, and bestselling audiobooks while doing household chores. Try a free trial !

How long does it take you to read? This book app is a valuable tool in helping you reach your reading goals by tracking your reading progress, maintaining an organized catalog of your completed books, and helping you set monthly or even yearly reading goals. It even provides you with personalized stats in real-time so you can track your progress. People who are trying to develop a good reading habit will like this!

Blinkist caters to those who don’t have the time or maybe even the interest to read an entire book. With this book app, you can get a summary of thousands popular nonfiction books in 15 minutes or less. So if reading isn’t your thing but you want the information from some of the best nonfiction books, Blinkist is the way to go.

Have you ever wished for a better way to pick the perfect next book? StoryGraph might be the way to do it. This app takes tracking to the next level by taking into account your mood and the mood of the books you’re usually reading (emotional, lighthearted, relaxing, etc). You can also view how your stats progress overtime to give you more insight on what books you should pick up next.

Unlike Blinkist, Summary Z provides a short summary of fiction books as well as nonfiction. So if you’ve got work to do for class and could use a refresher on a novel, check this one out! Summary Z is a great reference.

Poetry lovers, unite! Apps like Poetizer allow people to read, write, publish, and buy poetry. Poetry collections can be delivered to your doorstep and then promoted on your personal Poetizer platform. It’s an excellent app for writers & poets.

After you read a really great book, it’s hard to not want to talk about it with everyone you come in contact with. Having the community to do that with is rare. But it doesn’t have to be! Litsy is a place to share blurbs , reviews, your favorite quotes, and more. It’s my preferred social media account for book lovers !

• BookClub by Book Movement

Make your book club experience a lot easier by downloading this essential bookclub app. This app is excellent for those looking to simplify every aspect of being in a book club, from setting up meetings to picking your next book club book . Look up top book club books of the week or use their discover tool, and don’t forget to ask good book club questions !

Book apps aren’t just for adults. Kids book apps like Epic exist just to engage readers 12 and under. Epic is the largest digital library just for kids who love to read . It has over 40,000 kids titles to choose from, and they have audiobooks and learning videos available too. This app is free for educators and students to use during the school day.

• Aardvark Book Club

A book subscription box is a great way to gain access to new releases easily. Aardvark Book Club’s app allows subscribers to choose three new released books from a curated list of 4-5 newly published books to have delivered to their doorstep each month. Then you can discuss your favorites on their app in their discussion community. It’s just like having a bookstore and a book club in your pocket!

So which of these book apps will you be downloading? Let us know in the comments, and tell us if there are any you think we missed!

About the Author

Jaylynn Korrell is a nomadic writer currently based out of Pennsylvania. In addition to her writing and reading for Independent Book Review, she curates lists at GoodGiftLists.com .

Thank you for reading Jaylynn Korrell’s “17 Best Book Apps for Avid Readers” If you liked what you read, please spend some more time with us at the links below.

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5 of the best apps to track your reading and discover new books

As 2022 comes to a close, you may be looking for the best reads of the year that you might have missed, or you may want to start compiling a list of books you want to read in the new year. There are numerous apps out there that are designed to help you keep track of your reading and discover new books, so we compiled a list of some of the best ones to help you pick one that’s to your liking.

Some of the apps on this list are somewhat new, while others have been around for a few years. Amazon-owned Goodreads , which is arguably the most popular book-related app, isn’t included in this list because we’re focusing on newer, lesser-known platforms.

StoryGraph is an  Android and iOS app that lets you track your reading and get personalized recommendations. You can mix and match the app’s set of filters to find your next perfect read. The app offers many reading challenges, such as reading one book from every country in the world or reading one book per week across several genres. StoryGraph also includes a built-in reading journal and annual reading and page goals.

The app’s rating system is unique because it gives users a series of questions that the platform will then use when recommending a book to another user. For example, if you say that the book you read would be good for someone who likes emotional and fast-paced novels, StoryGraph may recommend that book to someone who is looking for such a read. The rating system also lets you rate using full, half or quarter stars, unlike Goodreads, which only lets you rate on a full-star system.

StoryGraph is great for people who want something kind of similar to Goodreads. The app is free to use, but also offers a $4.99 per month subscription plan that unlocks additional features, such as advanced stats and more personalized suggestions.

Tertulia is a somewhat new iPhone app that differentiates itself from other similar book discovery platforms by using machine learning to scan online discussions to see what books people are talking about. The app starts off by asking you to specify what kinds of books you want to read. You can choose to get recommendations from people you follow on Twitter, along with fiction authors, feminist voices, journalists, book critics, scientists and more. Then, the app will serve you daily recommendations tailored to your interests, which improve the more you engage with books on the app.

The app lets you browse books that are currently popular, while also helping you keep track of what you want to read. If you find a book that interests you, you can purchase it directly from the app if you live in the United States. Tertulia’s app is easy to use and features an intuitive browsing experience.

Tertulia is great for people who want to discover what books are currently popular across social media, podcasts and the web. The app is free to use and is launching on Android soon.

Basmo is an Android and iOS app that is designed to help you create a reading habit while also tracking your books. The app is mainly geared toward people who want to become a better and more efficient reader. Basmo tracks the time you spend reading and gives you an overview of your overall reading progress. You can also create a personalized reading schedule to help you easily tackle your goals one page at a time.

As you read, you can use Basmo to digitally scribble your thoughts and ideas about parts of a book that you find interesting. You can also scan and highlight your favorite passages as you read. Once you finish a book, you can track how it made you feel. For example, you can note if the book made you feel excited, happy, angry, bored or confused.

The app is great for people who don’t care about the social or community aspects of reading and instead want to focus on their goals and progress. Basmo is free to use with standard features. The app also offers a $5 per month subscription that unlocks unlimited functionality and additional features.

Readerly is an Android and iOS book discovery app that helps you track your reading and find new books. Unlike every other app in this roundup, Readerly doesn’t include a five-star rating system. Instead, the app provides context with every review that shows you how much your tastes overlap with the reviewer, books you’ve both read and topics you both enjoy. The point of this is to prevent you from possibly passing over a book that you may actually end up liking, regardless of what it’s rated on another platform.

The app also moves away from long reviews and instead has Gists, which are the app’s short review format. Gists essentially get users to write a TL;DR version of a review in 200 characters or less. Gists are then turned into an Instagram Stories-like format. Once you’ve created your Gist, you can add additional slides with your favorite quotes, characters or other additional information that you think others might find helpful. In terms of book discovery, the app will surface Gists from readers with similar reading tastes as you.

Readerly is great for people who want to try a unique book discovery platform. The app is free to use and also offers a $2.99 monthly subscription fee for users who want to support the new platform and receive personalized ratings.

TBR Bookshelf

TBR Bookshelf is a fairly new iOS app that is mainly catered toward #BookTok, a popular TikTok sub-community focused on popular books and literature. The app offers a simple and decluttered user interface. Like other book tracking apps, TBR Bookshelf lets you track books you’ve read, want to read and are currently reading. The app’s rating system lets you outline your favorite characters and quotes. You can also note if you reread a book or if you didn’t finish a book at all.

The app has specific rating categories for different genres that go beyond star ratings. For example, if you are rating a self-help book, you can give it separate ratings based on how inspirational and helpful it was. Or, if you’re rating a classic book, you can give it different ratings based on how heartfelt and interesting it was.

TBR Bookshelf is a good app for people who are part of #BookTok, as many of the features are geared toward these users. The app is free to use but also offers a $4.99 monthly subscription that unlocks extra features, including things like seasonal ratings, book playlists and TV show and movie adaption ratings.

Here are the best books that TechCrunch read this year

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Best ebooks apps in 2021

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Forget about dedicated e-readers — the best ebooks apps let you read everything from books to articles to comics directly on your smartphone or tablet. Apple's Books and Google Play Books already do a great job as stock apps, but specialist reading apps bring additional features to the fix — highly configurable settings, support for odd formats and read-all-you-can subscriptions just to name a few.

Check out more than a dozen of the best ebooks apps, from convenient, all-in-one marketplace-reader combinations to feature-packed and customizable standalone readers, as well as subscription-based unlimited reading services.

• Best Kindles : Get a top e-reader
• These are the best audiobook apps
• Where to get free ebooks

The best ebooks apps to download today

1. kindle (android, ios: free).

Amazon's Kindle app is a multi-platform e-book juggernaut, featuring marketplace, reader and library management features. More than 1 million titles are available in the Kindle store, from the latest bestsellers to free classics. 

A customizable display lets you set font size, brightness and other settings. Also, Kindle syncs your last page read, bookmarks, highlights and notes between devices and platforms. 

One of the best things about the Kindle app is Kindle Unlimited program. Through that program, Kindle users are able to access to thousands of audiobooks and e-books for a monthly fee. Overall, Kindle provides an excellent mix of usability, legibility, value and variety to feed your reading habits.

Download Kindle: Android , iOS

2. Realm (Android, iOS: Free)

It used to be known as Serial Box, but a name change to Realm hasn't changed the app's approach to getting a good story. You don't have to shell out for a complete audiobook, with Realm instead offering shorter, episodic content in bite-sized chunks of novels. If you've resumed commuting, Realm's installments are just about the perfect length.

You can pick from a range of genres — drama, fantasy, sci-fi and more. The first episode is usually free, with subsequent installments costing $1.99. You get both text and audio versions of a story, and discounts on the full version are available with a season pass. 

With offerings such as “The Witch Who Came In From The Cold”, “Bookburners” and “Tremontaine” and a highly configurable reader and audiobook player mode, Realm is an interesting take on digital books.

Download Realm: Android , iOS

3. Scribd (Android, iOS: $8.99/month)

While Amazon boasts of its Unlimited program, it wasn't first off the bat in providing an unlimited access program for books. Scribd offers an unlimited access program for ebooks, which was compared to a "Netflix for books." 

