While maybe just a couple of years ago it would have been hard to imagine a way to combine reading with smartphone use, nowadays the two go hand in hand. We certainly live interesting times and even though reading is a habit that was unchanged for thousands of years, modern times require us to adapt and change the way we read.
But, like pretty much anything else nowadays, choosing the best apps for book lovers requires you to go through several options before you find your favorite or to do extensive research searching for it. Luckily for you, we did part of the job just so you don’t have to and save some of your precious time.
What Is a Reading App?
A reading app is, as the name suggests, an application you can download and install on your mobile device, which helps you read or better organize your reading.
While some reading apps are dedicated to allowing you to read without owning paperback books and even offer additional features like the option to listen to books instead of actually reading them, others are more focused on helping you track your reading and your reading habits. Of course, some even combine these two major aspects into complete solutions for the modern readers.
Among some of the most popular features, we find reading lists, note-taking functionalities, timers, and automatically generated statistics regarding the number of books you read, the time you spend doing it and your reading speed.
Reading apps, or apps for books have been around for a good couple of years now, but their popularity has increased considerably recently. These apps attempt to tackle different difficulties the modern reader faces and they are extremely efficient in providing a better reading experience.
Why Do You Need a Book App Today?
Well, the answer is simple: because our lives have changed and we live in a completely different rhythm than we did only 100 years ago. We live fast paced lives and we rarely manage to find time for ourselves.
Reading apps help us organize our reading, they bring a little order in the chaos in our lives, reminding us to find the time for a reading session to soothe our souls.
Book apps make it easier for us to remember what books we want to read, keep track of the titles we already read and even find book recommendations that match our taste.
And in the case of book reading apps, the necessity for one comes from the fact that we tend to have less and less space in our homes for big bookcases. Keeping your reading digital saves you a lot of money and space, and is less wasteful since no paper is being used.
What Are the Best Apps for Book Lovers?
Whether you’re looking for an app to help you keep your book collection tidy and catalog your titles, good book reading apps or simply for an app to better organize your reading habits in general, there’s a lot of options for you to explore out there.
Here are some of the most popular ones that have been reported by millions of book lovers as being perfect for their purpose.
1. Basmo
Falling in the reading tracking category, Basmo is by far the best choice when it comes to adjusting your reading habits and taking full advantage of your limited free time.
Basmo is available both for iOS and Android and comes packed to the brim with features that will completely change the way you read, how much you do it and how much you remember from the books you go through.
With Basmo, you will be able to create and manage several reading lists, including personalized ones. You can set reading goals and keep track of your progress towards reaching them through comprehensive statistics. On top of this, users have the option to write notes directly in the app during reading sessions, within the books they read. Not only that, but there is also a journaling feature which allows users to write their thoughts and feelings about everything they read.
As if that wasn’t enough, Basmo also comes with a feature dedicated to quotes, which helps you save your favorite sentences or paragraphs from the books you read, either by writing notes by hand or scanning the pages of the book and extracting the text automatically. Quotes can even be turned into images and shared on all the relevant social media platforms.
2. Audible
We start off our list with an app that stands out especially through the fact that it is a book lovers’ app which takes actual reading out of the equation. Audible is a very popular app among iOS and Android users which focuses on listening to audiobooks rather than actually reading.
Available based on a paid subscription, Audible has a vast and impressive library of audiobooks and is the perfect choice for busy individuals who would rather listen to an audiobook while doing something else rather than taking the time to read during their busy days.
3. Apple Books
Pre-installed and made available on all iOS devices right from the start, Apple Books (or just Books) is a simple and user-friendly app, perfect for book lovers who own an iPhone or an iPad. It allows users to purchase books, ebooks, PDFs and audiobooks and thanks to the fact that it syncs over iCloud, it makes all your content available on all your iOS devices.
It can be used for reading as well, and allows you to change the background color, font style and font size in order to adjust the settings for minimum strain on your eyes.
Thanks to the huge collection of books available for purchase, the curated lists and quite regular promotions and discounts, Apple Books is a must-have for millions of iOS users across the globe.
4. Summary Z
Yet another pretty innovative book app designed to help the modern reader with limited time, Summary Z attempts to tackle our lack of time for reading through comprehensive and very well created book summaries.
