Books
Finally, a way to organize your reading material.
Avid readers know the struggle: You purchase a beautiful new copy of a book, only to realize that you already own it. If you’re having trouble remembering which tomes comprise your collection, you're going to love these free apps designed to help you keep track of your books — no matter how large your home library has become.
Sometimes, book nerds just can't resist the call of a free bin, a library sale, or a thrift store bookcase. It’s not so dramatic — you’ve likely never lost a job or put a relationship in jeopardy because of your reading, after all — but it’s still all too easy for your personal library outgrow your currently available shelf space. (Note that we said "currently." Feel free to continue holding out for gigantic home libraries, à la Beauty and the Beast.)
It’s all good for readers who can’t help themselves, however, because there are more than a few apps available for book nerds who want to catalogue their personal libraries. For the list below, we've picked out seven easy to use, free apps that you can download right now to help you keep track of your books.
Bookshelf: Your Virtual Library
Bookshelf: Your Virtual Library — not to be confused with the similarly named e-textbook app — is a newcomer to the market, but it’s already racked up a 4.7-star rating as of this writing. This handy program not only lets readers track their book collections on custom shelves, but it also analyzes users’ reading habits, all in one place.
Dante
With just three shelves available for categorizing — one for books already read, another for currently reading, and a third for yet-be-read tomes — Dante may seem overly simple for diehard book nerds. But don’t write this app off just yet. You can quickly and easily scan books into Dante via ISBN, and the app will gather pertinent data from Google Books, allowing you to track trends and statistics at your leisure. Dante will also select a TBR book for you to read at random, which is perfect for those rainy weekends when you just can’t settle on what to read.
Goodreads
You know Goodreads as THE site for rating and reviewing books, but its system of tags and shelves also allows you to sort your books in just about any manner you’d like— and there's an app that makes it easy to access from your phone.
Google Sheets
If you don't want or need any frills or fancy interfaces, Google Sheets can easily function as your go-to book-tracking app. Just enter the titles, authors, publication dates, and whatever other information you want, and sort to your heart's content.
Libib
Unlike some of the other apps on this list, Libib has a paid option for those who need to keep track of more than 5,000 items (yes, items: in addition to books, Libib can also catalogue movies, music, and video games). But if you’re still working up to that massive, 5,000-book strong home library, the free version should do the trick.
LibraryThing
In addition to helping users organize, LibraryThing is also fantastic reference: Just select a book you love, and you can find all of its associated tags and read-a-likes. LibraryThing lets personal users shelve 200 books for free, and memberships can be upgraded for $10 per year, or $25 for life.
Litsy
If you're looking for an app that's a bit more interactive, try Litsy. Essentially Goodreads-meets-Instagram, Litsy lets you share "bookish moments" with your friends — anything from a photo of a novel to a favorite quote from your reading material. You can even share reviews and blurbs. And if you post something from every book you've read, you will get a very cool diorama of your reading history.
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