13 Bookish Apps
Since most of us are on our phones all the time anyway, why not put some fun bookish apps on them to help boost our reading life, connect with other book lovers, and record our beautiful book collection? Here are 13 apps that I have personally tried out just for you. I’m confident that one of these apps will be a perfect fit for you.
1. Bookly
Overview: Bookly is a book tracker that lets you track your reading in real time. This feature is a favorite for most people.
Personal Thoughts: The main reason I was looking for a book tracker was to be able to not only record my reading goals and take notes, but I really wanted to be more mindful with my reading life and the content of what I was reading and not just shoot in the wind picking out books, especially contemporary fiction. I didn’t hate this app, it just wasn’t what I was looking for at the time.
Pricing Tier:
$5 Monthly
$20 (6) Months
$30 Yearly
2. StoryGraph
Overview: StoryGraph is a jack of all trades when it comes to the ultimate book app. It has a social media platform, you can track your reading progress, get book recommendations, and, best of all, it shows you content warnings!
Personal Thoughts: This is one of the apps I currently have on my phone. At first I didn’t get the hype, but once I got the pro version I was all in. Also, they are really on top of improving their product, which I really appreciate. I was on the hunt for something that would help me find content warnings before I picked up a book. After the extremely frustrating search to find content warning sites that were geared towards adults instead of kids, I was so happy to find this feature on StoryGraph.
Pricing Tier:
$5 Monthly
$50 Yearly
3. Bookshelf
Overview: Bookshelf is a book tracker and cataloguing your home library. It is very similar to Storygraph but does not provide content warnings.
Personal Thoughts: I really like the ascetics of this app compared to the other apps listed here. This would be the perfect app if they provided content warnings.
Pricing Tiers:
$6 Monthly
$30 Yearly
$60 Lifetime Access
4. Goodreads
Overview: The dominate player on this list by far is Goodreads. Just like many of the other apps, they provide social interaction with other users, book tracking, book recommended lists, and book cataloging.
Personal Thoughts: Before I did any research on bookish apps, my default was Goodreads. I still use it, but not nearly as much as StoryGraph, and I am hoping to step away from it completely by the end of the year. If you didn’t know, Goodreads is owned by Amazon and I would rather support smaller businesses when I am able to, I will choose to use StoryGraph instead.
Pricing Tier:
Free
5. Libby
Overview: Libby is a user friendly app to listen, read, and borrow physical and digital books from your local library. Libby and Hoopla are offered all over the states so just ask your librarian which one your local library supports.
Personal Thoughts: I LOVE using Libby. The interface is super easy and convenient to use, they have thousand—if not millions—of selections from audiobooks to digital reads. If I am not sure I want to purchase a copy of a book before reading it, this is my go to.
Pricing Tier:
Free
6. Bookbuddy
Overview: Bookbuddy is an app designed to catalog your home library. You can also track what you’re reading, make wishlists for future purchases, and more.
Personal Thoughts: This app is the reason I wanted to write this post originally. I was looking for an app that would purely catalog all the books I own in my home. My books, my kids, even my husband’s. I needed organization in my life, as I was tired of purchasing duplicate books. This app solved my problem! There are other options out there as well, but I wasn’t going to try out a bunch because there’s only so much time in a day. I have a lot of books y’all, and this app has saved me money and head space.
Pricing Tier: *each tier is based on how many books you own I think the first tier starts around 500 and goes up to 50,000 ALSO some the higher tiers include Music and Movie cataloging as well.
$2
$5
$20
$50
7. Hoopla
Overview: When I can’t find the book I am looking for through the Libby app, I check through Hoopla and usually they have it and vice versa. So it’s helpful to have both on your phone if you plan on borrowing from the library a lot.
Personal Thoughts: I really like Hoopla’s ascetics. It’s clean and modern and just a little bit better than Libby. Again, I recommend having both downloaded on your devices if you plan on borrowing a lot from the library.