The concept is quite great considering how limited our time is and Summary Z comes with one more ace up its sleeve: the summaries can either be read or listened to. Each one of the numerous summaries comes with an audio version.
Additionally, other features are implemented to ensure that you do as much reading as possible. The app gives you the option to set goals for yourself to ensure that you read every day, it gives you the option to read quotes and ideas hand picked by their community readers and writers.
Reading material is served in 5 minutes long increments and one of their most recent updates even added a quiz feature to conclude each reading or listening session. The app is available for iOS and Android users and while the first 3 days of use are free of charge, a premium subscription billed monthly or annually will be required after the trial period ends.
5. Blinkist
Turning reading into a completely different kind of experience, Blinkist is one of the most innovative apps for book lovers. While this solution is clearly not everyone, the creators of Blinkist seem to have understood quite a while ago how precious our time has become.
What they came up with is basically a huge collection of summaries of over 5000 non-fiction bestsellers that can be “consumed” in as little as 15 minutes each, available on a paid subscription basis. Not only that, but the in-app voice feature can turn each summary into a short audiobook.
6. Kindle
Probably one of the most popular names in the book lovers’ world, Amazon’s Kindle app is a virtual adaptation of the e-book readers that have become very popular since their initial launch back in 2007. Using the Kindle app, which is available both in the iOS and Android stores, is a lot like owning a Kindle.
It gives you the option to purchase books and read them within the app and has probably one of the most extensive collections of books available.
7. Google Play Books
The equivalent of Apple Books for Android users, Google Play Books is a great choice among book lovers for several reasons.
The app is easy to use, book prices are more than reasonable and the overall quality of the services provided is exactly what you would expect from a Google product.
8. Goodreads
Probably the best known app for book lovers, Goodreads has been around for more than a decade. It is mostly based on the social aspect of reading, being the home of the most book reviews and enticing users to interact and share their thoughts about everything they read.
Despite being owned by Amazon and having access to more funds than probably any other reading app on this list, both the website and the app look and feel outdated. Not only that, but the social aspect of Goodreads has been reported by many users to have backfired, many books having fake reviews.
9. Leio
Dedicated exclusively to iOS users, Leio is yet another reading tracking app claiming to help users take their reading to the next level.
While it does pretty much anything you would expect it to do, having most of the usual features like timer, progress tracking, statistics, deadlines and pace, it is not the most user-friendly and reliable reading app out there. Even though it is free to download, in-app purchases are necessary in order to take full advantage of its features.
10. Serial Reader
Another app that attempts to adapt our reading habits to our hectic lifestyles, Serial Reader serves its users classic literature in bite-size increments.
Users receive texts in bite-size pieces, which can be consumed in 20 minutes or less. The concept is nice, and the app is relatively easy to use.
What Are the Best Free Apps for Book Lovers?
While most reading apps can be downloaded and installed for free, most of the important features can only be accessed through in-app purchases or paid subscriptions for their premium versions.
There are some free book apps out there that offer most of their services with no charge. Even though they do offer in-app purchases as well, they can be easily used in their free version with great benefits.
1. Aldiko
Considered by many one of the best apps for reading books on a mobile device, Aldiko is completely free of charge, easily customizable for minimum eye-strain and can be used to read pre-purchased books, to buy or borrow new titles from its extensive library or to read ebooks you’ve borrowed from other sources.
It is available for iOS and Android and even allows you to take notes or highlight text you find particularly interesting.
2. Libby
Overdrive creators have come up with an interesting concept, building a completely free of charge app that allows users to connect to their local libraries using their library card. This gives them access to everything the library you are registered to has to offer: ebooks, PDFs, audiobooks or even video content.
3. Wattpad
Another one of our favorites, Wattpad is a completely free of charge app created both with readers and writers in mind. Writers can submit their work, readers can enjoy it.
This is a great platform to find new favorite writers on, or even unique content that has never been published anywhere else. You can find anything from short stories to entire novels and the app prides itself with over 90 million readers and writers from all over the world.
Conclusion
As you can see, the modern reader can enjoy a plethora of apps designed to improve the reading experience. While their purpose may differ, they have designed with you, the reader, in mind and have a lot to offer. Basmo is by far the best app for book lovers if you are not into reading books digitally.
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