Scribd features a library of more than 500,000 books from 900-plus publishers across a variety of genres. The app features a customizable display as well as curated editorial collections, personalized recommendations based on your reading history and the ability to download books for offline reading.

Download Scribd: Android , iOS

4. tiReader (iOS: Free)

Think of tiReader as an all-in-one iOS ebook reader option for consuming your DRM-free ebooks, audiobooks, and digital comics. The app supports a broad selection of formats, such as epubs, PDFs, cbrs and cbzs, as well as photos, archives, and more. 

A customizable reader includes bookmarks, annotation tools, day and night modes, library management and search filters, as well as cross-device syncing. tiReader also includes cloud support for ebooks that you store online, as well as OPDS support for publicly available ebook libraries and public domain content. 

The free version of this top ebooks app lets you try things out with a five-document maximum in the library (you can keep deleting files if you want to add new books). The $4.99 in-app purchase upgrades you to the unlimited version of tiReader.

Download tiReader: iOS

5. Libby by Overdrive (Android, iOS: Free)

Why spend a ton of money on ebooks if your local library already has a digital media lending system? Libby takes Overdrive's popular digital media management system and lets users to borrow ebooks and audiobooks from participating libraries. 

Simply sign in with your library card and then you can browse your library's digital media collection, allowing you to search for titles, set holds, borrow ebooks and audiobooks with a tap, and return or extend a lend just as easily. 

You can preview books from the app, downloading borrowed titles or streaming them to your phone or tablet if you prefer to save space.

Download Libby: Android , iOS

6. FullReader (Android: Free)

FullReader is an all-in-one Android ebook reader, supporting numerous formats, such as epub, PDF, CBR and CBZ, as well as office files like RTF, .doc, .docx and even MP3s (great for audiobooks). Users can sort their files into collections or simply use the built-in file explorer, and the app also includes cloud storage support as well as OPDS compatibility for exploring libraries of free online content. 

The reader itself is clear and easy to navigate, with access to bookmarks, the table of contents, text-to-speech, and the ability to make notes and annotations. The app is free and ad-supported, with an in-app purchase disabling advertising.

Download FullReader: Android

7. Madefire Comics & Motion Books (Android, iOS: Free)

Like other comic readers, Madefire gives you access to enough comic books to choke Galactus. But some of them also move, along with adding lashings of atmosphere with 3D elements and audio.

These aren’t cartoons — you get traditional panel layouts. But parts of the image transition in a manner that draws your eye to certain elements. Your reading pace is slowed, helping you take everything in. And the action is joined by rumbles and dark music in the likes of Hellboy, or iconic transformation sounds in Transformers.

This may be a gimmick — and it’s unlikely to tear you from your comic reader of choice. But as a glimpse into a different way of presenting comic stories, Madefire’s well worth a look.

Download Madefire: Android , iOS

8. KyBook 3 (iOS: $14.99/year)

KyBook 3 is one of the best ebooks apps because this all-in-one e-reader supports DRM-free formats like epub, RTF, DJVU, PDF, CBR and CBZ. Whether you're looking to read poetry or prose, comic books or RPG rules, KyBook's likely to do a solid job. 

You can configure the viewer's fonts (including supplying your own font files), themes, and other layout settings like margins and line spacing. Readers can upload files through iTunes, or access their ebooks in supported cloud services like iCloud, Google Drive, Dropbox, and Yandex Disk. There's even support for OPDS catalogs, allowing you to access tons of free and public domain content online. 

A premium subscription — $14.99 for a year, though three-month options are available — allows you to sync your ebook metadata and files across devices.

Download KyBook: iOS

9. Comixology (Android, iOS: Free)

Comixology is one of the most popular digital comic platforms online, featuring titles from major comics publishers such as Marvel , DC and Image. Readers can buy their favorite issues and series from the Comixology website and read them in the app, which in addition to being a top ebooks option is also one of the best comic book readers . 

Of particular note Comixology's the Guided View mode, which is great for reading on a small screen. US customers benefit from an Unlimited mode that works as a "read-all-you-can" subscription. On the downside, you can't import in an existing comics collection or make in-app purchases on iOS.

Download: Comixology: Android , iOS

10. Chunky (iOS: Free)

If you already have a collection of DRM-free comics, you may want to check out Chunky instead of Comixology. Chunky is a free and feature-packed comics option for the iPad . 

On the technical side, Chunky supports CBR, CBZ and PDF comics, as well as metadata tags from ComicRack and ComicBookLover. A smart upscaling mode renders even low-res files as crisply as possible, while multiple view modes let you read however you like. There's even an auto-contrast/tint fix to adjust for faded comic scans. 

The app can download comics from your cloud storage services, such as Dropbox and Google Drive, straight into the app's self-organizing library. Plus, a parental lock allows you to flag and hide titles behind password protection. It's a fantastic free package whose only fault is a lack of iPhone support. For the cost of a $3.99 pro upgrade, the app can connect to Mac or Windows shared folders, FTP or SFTP servers, ComicStreamer, Calibre or Ubooquity libraries for sharing files in and out.

Download Chunky: iOS

11. Comicat (Android: $2.99)

For DRM-free comic reading on Android, check out Comicat, another app that blends a comic book reader with the best ebooks apps have to offer. This premium Android comic book reader gives you a ton of features and customizability for less than the price of a single comic issue. 

The app auto-scans your mobile device (or selected library folders) for comics in supported formats (such as CBR, CBZ, and PDF). It then automatically sorts them into series in a nice bookshelf view which you can manually organize. Once you're in the reader view, the interface is unobtrusive, with long press or slide controls bringing out options and settings. 

Comicat supports cloud storage folders, password protection, manga-style right to left displays, image enhancement to correct contrast, brightness, and saturation among other tweaks.

Download Comicat: Android

12. Moon+ Reader (Android: Free)

Moon+ Reader is a nifty Android e-book reader app known for its highly customizable interface. While it may not come with a dedicated marketplace, Moon+'s UI makes it stand out from the pack. You can set font styles and sizes, backgrounds, spacing, paging modes, autoscroll, multiple view modes and more. 

The app is free, but a $6.99 pro version is also available to remove ads and add PDF support, as well as other extra features. If you already have a sizable e-book collection and are just looking for an Android app to read with, then consider Moon+ for your e-book reading needs.

Download Moon+: Android

13. FBReader (Android, iOS: Free)

FBReader supports EPUB, RTF, DOC, HTML, MOBI and other formats on both Android and iPhones. While it doesn't feature an attached store like some other best ebooks apps, FB Reader makes up for it with its highly customizable nature. 

Users can tweak text fonts, size, hyphenation, text colors and backgrounds, margins, page animations and more. External dictionary support, a browser/downloader for finding books online, language localizations and plugin support for PDFs and library syncing round out an impressive free package.

There is a pro version of FBReader that sheds some of the limitations of the free version — you can store more than 10 books and the translation feature is enabled. That costs $6.99 of Android users and $4.99 on the iPhone.

Download FBReader: Android , iOS

14. Aldiko (Android, iOS: Free)

Aldiko is a neat e-book reader app that supports EPUB, PDF, and Adobe DRM encrypted e-books. A clean and customizable interface includes settings for text size, margins, page layouts, brightness, fonts, colors and more. 

A library management system allows you to easily sort your material by tags and collections. The core reader is free, but a Premium version includes the ability to add notes, highlights, notes and an ad-free experience.

Download Aldiko: Android , iOS

15. Kobo Books (Android, iOS: Free)

While not as well known in the US, Kobo is especially popular in Canada and France. Featuring a library of more than 5 million ebooks and publications, Kobo lets you access content from its online store while also letting you import your own content. 

The app supports numerous formats, such as EPUB, PDF, CBZ and CBR. Obligatory view and text customizations let you get comfortable, and the app syncs across devices and platforms.

Download Kobo Books: Android , iOS

16. Marvin 3 (iOS: Free)

Marvin is a feature-packed and extremely configurable iOS reader app for DRM-free EPUB files; it also supports CBZ and CBR comics. 

As a reader, Marvin boasts several great reading features, from a variety of fonts (including a specialty font for dyslexic readers), a night mode and customizable themes, highlighting, annotation and dictionary tools. You'll also find numerous format tweaks ranging from text justification, to paragraph indentation and spacing. 

In addition, you'll find a solid set of organizing tools, allowing you to sort into collections, choose from list or cover views, collection sorting and more. The app also supports iOS features like Split View on the iPad. There are also premium features require a $4.99 in-app purchase.

Download Marvin: iOS

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Craig Grannell has been writing about tech for longer than he cares to remember, and spends his days surrounded by black rectangles, cables, and countless devices going DING when a notification comes in. He’s written for a bunch of magazines and websites including Tom's Guide, TechRadar, Wired, Stuff and many others, and specializes in Apple, apps, games, design and retro. At some point, he’s hoping someone will pay him a full-time wage to write about Robotron: 2084 and Bubble Bobble all day.

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The 6 Best Book Apps for Reading, Discovering, and Borrowing New Books

Everything we know about ‘love in taipei’, the ‘loveboat, taipei’ movie, these 14 books have the most unique magic systems in ya, choose a romance trope, we’ll give you a book rec.

It’s practically a book nerd’s duty to discover new ways to read books at any time. How else would we know the best ways to read on a rainy day, a crowded train, or while de-stressing during a chaotic week? Luckily for us, there are some great apps available to make reading, keeping track of your TBRs, and listening to audiobooks easier than ever! Plus, some that are just plain fun.

So, without further ado, here are six of the best book apps for your reading experience!

The 6 Best Book Apps

FOR READING AND DISCOVERING NEW BOOKS

1. Goodreads

Plus, you can search, rate, and review every book in the entire Goodreads catalogue. It makes it even easier to keep track of all the books you want to read and have read, you can add status updates for the books you’re currently reading, and you can take part in their annual reading challenge! If you’re already doing that, see how successful you’ll really be. We also love that through the Goodreads app you can talk all things books through messages, reviews, groups, and recommendations!