Pricing Tier:
Free
8. Pangobooks
Overview: Founded in 2021, Pangobooks is an online platform for booksellers to buy and sell books.
Personal Thoughts: I stumbled upon this platform one night and it got me hooked. Not only have I been able to make a little money by selling some of my duplicate books *eh hem*, I’ve also found some really great gems for great prices too. I like this platform because it’s just books. I don’t have to dig too much to find what I am looking for. I have a little shop if you’re interested in checking it out https://pangobooks.com/bookstore/amsmith
Pricing Tier:
Free
9. Audible
Overview: Audible doesn’t really need an introduction, but here we go. Audible is the number one audiobook provider in the world. They have thousands of titles from celebrity memoirs to classic literature. Listening to a book on the go, in the car, or doing chores has been a revolution to the reading world.
Personal Thoughts: I love Audible. I have close to 100 books that I don’t mind keeping forever on there. I like their policy that if you don’t like a book you can return it within a certain time frame. Their credits don’t expire, which is awesome, so you can have them for years without using them up. Personally I started using the Libby and Hoopla apps to listen to the audiobooks first from the library. Then if I loved the book and want to listen to it again, I will use my Audible credit on it. Seems worth it to me.
Pricing Tier:
$23 Monthly (includes plus catalog and 2 credits)
$150 Yearly (includes plus catalog and 12 credits)
$229.50 Yearly (includes plus catalog and 24 credits)
10. libro.fm
Overview: LIBRO FM is just like Audible BUT they support local bookstores versus Audible, which is supported by Amazon.
Personal Thoughts: I haven’t used this app yet, but I think once my Audible subscription expires this year, I will most likely move over to Libro so I can support local bookstores more. There is such a need to support local and any little way we can do that makes a huge difference.
Pricing Tier:
$15 Monthly (1 credit)
Additional Add-on Credits
2=$30
3=$45
6=$90
9=$135
12=$180
24=$360
11. Bookclubs
Overview: Bookclubs is just as it sounds—it’s an online platform to host your bookclub. They have a lot of perks such as, voting as a group on which book you want to read that month, your club gathering information, who is in your club and their contact information, and now you can even text the group through the app. Depending on what you are looking for there are different tiers you can sign up.
Personal Thoughts: This year I decided to start a bookclub called The Literary Luminaries It has been so much fun and hosting it through Bookclubs has been worth every penny. I decided to get the highest tier of service because I wanted to get the full experience of this platform. The customer service has been top notch when I have needed help, and they are constantly working on improving their site and offering more perks to their subscribers. I have been very impressed.
Pricing Tier:
Premium $5 monthly or $60 yearly
Pro $15 monthly or $180 yearly
Pro Plus $19 monthly or $228 yearly
12. Kindle
Overview: Last but not least the good ole Kindle app. Kindle offers thousands of digital titles from audiobooks, magazines, chapters books, and even mangas. There is a monthly subscription fee and they no longer offer an annual fee.
Personal Thoughts: I like Kindle. I am not a huge fan and I am still on the hunt for something that will support small businesses or just not be under Amazon's reign. I will give them a try during the next couple of months so I will try to update you guys with my findings on this point.
Pricing Tier: $10 Monthly
13. Scribd
Overview: Is similar to Kindle in that you can get audiobooks and digital copies of books and magazines on your e-reader or tablet device.
Personal Thoughts: What makes it stand out from the competition is that it’s more like the Netflix of the book world. You can read as many books as you want at once for a flat monthly fee. Unlike the library-based apps, you don’t have a time limit on when to read the books, and, unlike Audible, you don’t get to keep the titles but you also don’t have to pay for them all separately. It is literally an ADHD person’s book dreamworld.
Pricing Tier: $12 Monthly
Hope this was a helpful post! Would love to hear your thoughts and let me know in the comments what your favorite bookish apps are! Happy reading!