10 Life Hacks Every Libby User Should Know
Libby is a service that connects users with local library systems, providing them with free access to a vast catalog of digital content, including e-books, audiobooks, and magazines. If you love reading (or listening), you’ll find these tips and tricks for using Libby to borrow, organize, and make the most of your borrowed books.
Add multiple library cards to see their availability in other systems.
With Libby, you’re not limited to a single library system. The platform allows you to connect to multiple libraries, so you can take advantage of larger catalogs if one library has more titles or shorter wait times for the books you want to check out. You still need a library card at each connected library, but you can add city, county, and school libraries to your account (or even use a friend or family member’s card from out of town). Go to Menu > Add Library and search by library name, city, or zip code. Select a library to view its collections and follow the instructions to add a library card for that library if you qualify.
Use airplane mode on your Kindle to extend the life of your book.
Libby automatically returns books once their loan period expires, so unlike paper books, you can’t spend extra time reading them. However, if you’re reading on a Kindle, you can pick up a book and immediately put your device into airplane mode to freeze the loan period. While your Kindle is offline, you can return the book through the Libby app so the next person can borrow it. Note that there are reports that this workaround, unique to Kindle, may not be available on newer devices with the latest software versions, but Reddit users suggest that changing the date on your Kindle to a date before the return deadline and/or leaving the expired book open may also help avoid this issue.
Export your book reading data to an archive or add it to Goodreads.
If you want to track your reading history, you can export a timeline of your activity, which you can save to a personal spreadsheet or upload to Goodreads. Tap Shelf > Timeline > Activity > Export Timeline and choose a format— Table will create a shareable HTML page, while Spreadsheet will download an editable sheet to your device (JSON format is also available). The export includes information such as book title, author, borrowing date, publisher, and ISBN. When syncing with Goodreads, select Spreadsheet and follow the platform’s import instructions .
Create custom tags to organize your bibliography.
Libby’s tagging system makes it easy to organize and sort book titles into various lists, such as annual reading lists, favorites, or a “To Read” list (to name a few). Simply go to Tags > Actions > New Tag , add a title and description, and click Create . When you want to add a book to one of these lists, click Save on the book’s page and select all relevant tags. Click Tags in the bottom navigation bar to sort or filter tagged books.
Set up notifications to be the first to know about new releases.
Not all new releases are immediately available in all library systems, but you can speed up the borrowing process by using the “Notify Me” smart tag, which will notify you when books tagged with your tag are added to your library. When you find a book through search that isn’t in your library, you’ll be prompted to create a “Notify Me” tag. You can also create one manually by following the process for creating custom tags and selecting “Notify Me” to turn it into a smart tag. This tag also works for new magazine issues and new content from specific authors or book series. Make sure you have push notifications enabled for Libby.
Pin your search filters to see what’s available to rent immediately.
If you’ve finished one book and want to start another immediately, you can use the search filter to find books available right now instead of browsing through your backlog. You can then pin this filter so that every time you search—even if other filters are applied—only books available for pickup are shown. Go to Search and tap the three horizontal lines to open the filter list. Select Available Now > Show Titles , then long-press a filter to open the pop-up menu and tap Pin Filter . You can do the same with other filters (for example, if you only want to see books and/or audiobooks). Note that subject filters cannot be pinned.
Adjust download settings to manage the amount of space used.
Audiobooks can take up a lot of space on your device, and if you listen to several books at once, you might not want to dedicate that much space to these files. Customize how you download and stream audiobooks via Menu > Settings > Download Rules . There, you can choose whether to automatically download everything, nothing, or only books under 20 MB, and also enable downloading only over Wi-Fi (to avoid using mobile data).
Review your highlights and notes as you read, or use Read.Amazon.
If you like to highlight passages of text or add notes to books while reading, you can view these annotations for books borrowed through Libby even after you return them. In the Libby app, find a book, tap the cover image, and then tap “Reading Journey.” You can also export this data via “Actions” > “Export Reading Data.” If you read the book on a Kindle device, notes and highlights are also saved to Amazon and displayed on Goodreads .
Find skip-the-line books to avoid waiting in line.
Popular books and new releases often accumulate hundreds of requests in a short period of time, meaning you may have to wait several months for a copy to appear at your library. Some library systems designate some copies of these books as “non-reserved,” meaning they cannot be reserved or renewed and are checked out on a first-come, first-served basis after being returned by the previous user. These books are marked with a shamrock icon, and if your library offers them, you can find them through Search > Catalog Filters > Non-Reserved .
Use the Pause feature to stagger overlapping holds.
If you have a long list of reserved books with varying wait times, sometimes one or more books may be ready for pickup around the same time. If you’re not ready to read a book immediately when it becomes available, you can pause your reservation until you finish the current book or have more time to start something new. This will preserve your place in the queue, so the book will be yours once you resume your reservation and the current user returns it. In the app, go to “Shelf” > “Reserved Books” > “Manage Reservations” > “Pause Reservation” or tap “Pause” next to the book’s title if it’s ready for pickup.