• Find Goodreads on the iTunes store
• Find Goodreads for Androids

2. Bookmojis

This keyboard app includes a selection of custom YA emojis, GIFs, & stickers personally curated and created by us to celebrate book nerds and make chatting fandom fun!

• Find Bookmojis on the iTunes store
• Find Bookmojis for Androids

Using the Libby app, you can find and borrow a book with just a few taps. It has a built-in ebook reader and its own audiobook player! Plus, if you prefer, you can send books directly to your Kindle for reading. The Libby app allows you to sign in to multiple libraries with one or more library cards, stay signed in for as long as you like, download books for offline reading or stream them to save space, sample any book, read zoomable graphic novels and picture books, and consolidate all of your holds and loans on one convenient shelf! You can tag titles with ratings, sync loans and bookmarks, and keep track of your entire reading history. The possibilities are endless, and this app brings everything we love about libraries on the go.

• Find Libby on the iTunes store
• Find Libby for Androids

The community is full of passionate readers, authors, and influencers who create short posts about all of their reading moments. It’s almost as if you combined Instagram and Goodreads into one social experience.

Since enjoying a book has no end, Litsy is totally mobile and allows you to capture whatever bookish thoughts you have, whenever you have them. It also makes it easy to fall into a rabbit hole of book nerdy fun, browsing your feed wherever you are. When you find a book that catches your interest, add it to your stack! Litsy also features a “Litfluence” scoring program, which is a fun and validating way to show you that they know what you’re saying matters. It’s all fun, simple, rewarding, and super easy to use!

• Find Litsy on the iTunes store
• Find Litsy for Androids

5. Serial Box

The stories here unfold in episodes, week after week. They’re easy to pick up, episodes are available in audio and text, and, yes, are enjoyable on their own, but also build up over the course of the season to tell a greater story.

The team at Serial Box believes that reading should be as convenient, quick, and captivating as the best TV shows. Like your favorite shows, these serials are organized into seasons of 10-16 episodes that each take about 40 minutes to listen to or read. There’s a new season every year, and a new episode every week. They’re fast-paced and full of character, because this app is aiming to bring you the highest quality fiction in a brand new exciting and engaging form.

• Find Serial Box on the iTunes store

6. OverDrive

Available 24/7, OverDrive lets the library come to you. There are no more late fees because titles are automatically returned, and you can place holds, create wish lists, and get notified when books you’ve requested are available! You can sync libraries, bookmarks, highlights, and recent reading positions across devices, and all you need is a valid account with a participating school, library, or other institution. Each library builds its own collection of titles, so adding something is as easy as contacting them through the app with a tap and letting them know you’re interested!

• Find OverDrive on the iTunes store
• Find OverDrive for Androids

Are there any other apps that you use? Let us know in the comments down below!

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Our 8 Favorite Book Reading Apps of 2024

Your tablet is great, but these apps make reading on your phone a breeze

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Book lovers no longer lack choices regarding quality e-book and audiobook apps. Here are some of the best book reading apps for Android and iOS devices.

Best Free Book Reading App: Media365 Book Reader

Massive library of popular and niche e-books.

Import your own e-book files for reading in the app.

Offline reading requires a Premium subscription.

Only for Android.

Media365 is a free reading app for Android that lets you read any of the books in its library in exchange for the occasional fullscreen advertisement. Authors can self-publish on the Media 365 platform, which is why so many niche and indie titles are available. Many mainstream books are also available, like the entire Harry Potter book series.

The Media 365 library stores e-books in 15 languages, while font size can be adjusted simply by doing a two-finger pinch on the screen. There’s also a text-to-speech function, which lets the app read books to you. You can also upload your ebooks with supported EPUB, PDF, AZW3, CBC, CBR, CBZ, CHM, FB2, LIT, MOBI, TCR, AI, and PUB formats.

Best E-Book Reader App for Amazon Prime Members: Kindle

Massive library of e-books to choose from.

Apps are updated on a very regular basis.

Windows version is more for computers than touchscreens.

Can’t buy ebooks within the iOS or Android Kindle app.

The official Kindle apps on iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows are Amazon’s way of letting its customers consume their Kindle e-books without having to buy a Kindle.

Users can read any Kindle-branded e-book on the Amazon website within the Kindle app. A variety of features set this app experience apart from its rivals, including the built-in dictionary, the ability to skip ahead without losing your place, and Amazon’s X-Ray tech, which reveals extra information on a book’s characters and world while you’re reading.

The Amazon Kindle apps aren’t perfect, though. The Windows Kindle app is designed more for traditional desktop computers than modern devices with touchscreens, and the iOS and Android versions don’t support e-book purchases. However, you can still purchase Kindle e-books on the Amazon website, and titles will sync to the Kindle app almost immediately.

Most-Available Reading App: Rakuten Kobo

Many options to customize reading experience.

Official Kobo app for most phones.

Audiobooks only in iOS and Android apps.

Facebook login buggy.

Rakuten’s Kobo is a major competitor to Amazon, with millions of e-books and a growing number of audiobooks on its platform. While there's no dedicated Windows or macOS version, users can download the separate desktop version of the app for use on PCs and laptops.

The iOS and Android Kobo apps are clearly where the company puts most of its attention, with each app offering an impressive variety of font sizes, styles, and color options to make the reading experience more personal and comfortable for individual users.

Best Reading App For Kids: Epic!

Lots of in-app gamification encourages reading.

Great classic and modern children’s books.

Requires monthly subscription after 30-day free trial.

Changing settings is a bit of a convoluted process.

Epic! is like a Netflix for kids, but instead of TV shows and movies, it supplies the user with a massive library of e-books and audiobooks . Parents can make unique profiles for each of their children, who can customize their profiles based on their tastes.

While many classic children’s books are available to download, there are also many modern releases, such as one series of books covering famous pop culture icons. Children can also choose from family-friendly comic books like Snoopy and The Smurfs , and view numerous short video clips.

Best iPhone E-Book Reader App: Yomu EBook Reader

Supports numerous file types.

Save e-books from any iOS web browser.

Settings menu is very hard to find after adding books.

Download links in the tutorial, not in the main menu.

The Yomu EBook Reader is a fantastic app for iPhone and iPad users who download their ebooks in various file formats, and want to bring them all together for a cohesive reading experience.

Yomu, Japanese for “to read,” supports all of the popular e-book file formats and those supported by Amazon Kindle. Users can import files to the app via a cloud service like iCloud , Dropbox, Google Drive , or OneDrive . Once you install the app, Yomu will appear as a source when saving e-book files from any iOS web browser app.

PDF E-Book Reading App: Foxit PDF Reader

Share PDF files directly to the app on iOS.

Reflow options allow small screen readability.

New PDF file creation requires monthly subscription.

Lack of back button makes app navigation confusing.

Foxit PDF Reader Mobile is one of the better PDF apps, and is an ideal solution for those who prefer to consume e-books in the PDF file format . Unlike many similar apps that display a PDF as is and require you to pinch and zoom to read its content, Foxit features a reflow setting that resizes and reorganizes the text on a page to fit perfectly on a mobile phone’s screen.

PDF files can be transferred to the Foxit app via Wi-Fi , iCloud, or Foxit’s own Foxit Drive service. Those using an iOS device can import downloaded files directly from the share feature while using other apps.

You'll need a monthly subscription is to take advantage of many advanced settings, but those looking for an app to simply read their PDF e-books will be fine with the free functionality.

Best Reading App on Nintendo Switch: Inky Pen

Many free comics from popular franchises.

Comics look great on the Nintendo Switch.

Monthly cost a bit expensive.

No Marvel or DC Comics series.

Most would think the Nintendo Switch is just for playing games, but its library of non-game apps has been slowly growing since its launch. One of these apps, Inky Pen, is a full-fledged comic book reading app that lets anyone read full digital issues from popular comic book series on their Switch.

Inky Pen does charge a monthly fee for unlimited access to its entire library, but there are an impressive amount of free issues available that will keep most comic fans entertained during long car trips or lazy weekends. What’s cool is the app works when the Nintendo Switch is docked so that a group can read comics on a TV.

Best Reading App For Google Users: Google Play Books

Very smooth reading experience.

Page turn animation looks fantastic.

Runs really well on cheap, low-end Android tablets.

Switches to Google Play app every time for more book info.

Has a much smaller selection than Amazon.

Google Play Books, as its title suggests, is Google’s first-party app for reading e-books and listening to audiobooks bought within the Google Play Store . The book selection isn’t as extensive as Amazon’s, but it’s still large enough to please the casual reader. Those who enjoy reading at least one book a day may want more.

The good thing is that Google Play Books isn't a subscription service. You can use it to enjoy a purchased e-book or audiobook one weekend, then ignore it without feeling financial guilt for not taking advantage of some monthly fee.

Google Play Books is an excellent reading app, especially for those immersed in the Google ecosystem. It’s a very solid reading experience overall, is stable and easy to use, and has some of the best page-turn animations out of all the book-reading apps.

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Trust book recommendations from real people, not robots 🤓

Blog – Posted on Friday, May 01

The best book review sites for enthusiastic readers.

Book lovers, stop us if you’ve heard this one before: you’ve just finished a mind-blowing book and you need to hear some discussion about it. What do you do? Dive straight into the limitless realm of the Internet and search for book review sites, of course. 

Or here’s another scenario: you’ve finished reading a novel and now you’re searching for something to fill the void. Maybe you want more of the same, or maybe something completely different to switch things up. You’ll probably also scour the Internet for ratings and trustworthy recommendations. 

Fortunately, there are endless review blogs and book review sites that you can peruse. Un fortunately, not every one of them features a wide enough variety to help you. But don’t worry: we’ve got you covered with ten of the best book review sites to satisfy the bookworm in you. If you want to cut to the chase and get a personalized pick for a book review site in 30 seconds, we first recommend taking this quick quiz:

Which review community should you join?

