ISBN Book Scanner & Library

Description

A friend of mine keeps a shelf of books behind her sofa, most of them titles I had never come across. Last summer I went through the whole shelf with my phone, scanning one spine after another until every book was saved to my library. That is the app in one sentence: the fastest way I have found to get books into a list I actually keep.

Point the camera at the barcode on the back of a book and the app reads the ISBN, then looks it up in Open Library, Google Books, Apple Books and more at the same time. The title, author and cover usually appear within a second or two, even for older or obscure titles.

YOUR LIBRARY

Every book you scan lands in your library. Mark each one as Read, Currently Reading, or Want to Read, and sort them onto shelves you make yourself. I keep one shelf for the books I lend out and would like to see again.

BATCH SCANNING

When you have a whole shelf to get through, turn on batch mode and scan without stopping between books. The app keeps a running count and lets you look over everything once you are done. This is the mode I reach for when cataloguing a bookcase or a stack from the library.

RATE & REMEMBER

When you finish a book, give it a rating from one to five stars and write down what you thought while it is still fresh. I use the notes for the small things I would otherwise forget: who recommended it, who I want to lend it to, the line I underlined. Ratings and notes stay private, and they come along when you export to Goodreads, The StoryGraph, or LibraryThing.

YOUR READING YEAR

Set a goal for the year and watch the ring fill as you finish each book. A dedicated tab turns your library into a picture of the year: books read, your average rating, the author you come back to most, whether you are keeping pace, and a chart of every month. I set mine in January and check it more often than I should admit. Setting a goal is free. The full set of insights comes with Premium.

EXPORT

Your library does not have to stay in the app. Export the whole collection to Goodreads, The StoryGraph, LibraryThing, or a plain CSV file, or share a single book's citation as plain text, BibTeX or Markdown. The citation formats are there for students and anyone who keeps a proper reference list.

BUY WHERE YOU LIKE

Open any scanned book in Apple Books, Amazon or Bookshop.org and buy it there. That link, from a book in your hand to the edition you want, is the reason I first built the app, back when I mostly wanted the ebook of whatever I found in a shop. Amazon links cover stores in 20 countries, and Premium lets you set the one you shop with.

GO PREMIUM

The first 10 books and your first shelf are free, with every book source available. So is setting a reading goal. Premium removes the limits, unlocks batch scanning, ratings and notes, the full reading insights, removes ads, and lets you set the Amazon store you prefer.