10 Life Hacks Every Goodreads User Should Know
Goodreads is a popular platform for managing your to-read list (TBR), finding recommended books, tracking your reading stats, and sharing reviews, ratings, and notes with friends, but there are ways to improve the experience. If you’re an avid reader, use these tips, tricks, and hidden tricks to get the most out of Goodreads.
Use a barcode scanner to check out books while you’re in the bookstore.
The Goodreads mobile app has a built-in scanner that uses your device’s camera to scan a book cover or barcode. It then displays title information, including a description and ratings/reviews from other Goodreads users, so you can decide whether to add a book to your “My Books” section while in a store or browsing a friend’s shelf. Simply tap the camera icon in the search bar. You can also view your scanned book history in the “Camera” tab.
To prevent overwriting existing data, the log will be re-read with different dates.
Some books are worth rereading multiple times, and Goodreads allows you to track each reread as a separate entry so you don’t overwrite the original entry and affect your reading marathon stats. If you simply click “Read” on the title page, the book will simply be marked as read without any additional information. Instead, select “Edit My Activity” > “Add Read Date” to enter the start and end dates for each reread.
Choose the right edition of your book to get accurate reading progress information.
If you’re interested in detailed statistics about your reading, be sure to select a specific edition of the book. Different editions have different page counts, and you can also choose the audio version if you listen rather than read, so those pages don’t count toward your total. Available editions can be found on the book’s title page, or by clicking “Show all editions” and selecting “Switch to this edition” next to the desired edition.
Exclude audiobooks and graphic novels from your reading marathon to maintain your stats.
Goodreads counts all books you read in a calendar year toward your annual reading marathon, but there may be books you don’t want included in your yearly statistics. For example, if you track audiobooks, graphic novels, or children’s books on Goodreads, you can exclude them from your reading marathon so they don’t count toward your page read goal. You can also exclude books if you want your reading marathon to focus on one type of book specifically. In the app, go to More > Reading Marathon > Marathon Details , select the book you want to remove, and click Remove from Marathon > Remove . (This can be found in your profile on the web interface.) To add books back later, delete and re-add the reading date.
Use Goodreads for direct access to notes and highlights on Kindle.
If you use a Kindle, you can link your Amazon and Goodreads accounts so your Kindle notes and highlights are centralized in Goodreads, including notes and highlights from library books read on Kindle. You can add or edit existing notes that sync with your Kindle book, and share notes and highlights with others. On the web, open the profile menu and select “Kindle Notes and Highlights” > “Connect Your Accounts.”
Create a closed group to keep a personal reading diary.
Goodreads doesn’t allow you to make your bookshelves private, meaning anyone can see your activity. Even if you set your profile to private, your bookshelves and reading history will be visible to your Goodreads friends. To keep a private reading diary that no one else can see, you can create a secret group where you’re the only member and use the group’s bookshelves to track your private activity. On the web, go to Community > Groups > Create a Group and select “This group is secret.”
Use an unread bookshelf to separate neglected books from those you’ve already read.
The “Did Not Finish” (DNF) shelf is a place for books you started reading but abandoned, giving them a distinct space separate from other categories. Earlier this year, Goodreads added a default “Did Not Finish” shelf next to the “Want to Read,” “Reading Now” (Tumbnails), or “Read” categories, eliminating the need to manually create one. If you abandoned a book before finishing it, you’ll still be able to track your progress, but it will be placed on the DNF shelf. (Note that these books will still count toward your goals if you include a read date in the entry, so you’ll need to exclude them using the steps above if you only want to count books you’ve finished.)
Use Compare Books to find recommended books for a book club or to share with friends with different tastes.
If you’re having trouble finding books you and your friends want to read together, you can use the “Compare Books” feature on Goodreads to see a comparison of your bookshelves to see if you have similar interests. Go to your friends list and click “Compare Books” next to a friend’s name to get an analysis of your libraries, including a list of shared books and a score for how much your tastes match.
Customize your sorting criteria to keep highly rated books at the top of your reading list.
Goodreads offers detailed settings for viewing and sorting books on your shelves. If you have hundreds of books saved to your “Want to Read” list, set up and save a sorting category so that the highest-rated books (or those with the fewest pages, or recently published books, for example) always appear at the top of the list. Each shelf must be sorted separately. Open the “Settings” tab at the top of the list, select the inclusion criteria, and then select a sorting option from the drop-down list. Click “Save Current Settings” for your shelf to lock them.
Export your data for backup or for in-depth analysis of your reading history.
Goodreads tracks your reading history and statistics, but you may want to back up your data regularly to avoid losing years of records if something happens to your account. Exporting your library includes fields such as book title, author, publisher, publication year, and page count, as well as reading dates, ratings, and notes. When downloading in CSV format, the data can also be sorted and analyzed in a variety of ways. To export books on your computer, go to “My Books” and click “Import & Export” under “My Tools .” Click “Export Library” and then the file name to download it to your device.