Find out which review community is best for your style. Takes 30 seconds!

Then read on for the full explanation of all of the best book review sites out there!

1. Goodreads 

It’s impossible not to mention Goodreads when discussing book communities: it’s the Facebook of book reviews — the ultimate social media platform for bibliophiles. If you’ve somehow managed to go this long without stumbling upon this omnipresent site, here’s the run-down: you can use Goodreads to organize, display, and discuss your virtual bookshelf with other users. 

Goodreads recommendations are based on your listed interests. You can follow authors and book influencers ranging from Celeste Ng to Bill Gates . This allows you to see all their reviews, which vary from compact one-liners to critical analysis, and watch the new reviews roll in. For a quick verdict, just take a look at the star rating that they give the book. 

Also if you like to browse lists, Goodreads compiles the best and most popular books for every genre. There’s also the annual Goodreads’ Choice Awards to celebrate each year’s new releases, where you can cast your vote or peruse the list of contenders to find a new book to read. It’s a site for every kind of reader, with abundant ways to comment and interact. 

2. LibraryThing

This is the OG of all online book catalogues and discussion boards — take a look and you’ll see that it’s an oldie but a goodie. Of course, the basic functions of LibraryThing are rather similar to Goodreads: there are millions of books that readers can add to their lists, as well as review with star ratings.

While the interface harks back to the earlier days of the world wide web, LibraryThing has a secret weapon that’ll appeal to all readers, especially modern ones: their Zeitgeist . This page displays the latest crème de la crème of the whole site, from the most popular books to the hottest reviews , which you can also write with the help of a good book review template . Just a glance shows that the readers here know how to read between the lines and wield their words!

So if you’re hoping to read or share some in-depth literary thoughts with fellow sharp-minded users , LibraryThing is the site to browse. (You can even access it without creating an account!) 

3. Reedsy Discovery 

Now, if you’re searching for some hidden gems to peruse, Reedsy Discovery ’s got your back. While our blog features everything from classics to contemporary hits, Discovery’s specialty is indie publications, many of which are accompanied with succinct comments from experienced reviewers . There’s no better way to broaden your horizon! 

Moreover, if casual and creative reviews are more your cup of tea, then rejoice: the burgeoning community of readers on Discovery can leave comments, one-line reviews, and video reviews (calling all Booktubers!) on just about any book. It’s a fun and interactive way to geek out over your favorite reads and discover all the coolest new titles you won’t find anywhere else.

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4. LoveReading 

Though it’s UK-based, this prolific site caters to audiences around the world. LoveReading is strictly a reviewing site, with a base of staff writers and carefully selected contributors, so you know the reviews are top-notch. The staff often give quite personal reading experiences in their reviews, which make their recommendations very endearing, like they’re from a close friend. They even offer you presents — well, if you think of giveaways as presents! 

LoveReading covers books from every genre you can think of. They also have weekly, monthly, and yearly list features to keep you up to date with the latest stellar releases, so you’ll never be in want of something to pore over. 

5. The Millions 

In search of reviews that really dive into the themes, metaphors, and overall executions of interesting and highbrow books? The Millions has got you covered. 

Written by a collection of seasoned critics, these reviews are speckled with memorable quotes, elegant analysis, and plentiful comparisons to other works — which means extra reading recommendations for you! If contemporary and literary fictions are your go-tos, then The Millions is the site for all your lit nerd needs. 

6. SFBook Reviews 

Those who think quantity and quality don’t go hand in hand, you clearly haven’t encountered SFBook Review . The five reviewers on the team here share two common and important goals: firstly, to follow the outpour of new titles in the sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres every year, and secondly, to give thoughtful reviews to as many of them as possible.

This team knows their SFF niches inside out, so their verdicts are very credible. Still, their reviews are quite friendly and personal — they discuss other related books and share their reading experiences to help you make your own reading choices. 

7. Bookpage

Bookpage features all kinds of genres: from children’s books to nonfiction, from the works of household names to debut authors, and so much more. Their format is neat and straightforward — they bring you the volumes they think are most worthwhile, recommending them to you by summarizing and concisely commenting on the prose, the theme, and the plot of each chosen book.

In addition to this, Bookpage also features author interviews and articles that unearth the deeper themes and purposes of certain books. If you’re a true book lover seeking like-minded literary aficionados, this may be the perfect place for you.

8. Book Riot 

Avid readers, you’ve probably stumbled upon Book Riot more times than you can remember. While it’s not a site that individually assesses titles, it has lists for everything — from timeless literary giants to the top books in each genre. What’s more, Book Riot has lots of thinkpieces that dive deep into the way certain titles make readers feel — be it exhilarated, motivated, or enraged — and that’s really all you need to know when deciding to embark on a new reading adventure. 

Additionally, if you’d rather listen to discussions and reviews rather than read them, you'll be happy to know that Book Riot has a range of podcasts for you to choose from. 

9. NetGalley 

NetGalley is another platform bringing you new and unconventional recommendations. They specialize in connecting authors who are publishing to readers who’d like to preview and put in their two cents. While the database of books available here are not the most expansive, those that are featured are certainly worth your time. 

Readers can benefit most from NetGalley via their book recommendation site, Bookish , where the staff reviewers update you with their recent reads and in-depth thoughts on those reads. Along with that, Bookish also has book club kits, equipped with comprehension questions and discussion points, to help readers explore stories mindfully. 

10. BookBub

While it’s very similar to Goodreads, BookBub focuses more on connecting readers to books that might suit them specifically — which is partly why you’ll see plenty of bargains and deals promoted on the site.

Because of this promotional value, BookBub has quite a strong author community. Diana Gabaldon and Gillian Flynn , for instance, are constantly recommending books on their accounts. So if you’d like to tag along with your favorite author, this is an excellent website to visit. The only drawback of BookBub is that they only have community reviews from users based in the US, and you have to sign up in order to read them. 

With these ten sites, you’ll be sure to find your little community of fellow book lovers regardless of what your interests are. Here’s to exciting TBR lists and nourished minds!

If you want to try your hand at reviewing, we’ve got a little guide to help you out ! On the other hand, if you want to plough away at your books, why not consider the Kindle Cloud Reader ?

Continue reading

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Apple Books 12+

Read, listen, discover‪.‬.

• 3.9 • 26.9K Ratings

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Description.

Apple Books is the best place to discover, read and listen to entertaining and informative books and audiobooks. Browse through top charts, personalised recommendations and expertly curated collections in the Book Store and Audiobook Store, or use search to easily find the perfect read or listen, no subscription needed. Track what you’ve read and want to read, and set your own reading goals—all in one app and across all your Apple devices. Explore millions of books and audiobooks 
 • Check out today’s bestsellers, free books and special offers for readers of all ages, plus personalised recommendations.
 • Explore collections curated by the Apple Books team to find your next book or audiobook in your favourite genres, from mysteries and thrillers to romance, history, self-development and kids. 
• Sample any book or preview an audiobook to start enjoying the first few pages for free.
 • Keep track of the books and audiobooks you’re interested in with your Want to Read list. Customise your reading experience
 • Choose from a selection of reading themes, which include a variety of fonts and background colours.
 • Make your book easy to read by adjusting line height and letter spacing to your preference.
 • Use Auto-Night Theme and adjust your screen brightness to make reading more comfortable for your eyes.
 • Enable vertical scrolling to move continuously through books instead of flipping pages. Make reading a habit with Reading Goals
 • Set a reading goal to encourage yourself to read daily.
 • Track reading streaks and how many books you’ve read this year.
 • Get reminders and coaching to help you achieve your reading goals. Share with your whole family
• Family Sharing lets you enjoy your books and audiobooks with your favourite people. Invite up to five family members. Apple CarPlay 
 • Designed with safety in mind, the Audiobooks app in Apple CarPlay allows you to listen to audiobooks while driving.
 • Large buttons make it easy to start and stop, rewind or fast forward, and the simplified library helps you find your next audiobook while still keeping your eyes on the road. Apple Watch features
 • Use the Audiobooks app on Apple Watch to get back to your recent audiobooks or browse your library right from your wrist.
 • Use the Watch app on iPhone to choose which audiobooks to download to your Apple Watch. Requirements & store availability
 • iPhone requires iOS 11 or later. • iPad requires iPadOS 11 or later. 
• Content varies by country or region and may not be available on all devices.

Ratings and Reviews

26.9K Ratings

UPDATE: whoever fixed the annotation issue i love you and i hope you get a raise. OLD REVIEW: Came to the app store to find a new reader. Glad to see I'm not the only one who's having trouble with the new version- hopefully they'll revert it!! Here are some more suggestions: -the app deletes books off the device to save space. it's always done this but with the new version, it's not always able to re-download them- even if the epub is saved local on the files app! i've lost annotated copies. please fix this, and add a way to turn off the feature in the first place. i want all my books saved local. -every time you open the annotations list, it takes you back to the top. I'd like to be able to scroll through my annotations, click one and read it, and then open the list again and be where I left off so I don't have to scroll down and find it again. It's so annoying-i have hundreds of annotations in some books. the original version held your place in the list. Everything else I've seen described in other reviews. you dont even have to go through the trouble of fixing all this just take it back to the previous version pleaseeeeee please

Scroll Reading Issues with iOS 16

Frustration with iOS 16 disfunction leaves me wondering if the upgrade was tested before being released. I agree with the previous reviewer and won’t re-address those same concerns. However, I will address the book mark and scroll reading issues. The slightest touch while scroll reading activates the red book mark which (because I’m reading) needs to be cleared. Sometimes touching the red bookmark is enough to clear it, but other times you have to open the Themes and Settings menu and remove the bookmark there as well. This seems to be more sensitive with iOS 16 than previous versions. Even more frustrating, though; when using the scroll reading feature near the end of a chapter the (scroll) screen jumps ahead - sometimes paragraphs ahead, sometimes pages ahead, sometimes to the end of the current chapter, or other times to the end of the book. Imagine trying to find where you were reading last when that happens. (An opportunity to use the search feature as long as you have the exact verbiage.) Anyway, to fix the jumping scroll issue I change from scroll to page turning or sometimes I have decreased the font size, and then sometimes I have to close the book because it won’t reload after a font size change. And since the pages are renumbered you can’t just go to your last page and continue reading. Please FIX this bug in the near future. Thank you.

Can be the best reader

Dear Books Product Team, I am delighted to be able to reach out to you in this manner! I am a devoted Apple user and a passionate book enthusiast :P. I thoroughly enjoy your Books app, whether it's on my Mac, iPhone, or iPad. The Books app consistently provides me with a seamless and enjoyable reading experience, and I am truly grateful for your hard work! However, one minor issue I've encountered is that when I read books in the epub format, although I've noticed that the Books app allows for customizing fonts, unfortunately, the selection of fonts provided by the app is a bit limited and doesn't include my preferred ones. I attempted to find a solution through Google but was unsuccessful. The response I received was that the Books app doesn't offer additional font options (sad face). I earnestly request if it would be possible for you to add more font options, preferably allowing the import of TrueType Font files or selecting fonts from the system. Of course, it would be fantastic if I could also choose fonts that I have installed in my system (like Pages, Numbers app). Thank you sincerely! I hope you can accommodate the request of this fervent Apple Books enthusiast. Once again, thank you! Wishing you all the best!

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6 Book Recommendation Apps That’ll Tell You What to Read Next

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There's absolutely nothing worse than finishing up a great book or book series and not knowing what to read next. Sometimes it's difficult to find a book series that speaks to you as much as the one you just fell in love with, or to find more niche, smaller authors to support.

This is where book recommendation apps come in handy. Have you ever been to the bookstore and received a print out with your receipt of three or five books you might like based on the ones you just purchased? Well, this is exactly like that, just in app form. Check out the best book recommendation apps you can download today!

1. Likewise

Every day, Likewise presents you with a few books that you can either mark as read or save to read later. Then, you can view your saved books on the Saves tab and even create new lists if you already have a few books on your to-read list.

Related: Ways to Read More Books and Develop a Habit of Reading Regularly

Likewise also has a Community tab where you can view or join discussions, ask for recommendations from others, or join groups in your favorite genres. Then, there's a Discover tab where you can spend hours reading through trending books and lists like "Lana Del Rey's Favorite Reads" or "19 Page-Turners That Read Like an Action Movie."

And what's awesome about Likewise is that you can find more than just book recommendations. If you're looking for new TV shows, movies, or podcasts, the app can help you connect to similar communities and find your next favorites.

Download: Likewise for Android | iOS (Free)

2. Goodreads

With the Goodreads app, you can view personalized recommendations based on your favorite genres and previously read books. When looking at a recommendation, you can rate it if you've already read it or add it to your "Want to Read" list.

The app also has a cover scanner, which is nifty if you're in a physical bookstore. If you see a book you like, you can scan the cover and if there are reviews on Goodreads for the book, they'll pop up instantly.

Goodreads also has quite a few lists to scroll through on the Discover tab, to help you find books. The app also has reading challenges and giveaways, and you can invite friends or join groups to connect with the reading community.

Download: Goodreads for Android | iOS (Free)

Inkitt is a fantastic app to help support upcoming authors who have either just published a book or are currently working on one and want feedback. You can find pretty much every genre imaginable, so there's something for everyone on this app.

Related: Chrome Extensions to Manage Your Reading List

You tell the app what your favorite genres are and it'll automatically recommend you one or two books it thinks you'll like. Once you've read a story, you can comment on it, like it, or leave a full review for it. And you can download available books for free to read them offline while you're out of the house.

Overall, this app is really awesome for finding niche picks from smaller authors that you may not have ever heard of otherwise.

Download: Inkitt for Android | iOS (Free)

4. Bookshelf

Bookshelf won't give you personalized recommendations, but there's plenty to look through on its Explore tab. You can filter books by category to see a plethora of options, including Crime & Thriller, Food & Drink, Romance, Sport, and more. Then, once you select a category, you can even niche down your options further by selecting a subcategory.

At any given time, each category will have 60 of the bestsellers in that genre. And although you can't read reviews for each book, you can see the number of reviews and the star rating for each of the 60 books in a category.

One of the neat things about this app is your virtual bookshelf. You can add all the books you've read and use a five star rating system, tags, and notes to keep track of how much you liked it.

Download: Bookshelf for Android | iOS (Free)

5. BookSloth

BookSloth gives you personalized recommendations based on your interests and lets you browse through curated lists. Then, you can keep track of all the books you've read or want to put on your future reading list, review books when you're done reading them, and even work toward fun in-app achievements.

Related: Tips to Remember More of Every Book You Read

The app also lets you create a profile and connect with people who enjoy the same genres and authors as you. And if you don't want to actually friend anyone, you can just interact with the community by exploring discussions about books or joining book clubs.

Download: BookSloth for Android | iOS (Free)

6. ThriftBooks

If you love to buy physical books, but hate spending your entire paycheck on them, you need to check out ThriftBooks. On top of browsing a ton of curated lists and current bestsellers, ThriftBooks also gives you personalized recommendations. Each book in the app has a five star rating and most have written reviews to go alongside the rating.

ThriftBooks is also great if you're in college and want to find the cheapest textbooks possible. You can always double check Amazon and Chegg just to make sure you're getting the best price, but usually ThriftBooks has other retailers beat.

Plus, if you shop through the app and join the ReadingRewards program, you can get a free book sent to you for every 500 points you earn. And who doesn't love free books?

Download: ThriftBooks for Android | iOS (Free)

Always Have Your Next Book Lined Up

With excellent recommendations at your fingertips, you'll never run out of great books to read. And although the recommendations from app algorithms are usually pretty spot on, the communities within these apps are awesome for finding even more recommendations or just connecting with like-minded people.

If you love the smell, feel, and just enchanting world of physical books, make sure you check out your local libraries, bookstores, or even invest in a book subscription box that'll keep your life fun and interesting.

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Best Book Summary Apps 2024 – Tested and Reviewed

I love reading books.

Yet I finish most of my days with the regret I was not able to carve out enough time for reading. Between blogs, podcasts, and chatting with friends, nowadays I’m getting so many recommendations for nonfiction books that my Kindle library grows way faster than what I can read.

I have another problem. Business books usually fall into three categories:

• Great ones: full of interesting ideas and enjoyable to read (like The Unicorn Project or Lost and founder )
• Boring ones: a lot of good ideas written in an extremely boring way
• Bad ones: few ideas lost in a plethora of useless and boring pages

I love books in the first category, and they are usually the ones I review here in my blog. Unluckily, I hate the others.

It usually takes me forever to get to the end of boring nonfiction books.

I give up within the first couple of chapters when I read a bad one. And that sucks because sometimes they still have some interesting concepts I’d like to absorb.

That’s why over the weekend I came up with a new strategy: reading the entire book when it’s great. Fallback to book summaries for categories n. 2 and n. 3.

So, I’ve spent the last couple of days testing out the 4 best book summary apps to see which one is worth subscribing to. And now, I’ve decided to share my findings with you to save you some time should you be facing the same question.

The book summaries apps and websites I’ve tested are:

• getAbstract
• Mentorist (2022 update)
• Headway (2024 update)

But before I declare the best book summary app in 2024…

Is it worth reading a book summary?

Yes and no.

But before we dive deeper, a quick premise. I’m considering only nonfiction books. It would be crazy to read the summary of a novel in my opinion. This also seems to be a consolidated trend in the industry. All the book summary apps I’ve reviewed focus on nonfiction books.

Now, back to your question.

If I had enough time, I’d probably avoid reading book summaries… it feels a bit like cheating.

But I have to admit it’s an effective way to learn the key concepts of an entire book, usually in less than 30 minutes. The big question mark is… will they stick?

The value of reading a full book is that you usually get a lot of examples and repetition of the key concepts. This is useful to make it stick and to convince yourself it’s a good idea you should put into practice.

Reading the summary you get to the core concepts immediately, but you lose a lot of contexts. It feels like eating meal replacement powders: you likely get all the nutrients. But you lose all the taste .

This problem can be big or small depending on the kind of book you’re reading.

If it’s a book about “HR best practices”, it’s likely fine to read the key ideas in 30 minutes.

If you’re reading personal development books or self-improvement books … well, my personal take here is that the key ideas are almost the same on all of these books. And you probably already know them. You’re lacking the motivation to implement them.

In this scenario, reading the original book could be better. The way the author communicates the message. The motivation examples he uses to reinforce it are what really matter and they’re likely gonna be missing in the summaries.

So, if you are the kind of person that could benefit from nonfiction book summaries, let’s find out what’s the best app for you.

My criteria to pick the best book summary apps in 2024

Before I started the free trial of all these book summary apps, I’ve defined some personal criteria to pick which one I would subscribe to and which will be canceled.

I defined four main categories to rank the apps:

• Book catalog : How many book summaries do they have? Do they have the books I want to read? This is a big one and a deal-breaker for me.
• Summary quality : Another critical factor. Is the summary good? Did they capture the core ideas? Is the quality consistent across multiple books?
• Original content : Do they also have their own original content on top of book summaries? Are they any good?
• Features : do they have a mobile app? Is the website or app easy to use? Do they have any interesting unique features?

As you can see I’ve not added price as a relevant category. That’s because, no matter what’s the cost, if I’ll read summaries in a consistent way, I’ll save a lot of money compared to buying each individual book.

I actually added the last two categories after I started testing the various apps. Seems like all of them are moving beyond just book summaries and are starting to produce their own original content. Often curated summaries of multiple books on a specific topic.

On the features side, most of them nowadays also do audio summaries of most books (but machine-generated audio). I also find the usability of the app a very important factor given I’ll be using it every day.

Finally, if you’re curious to know how I tested the catalog section, here’s the list of 12 books I’ve been looking for:

• Why we sleep
• Atomic Habits
• No Rules Rule
• The subtle art of not giving a f**k
• AI Superpowers
• Lost and Founder
• The revenue marketing book
• The unicorn project
• How to lie with statistics
• Traffic secrets
• The making of a manager

Ok, time to start reading some book summaries and pick a winner!

Blinkist is probably the most known summary app in the market and the one that really started this industry. It’s reasonably priced, starting at $14.99 per month or $89.99 per year and it works like a charm.

They divide book summaries into what they call blinks. It’s usually a good mapping to the book chapters or main ideas. Each Blink usually takes no more than 5 minutes to read (or listen). At the end of the book summary, there is always a final part that recaps all the core ideas of the book.

Being the oldest book summary service the quality and catalog are usually very good.

Catalog – Vote 8

In Blinkist I was able to find 8 out of the 12 titles I used for the test. Good but not crazy good. I was actually expecting something better from their 4,500+ book summaries catalog.

Clearly, they’re focusing more and more on their original productions. If a title is a bestseller, it’s 99% sure you’ll find it in Blinkist. When you look for more niche books, there’s a 50-50 chance of not finding them.

Quality – Vote 7

The good thing about Blinkist is their consistency. You can expect all the book summaries to have quite good quality. They summarize a lot. Sometimes I would have preferred some more info on specific details.

The average summary takes 15 minutes to read. I would have preferred to go up to 30 minutes and get more details.

Still, they did a pretty good job in identifying all the core concepts of each book and expressing it in a very compelling way.

Original Content – Vote 7

Most of their original content is in form of Shortcasts. You can think of them as mini podcasts where every episode is usually 10 minutes long. There’s also a written summary for each episode.

They are of good quality and with a good selection of authors. However, I’m not a super fan of the audio format so I ended up not consuming them a lot.

Features – Vote 7

Blinkist has a very good offer. You can read on a desktop through a browser, on mobile, and on tablets.

The quality is very good with very high readability of the book summaries.

The thing I didn’t like was the inconsistency of the user experience across devices.

I LOVE the fact that you can highlight text and save it for later. Going back through my highlights of a book is something I do often. Yet I was not able to understand how to do it on my iPad. And the sync between browser and iPad is odd.

On the browser, the main dashboard is focused on the books you’re reading. On iPad on the discovery of new content. Overall, their book summary app is good but not yet great.

One very nice feature that is worth mentioning is the capability to sync your highlights with Evernote and book summaries with Kindle to read them over there and keep under the same umbrella summaries and full books.

Update May 8th 2023: Blinkist has just been acquired by EdTech startup Go1 . While this will likely have no impact in the short term, things often tend to get messy post-acquisition and we’ll need to check if they’ll keep up with their current mission or align more with Go1 needs.

Update Jan 25th 2024: Luckily, the acquisition doesn’t seem to have impacted Blinkist. So far, they have kept releasing new book summaries at the same pace, and the quality has been consistent since the acquisition.

Shortform was relatively new to the game when I first wrote this blog post, but it’s now one of the market leaders. Their catalog, once relatively small is now almost on par with Blinkist and they keep adding new books consistently with a weekly cadence.

They charge $24 per month or $197 for the annual subscription. They offer a 5 days free trial where you can explore the catalog for free.

Overall they have the best book summaries of all the apps reviewed here, and three years later since I originally wrote this post, I’m still subscribed to their service, and it’s the only book summary app I use nowadays .

The catalog is smaller than Blinkist as you can expect from a newcomer in the market. They claim 1000+ book summaries and, as you can guess, most of them are bestsellers.

I was able to find only 5 of the 12 books used for the tests. I was hoping for something more, to be honest. Most of the marketing books were missing, and even in the bestsellers, there were some gaps.

The upside is that they seem to be adding new titles at a good pace.

( 2022 Update ) The catalog keeps growing slowly but consistently. They have recently launched a Video Summary series which is free on Youtube. They are also publishing super-short summaries on Instagram .

(2023 Update) Since they keep adding books at a great pace, with around 3 to 5 new titles published every week, I’ve rechecked my list, and now 7 out of 12 books are present, absolutely in line with the other top players. I’ve increased the score in this category to a solid 8.

(2024 Update) I’m really impressed by the work Shortform is doing to improve its catalog. I’m now (Jan. 2024) reading “Feel Good Productivity” which I bought from Amazon the day it was released assuming it would take forever to get a summary. Well turns out that after just a month, Shortform has already released the summary! Great job!

Quality – Vote 8.5

The quality of their summaries is the real strength of ShortForm. I love how they structure summaries and the level of depth.

Shortform has the only summaries that can really replace reading the whole book, in my opinion .

All the other apps are only useful to understand if you might like a book before buying it or absorbing a few quotes to sound smart with your friends.

They have a generous 1-page summary to get started with. It’s really high quality, and for a quick read, you could stop there.

But if you want to go more in-depth they also offer a more detailed summary chapter by chapter. When it makes sense, they also have exercises at the end of some chapters.

Another incredible strength of ShortForm is how they make connections outside the specific book to really help you understand the topic. They often mention other books covering the same topic to add value to the summary and give you more context / different points of view.

ShortForm has the best book summaries of the apps reviewed here. Period!

Original Content – Vote 6

They don’t offer original content, but they feature summaries of top articles from the US press. The selection is still fairly limited, with around 500 articles in the catalog. Nothing to go crazy for.

There’s an audio version for all the summaries, but it’s not human-narrated, it’s actually an AI voice, which I would not listen to for 30 minutes.

Features – Vote 8

Good web and mobile versions, so avid readers will enjoy their summaries everywhere.

The experience is consistent across devices and there’s full support for highlighting text or adding notes which, unlike Blinkist, works very well also on mobile.

A nice touch is the support for dark mode in the reader to enjoy your summaries also at night.

The mobile app improved a lot over the last year and it’s now very fast and responsive. Overall it’s a very pleasing experience.

A big one for Shortform is the possibility to download a book summary as a PDF . Way more flexible than the Kindle integration found in Blinkist.

Another feature that I love is their support for ReadWise syncing. ReadWise is my app of choice to gather together all the highlights from books and articles I’ve read and check them daily to brainstorm. It’s great to have my ShortForm highlights imported there.

Update 8/8/2022: Shortform has just released another great feature that saves me money and makes my life easier. They now integrate and sync notes with Notion!

Overall, it’s a great book summary app from a software standpoint, and they keep improving it at a good pace.

The cherry on the pie is a useful summarization Chrome extension that can help you summarize in one click any webpage you’re reading, even youtube videos. It works extremely well, and I’ve been using it more and more to extract key information from posts I was reading. Since we were talking about Notion, I also use it in my daily note-taking workflow to attach some notes to the URLs I’m storing in my second brain.

GetAbstract

GetAbstract has a very unique approach. They’ve been in the book summary apps space forever with a strong focus on enterprise offerings.

Looking at their website, it’s clear that their main focus is selling to companies to give multiuser access to their employees. Still, they also have subscription plans for private users with a $29.90 monthly price tag. It goes up to $290 for yearly subscriptions.

Oddly enough, if you connect from Europe, there’s also a cheaper plan that gives you access to a more limited catalog.

Their approach is different from all the other players. While everyone is playing in a grey area from a copyright standpoint, GetAbstract acquires the rights from the publisher before writing a book summary.

Catalog – Vote 4

Even tho’ they have the largest catalog with 20,000+ book summaries, they also have the worst catalog.

Since they try to acquire rights to summarize books, you’ll find a lot of niche books but very few best sellers. I found none of the 12 books I was looking for, which was shocking.

For some of them, a review was available. For others, they said they had selected the book as interesting and were trying to secure rights. For many nothing could be found.

Clearly, the focus of this book summary service is different from the others. If you’re looking for random books to read or some very niche stuff it could be a fit. Otherwise, I’d stay away.

Quality – Vote 6

Given their unique approach, I was expecting really high-quality summaries. I was disappointed.

Don’t get me wrong, they are good. But not mind-blowing. They are also quite short, in a way comparable to Blinkist. Audio summaries are available for most books and are usually 8-12 minutes long.

Unique Content – Vote 0

They don’t seem to have any unique content added to their offer. It’s not a big issue for me, as I’m mainly looking for book summaries.

My take here is that other players recognize there’s a copyright threat to their core offer. So, they started differentiating with more and more unique content. GetAbstract secured legal rights before writing a review so they didn’t feel the need to diversify their offer.

Features – Vote 6

Everything works smoothly both on the website and the mobile app.

They support highlighting, and they have the concept of channels where you can create (or consume) curated collections of books.

I don’t like the reading experience on browsers. A lot of distracting elements in the interface and small fonts make them look more like regular blog posts than the interface of an ebook reader. The experience is way better on the iPad app.

On the bright side, you can download a PDF version of all their summaries. Overall, it’s not among my favorite book summary apps.

Another consolidated player in the book summary apps space. Instaread ‘s unique take on book summary apps is to produce a lot of high-quality, unique content on top of summaries.

Pricing is relatively cheap; they start at $8.99 per month or $89 if you go yearly. They also have a nice lifetime deal where you can get unlimited access forever at $299. It’s not bad at all if you are planning to read book summaries as a life habit.

The free trial lasts 7 days.

Catalog – Vote 5.5

Instaread has 1,000+ book summaries like Shortform but in my selection of 12 books, I was able to find only 4 of them, the big hits. None of the more niche books I was looking for were available.

This may also be due to the fact that within the 1,000-plus books, they also list a lot of fiction.

When it comes to the quality of the content… It’s okay but not my favorite one. It’s basically a collection of chapter summaries with the key takeaways of each chapter.

Everything is very condensed and schematic with a bullet-point approach. I don’t love it, but that’s a matter of personal taste. I have to admit it’s well done.

I missed the one-pager introduction that ShortForm has.

An audio version is available for every book. Like the other apps, it’s not human read, but it’s a generated voice.

Unique Content – Vote 8

Instaread clearly bets heavily on original content.

First of all (even tho’ it’s not unique), they have a large collection of article summaries from top publishers they’ve partnered with. This includes articles from The New York Times, Harvard Business Reviews, and many others.

On top of this, they have a lot of Instaread Originals. Short-form books on almost any subject. A strong area of attention seems to be biographies. They cover anyone from Kamala Harris to Jack Dorsey. They are usually well-done and insightful. Reading time for their originals averages on the 15 minutes mark.

Features – 6

They support both web and mobile with a pretty good app.

The reading experience is ok, even though moving from one chapter summary to the next could be better.

A unique feature of the mobile app is the Cards section, where you can read through cards, each containing a key takeaway from the book.

It’s not possible to save highlights from the summaries… this, for me, is a real deal-breaker.

Headway is a newcomer to this list, added in 2024. It’s becoming really popular and has an impressive growth.

Pricing starts at $14.99 per month, but, full disclosure: they were nice enough to give me a free account for this review.

I just discovered that as of January 2024, it’s being listed on AppSumo to purchase as a lifetime deal for $59. A true bargain if you end up liking the app. This is great news but also a bit scary… I’m often a bit skeptical of mature companies running lifetime deals… they are great when you get started as a marketing opportunity, but in the long run, they are not economically sustainable.

Headway has a very unique positioning within the book summary apps space. While competitors focus a lot on the core idea of book summaries, Headway wants to position itself as a personal growth tool with a lot of emphasis on self-assessment tests and reading lists based on which area you want to improve.

This approach is somehow refreshing, especially for users who are not book nerds with a long list of titles they want to read but rather have an objective they want to achieve.

Now, let’s see how it compares to the other tools in my four categories!

Catalog – 8

The catalog is large, even though it’s slightly skewed towards personal growth books. However, I found 7 out of the 12 books in my test list. It’s worth noting that 3 to 4 books in the list are very niche, and it’s not surprising that they’re not here.

Anyway, they keep adding new books quickly, and I found many relatively new books. It’s worth noting, however, that in the last few months, they appear to have reduced the pace of publishing.

Overall, I think it’s almost comparable to Blinkist and maybe larger than Shortform.

Quality – 6

This is probably the most disappointing part of Headway… it’s also very personal so you should decide by yourself: I don’t like too much their summaries.

The idea is good; for every book, they highlight some key concepts and you can read through each one of them to go more in-depth. Each point, on average, is longer than alternatives like Blinkist, but is nowhere near the depth and quality of Shortform.

Very often, it seems more like a collection of quotes and sentences taken from the book rather than a straight-to-the-point summary. 

The idea of having one or more key concepts within each chapter that you can easily save and then access later in the form of a flash card is very nice. And effective when well executed. It’s not always the case.

As an example on a page from “AI Superpowers” about the AI revolution and how it will eliminate manual laborers, the key takeaway that you can save is: 

“The internet connects the world easily and quickly, creating an environment where ideas can be exchanged and discussed.”

This is completely off-point and obvious… thank you for reminding me what the internet is!

The quality varies a lot from book to book, and it’s often inconsistent.

Original Content – 4

Headway doesn’t produce original content, but I’m feeling generous, and I’ll consider as original content their effort in content curation.

They do have many guided “challenges” to learn something new. Each challenge has a duration of days, and each day it’ll recommend reading a specific book from a curated list to learn a new skill. It’s nice and well-curated.

They also produced some “Visual stories” for bestsellers. Think of them as Instagram stories for book summaries. There are few of them, and honestly, they are pointless. Here’s an example:

Can you see the problem? it looks half-baked. The text is small for the amount of space available but most of all… the illustration is nice but completely useless to help you better understand the concept.

I think this is a big missed opportunity. Some people need visuals to learn new concepts. And an Infographic-like approach could have helped a lot differentiate Headway from competitors. These illustrations are nice but don’t add anything in terms of value.

Features – 5

The app is overall okay but doesn’t shine.

It has a nice UI in category pages, but I don’t love the reading interface… it’s too minimal and with little control over fonts.

One key feature that is missing is a web version; I get it… their approach is so unique it needs to be mobile first. On the other hand, now and then, I find it useful to access book summaries from the web browser too. Especially for copying and pasting to take notes.

Notes are the other issue I have with the App. While Headway lets you highlight and store text, everything remains within the app. As of now, there’s no integration with ReadWise or Notion.

Mentorist is a new entry I’ve discovered in January 2023.

It has a unique twist. Their focus is not only on summarizing books but more on helping you execute what you learn.

I can relate to the core value proposition of this app. Way too many people use the number of books they read in a year as their key metric rather than focusing on really understanding the book and taking action.

That’s what intrigued me the most about this app. Let’s see if it lived up to its promises.

Catalog – 5

The catalog here is very limited. Out of the 12 books in my basket, I was only able to find 3, the most popular ones, and focused on self-growth. Quite surprisingly, they didn’t even have “No rules rule” which is very popular.

A back of the napkins calculation based on their books page as of March 2022, shows only 182 books in their catalog.

Somehow this was expected, Metorist launched later compared to its competitors in the book summary space, and clearly, it still has to build its catalog.

The good note is that since I’ve signed up to the service, they’ve been adding 2 to 4 books every week and the browsing of the catalog is very pleasant with a lot of curated collections.

What can I say… it’s acceptable but not great. The summaries are very short, divided into short pages. Most books range from 10 to 20 pages, and there’s a bit of inconsistency among the length of the pages from one book to another.

What I did like about Mentorist is the audio summary. It’s usually in the 20-minute range, and finally, it’s not recorded by a robotic voice but read by a human being. Overall listening to the summaries has been quite a pleasant experience.

Personally, I think I’d use it to understand if I want to buy and read the full version of a book or to read something I’m not really interested in. For something that I care about, the summaries are too short.

Unique Content – 0

Right now Mentorist doesn’t have any unique content and they’re only focusing on summarizing popular books.

It’s a choice that somehow makes sense given they’ve chosen the app dynamics as a differentiator while other players in the space all have the same kind of app and are trying to diversify themselves more based on the catalog and their unique content catalog.

Features – 8

Feature-wise, Mentorist built a pretty good App to consume summarized books. As you can see it support dark mode and overall it’s always pretty fast and responsive.

The thing that I like the least is the reading experience. Instead of a full-page reader, it opens the summary in a relatively small window.

Highlights work very well with a dedicated page to check them and the capability to set reminders to read them again and set aside some time to brainstorm.

Finally, at the end of each book’s summary page, there’s an actionable takeaway that you can add to your list. It only takes one click and comes with some quick steps to execute it.

Once added you’ll be asked what’s the objective you want to achieve with that specific takeaway and you’ll receive reminders.

You can also log your progress and add notes.

Overall it’s a very good app with a strong idea behind it.

Good enough to forget about the small catalog and the mid-quality summaries? Not for me. I don’t think a “todo-list” tied to a book summary will make much of a difference for me. But if they improve the quality and the catalog they might be on the right path to have real differentiation in this market.

Other Book Summary Websites

There are a lot of other players in the space. I’ve tried a bunch of them, like 12min , Perlego , and ReadinGraphics for visual learners.

All of these websites offer their own take in the “app that summarizes books” space. I don’t think it’s worth mentioning them in this comparison because of their catalog size.

It’s gonna be interesting to revisit them in a year (yes, I promise I’ll keep this updated at least yearly) and see which one increased its catalog the most to become more appealing.

What’s gonna happen to the book summaries space?

My personal take is that this space is too crowded with very little differentiation between players.

Adding more books, of course, is the best way to get more customers. On the other side once all the best-sellers are covered, scaling up the number of summaries for niche books might be too expensive compared to the number of potential customers they could bring in.

This might also open opportunities for smaller players that focus on a specific niche. As an example, I’d be 100% happy to signup even at a premium price to a service specialized in marketing books.

The other question mark is legal. I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t know if book summaries are legal or not. For sure, things are changing. A few years ago, all the services were using original covers of the books. Nowadays, no one does.

For sure, there’s a level of risk involved in this business, and should the space become big enough, publishers could partner with these apps or go hard against them and keep all the pie for themselves.

Finally, another potential disruption to this industry could be AI and, specifically GPT-3. This new system has already proven to be able to write books… it’s gonna be relatively simple to use it to write book summaries at scale and with good consistency.

The Best Book Summary App in 2024

Guess it’s time to declare a winner.

Let’s go by exclusion!

getAbstract … sorry not my cup of tea. I loved the fact that you were the only ones not forcing me to insert the credit card to join the trial… but your catalog is just not a good fit for my interests.

Mentorist … The idea behind it it’s nice, helping you put into practice what you learn. But the catalog and the summary length are not where they should be right now.

Headway… It’s a missed opportunity. They have the unique concept of focusing more on a personal-growth path rather than just book reviews. It remains an idea poorly executed.

Instaread … well played with original contents and article summaries, but you didn’t excel in the catalog or the summary quality so I don’t see a reason to sign up; I’m canceling my trial, but you could be a good fit for many.

Blinkist …size does matter. And when it comes to the books that I care about, they have the largest database. However, quality matters the most for me, that’s why in the 2022 update, I’ve moved Blinkist to the second spot. Their summaries are just too short for me. They don’t have the best mobile App. Overall, the quality is consistent, and it’s reasonably priced.

ShortForm … It’s my winner for the 2024 edition of this post. The catalog is not yet where I’d love it to be, but it keeps growing, the app is great. They let me download PDF versions of the summaries, and the quality of the summaries is just great. By far the only ones that can really replace reading the full book and passing enough information to make it actionable. It’s more expensive, but it’s a price I’m more than happy to pay for the value I’m getting.

Taking everything into account, ShortForm is the winner of my roundup of the best book summary websites in 2024.

Conclusions

That’s it for this year. It was a tight Blinkist vs Short Form battle, but in the end, to call a winner, I just went with the one I keep using way more often. If you want to pick just one app go for ShortForm , you won’t regret it. If you can afford to spend a bit more, add Blinkist to the mix to get a quick overview on a broader number of books.

I hope I have helped you save some time and money by picking the best tool among all the book summary sites.

Now, it’s up to you to decide if reading book summaries is good enough for you. I still have mixed feelings about it and wish I had more time to read the full-length books. Unluckily, I don’t, and I found these summaries to be useful when there’s something I know I would not love to read, but would still be valuable for my personal growth.

Did I forget some Apps in this roundup? If there’s any service worth testing that I didn’t mention, just let me know in the comments below and I’ll be happy to add it.

Bonus Tip: Book Summary Apps coupon code

Nah, I’m just kidding. I don’t have any coupon code. BUT…

I have a couple of tips to save some money when subscribing to most of these apps.

First of all, wait for the full length of your trial. Some of them might send you a 10% discount if you upgrade to a paid plan earlier.

Second, signup through their websites, not the mobile app. This is for a couple of reasons:

• Some websites have popups that offer a 10% discount if you sign up for a trial
• Some Apps actually have different pricing if you subscribe on the browser or on mobile. Mobile is usually expensive (because of % they have to pay Apple and Google)

Finally, even if you should not do it, if you live in Europe with the current crazy EUR/USD exchange rate, you might want to use a VPN and sign up in $ masking your connection as a US resident. I use TunnelBear for this usually.

Massimo Chieruzzi

I'm Massimo and I run this blog. I'm a jack of all trades, master of none, juggling between startups, marketing, and product. You might know me as the co-founder of AdEspresso and Breadcrumbs. This blog is my playground where I build stupid tools to solve everyday marketing problems and experiment with the latest marketing tactics!

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25 comments.

July 26, 2022

Hey Massimo! First of all, congrats on the excellent post! Strict to the point, you reviewed what really matters. I want to ask you if you have ever heard/tried Accel5, from EBSCO? Their content seems niched for me, but I've found some engaging titles there and also liked the quality of the first summary I got. Have a nice week Best, Thiago

July 27, 2022

Thanks for pointing that out Thiago, I had never heard of them but the catalog looks interesting enough, I'll try to check them out in the near future!

August 13, 2022

I really love your breakdown here. For me Shortform is also the clear winner. One thing to keep in mind which is a bit unfortunate is that in recent months shortform decided to stick to publishing new summaries exclusively as 1-page summaries. In the past the 1-page summary was the brief introduction and you could read the whole deep dive afterwards. Now there is no deep dive anymore which unfortunately brings it down to the level of blinkist because I feel like I'm missing out on the detailed analysis...

September 5, 2022

Hey Timon, Yeah, that's an unfortunate choice even tho' I get the rationale behind it from an economic standpoint :( I'll reach out to them to get more insights and update the post. I'm also afraid the decision was based on monitoring users' behavior and realizing that most users were stopping at the 1 pager. Still, I find their one-pager way more in depth and well done than Blinkist. Ciao! Max

August 16, 2022

Why isn’t summary.com listed in this comparison?

Hey Ryan, Good catch, I had never heard of it, I'll check it out and update the post! Max

October 29, 2022

Nice! I'd like to publish a translation of this article in my site. I think my readers will enjoy what you have to say. Is it possible? :)

Yes as long as you give credit and link the original article on top of your translated one :)

I really really loves reading this blog post. Very insightful abd thank you for the time you took to put this together. I never wrote s feedback on a blog before but here you go, this one is just wow. Loved it. I'll sign up to one of these apps.

November 7, 2022

November 17, 2022

Would love to hear your thoughts on Headway - I'm about to end my trial and enjoyed the summary I read but obviously I want the best app possible.

December 5, 2022

I'll try to add Headway in my next review of this post for 2023 :)

January 24, 2023

Thanks for a very thorough write up. Is there anyway to find out if a specific book is covered PRIOR to signing up for Blink or Shortform.? Do they have a public index?

January 25, 2023

Hey Neil, It's a bit tricky but you can. For Shortform, here you'll find a list of books by genre. Those with the button "Read full summary" are in their library. For Blinkist just use their top navigation under Explore :)

April 15, 2023

I'm so excited to read this one. It's wonderful!!

Book summaries

May 17, 2023

May 18, 2023

No sorry, I'm planning to go multi-language at some point, also your blog seems to be in english :)

September 28, 2023

Thank you so much for this excellent source of info on summary apps. I am now 70 yo and just do not want to waste my time and funds at this point. You have helped me!

November 30, 2023

Glad to hear that Paula!!

February 4, 2024

where is the summary of this page? kidding..thanks for great review. usually such comparison reviews have a comparison table at the bottom with a full view across all apps and ratings. helps to see a bigger picture?

ahahhaha that's a great point thanks! I'll try to add it asap, over time this review has become huge :)

March 5, 2024

This post was AMAZING!!! I wish you had a review on literally everything! Thank you for taking the time to update this annually. This space is growing and being able to come to a trusted source for the best option saved me much appreciated time and money! Your thorough, helpful, and reliable all key qualities that seem difficult to find these days🤍

March 8, 2024

Wow, this was incredibly thorough and helpful. I also subscribe to shortform but was wondering if there was anything out there with comparable summary quality and a lower price. Now, I'm happy to stay with them :)

April 29, 2024

Massimo thank you so much for this review! I was doubtful about which app to choose but I will choose shortform. I think they are expensive but they are worth the value because they have so much to give on the app

This is a very thorough review! Thanks! A lot of these are so pricey though and I don't need audio format so I use Littler Books.

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15 Amazing Free Reading Apps to Take Your Books Everywhere

Whether you’re Android or iOS, smartphone or tablet, take your pick of these free reading apps, and you’ll never be without something to read again.

Emily Wenstrom

By day, Emily Wenstrom is a content marketing specialist. By early-early morning, she is E. J. Wenstorm , an award-winning sci-fi and fantasy author whose debut novel Mud  was named 2016 Book of the Year by the Florida Writers Association.. Her Chronicles of the Third Realm War series includes Mud (#1), Tides (#2), Rain (#0), and more to come. Follow her on Twitter @ejwenstrom .

View All posts by Emily Wenstrom

When one is a voracious reader, one is frequently in the difficult position of figuring out how to take their books with them. On the subway, to the beach, on planes…Because going somewhere without them? Forget about it. But lugging them all over creation is inconvenient to say the least. Being caught mid-vacation without something to read is my nightmare. Luckily, there’s an app for that. Many reading apps.

Whether you’re Android or iOS, smartphone or tablet, keep your charger close, take your pick of these excellent free reading apps, and you’ll never be without something to read again. (This post was updated in 2022.)

Free Reading Apps

These free reading apps are free to download and also offer free books through their app.

The most interesting feature for this app is its highly customizable reading interface. Enables reading for ePub, PDF, and CBZ files, and lets you shop for new reads within the app, including many free classics. If you opt to pay for the Premium version, you can add as many audiobooks as you wish, as well as highlight and leave notes as you read. Android , iOS

A great way to discover new authors with freebie chapters, short stories, and even novels. Syncs right into your Kindle Fire. Android, Kindle , iOS

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This is a convenient reading app that can handle basically any ebook format you throw at it, including PDF, EPUB, Microsoft Word docs, and some I’ve never heard of. If you want to read a DJVU file, here’s how to do it. It auto-detects books you’ve downloaded and has adjustable reading settings. Android

This reading interface supports most popular ebook formats, and is extremely customizable, so that you can create your own online reading environment. Access reads through your library or bring your own books by uploading to Google Drive and connecting to the app. There’s also a premium version with more features. Android, iOS

Oodles eBook Reader

Another discovery platform, Oodles boasts 50,000+ reads and more than 10 languages. So learn Russian, why not. Android, iOS

This app lets you connect to your local library and access anything within its database, including both ebooks and audiobooks, and even magazines, by simply connecting your library card. This is the same company who made Overdrive, but this app is easier to use and, let’s face it, prettier. Android, iOS  

Prolific Works

Much like BookFunnel, this network is set up to help readers discover new authors with promotional freebie reads, and syncs to most ereaders. Android, iOS

This network allows authors to promote exciting new works to eager readers, making it a great place to discover new favorites. Geared toward social reading, it allows you to share thoughts via notes as you read. Android, iOS, Microsoft

Free Download, Pay for Books or Subscription

These are free reading apps to download, but from there you pay for a book subscription. Many are pretty affordable.

Amazon’s audiobook subscription service, with different levels so you can scale based on your listening pace. Android, iOS, Windows Phone; syncs to any Amazon device, laptops, and many others

Apple’s bookstore for both ebooks and audiobooks. Designed to be simple and accessible across any Apple device. iOS

Amazon’s ereader platform. Access your Kindle ebooks on any device, synced so you can pick up where you left off, and sync to Goodreads. They also offer some free Kindle books through the app. Android, iOS, Mac, PC

Another robust app with the usual features like highlighting, custom recommendations and the like. Kobo is not as big as Kindle or Nook, but is about as robust and emphasizes a more “indie shop” experience. Android, Blackberry, iOS, Windows, Desktop

For the Amazon holdouts, the Barnes & Nobles ereader’s companion app will let you sync your reading experience to your smartphone or desktop so your books can come with you anywhere. It also now features a serial reading experience. Android, iOS, Windows

If you want access to a huge database of ebooks for a monthly subscription fee, this is the service for you. They have over a million ebooks, hundreds of thousands of audiobooks, and over a million magazines and news articles to read. Android, iOS , Desktop

Comics fans will want to download this app, which is designed for comics reading. You can also sign up for a Comixology Unlimited subscription to get access to a database of tens of thousands of comics. Android, iOS , Desktop

Looking for reading apps for kids? Get them here.

Book clubs have their own apps too!

And here are even more great apps to support your reading life .

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