Leave a Review hoopla Digital
Great except for bugs
I love Hoopla, and prefer the selection to the other library audiobook sources I have tried. My biggest problem is that there is a bug with downloaded titles and renewing. Anytime I have used the option to renew a title before it expired, the title stops working. Deleting the download and re-downloading doesn’t fix, restarting the app doesn’t fix. The only way I can ever get it to work is to completely return the title and use another borrow to check it out. Happens every time- so I highly recommend not renewing but rather letting the book expire and just checking it out again. Also, I cannot find any way in the app to switch the audio output source. This means if I am listening to a book on earbuds and then get into my car, it automatically switches to playing in the car and I cannot find a way in the app to switch back. Otherwise, I enjoy the app.Show lessLhuz
Not very responsive anymore
I used to love this app. And I still think it’s a wonderful idea. It gives people the opportunity to borrow books through their library without having to leave their home and go to the library. And it gives you more choices that might otherwise not be at the local library. That being said this app isn’t as responsive as it use to be. It is horribly glitchy lately. Whatever the developers did when they updated this app it wasn’t for the better. It kicks you out whenever you are looking though book titles. Starts you back at the beginning. And isn’t very touch responsive. Please fix this app. Update it for the better this time not for the worse as it is now. It needs to be better. And also allow you to play a sample before borrowing an audiobook. There is so much you can do to make this app better. I only hope you take the opportunity to do so. Also needs to have a better way of telling how many titles you borrowed. A counter so you know how many you have left to borrow. And allowing to borrow more would be nice like 10 a month. Especially with audiobook and movies. The bonus borrow is a nice touch I hope that continues.Show lessSassysweetness
Developer Response
The monthly borrow limit is something your library puts in place! Feel free to contact your library to see if they plan to increase their limit in the future. If you ever have any questions please contact us at feedback@hooplaldigital.com. We'd love to be worthy of 5-stars!Loses my place when I close the app
I have to use this because my old library account with a library that uses Overdrive expired, which is the only reason I bother reviewing this.
My place in ebooks and audiobooks keeps resetting every time I close the app out and I have to actually place a bookmark to mark the spot. I don't think this is supposed to happen. And it doesn't ever in overdrive. Also the ebook format is irritating. I want to be able to see the time, cell service, and battery percentage at the top of the screen. Maybe they could switch out the unnecessarily wide band at the bottom reserved for the 'percentage left' or whatever, make that smaller, and let us see the top indicators on phones. And the way the pages flip in the ebooks is jerky and annoying sometimes. But really my biggest beef with Hoopla is losing my place in ebooks/audiobooks and not showing the time/battery percentage/cell service indicators at the top of the screen when reading an ebook. I need to know what time it is when I am reading because I like to read during my lunch break at work and I don't want to have to set an alarm or check my watch every few seconds to make sure I am staying within the allotted time. And I raise these issues knowing full well they could fix them because Overdrive has everything down perfectly basically. I wish my current library used their platform. Sad times.Show lessmargaret_holmes
Developer Response
This sounds like an issue for our customer support. If you haven’t already contacted them, you may do so at feedback@hoopladigital.com.Barrow Audiobooks
I understand that you’re allowed to check out so many per month, but I don’t understand why you can’t check out other books when I have return them with in a day to a week at the most. But I’m not allowed to check out any other audiobooks when I don’t even have any because I was responsible In returning them for other people to listen to. It’s like your punished for returning what you downloaded way before the return date. And with not a single audiobook waiting for me to listen to on my account, I’m still not able to download any. So being a truck driver and having the time to listen daily and nightly I’m unable to listen or download. I know before audiobooks I was able to take a certain amount and when I returned them I was able to take more, just as long as I returned them. Now with the automatic download and with them being able to take them back at there time I’m having a hard time understanding returning before the due date and not allowed to check out any other, and with all this technology they can’t see that but the old time returning work better.Show lessAt Night
Developer Response
The monthly borrow limit is something your library puts in place to control their budget! Feel free to contact your library to see if they plan to increase their limit again in the future. If you ever have any questions please contact us at feedback@hooplaldigital.comProblems with e-books…
As a blind user, I love the audiobooks and never have any problems with them. The e-books, however, are always a problem and it’s getting worse! I use the app on my iPad and iPhone. When you try to use voice over to listen to an e-book, it will give you all kinds of problems. It used to at least let you listen until the last page in the chapter. Now, I pretty much missed the whole chapter because it keeps stopping. Very annoying! Anybody that uses Kindle knows that you simply turn voiceover on, swipe down with two fingers and it will read to you automatically. Hopefully, they can duplicate this technology so that Blind people can enjoy more than just audiobooks. Thank you I am updating this review… They did make some changes where the voiceover reading experience is smoother. However, after each chapter of the book you must stop voiceover and then restart it for the next chapter which is beyond annoying! It would be wonderful if you guys could make a consistently smooth reading experience such as on the Kindle. Thank youShow lessClarity2020
Worst audiobook app
Hoopla is the most frustrating audiobook app I have used (and I use several). It is much worse than overdrive for several reasons. For some reason it takes forever to download titles, and it downloads all as one big file. Plus sometimes the download doesn’t work and you don’t realize until it’s too late and you’re already on your road trip, etc. overdrive is superior in this regard. It downloads individual files that save faster, plus you can delete them one by one to free up space on your device. On hoopla it is also difficult to navigate between chapters/sections (once again, one huge file for whole book). As far as I know hoopla doesn’t let you listen to a sample of the book before borrowing. The 15 seconds back/forward feature seems to have a multiplicative effect if you hit it several times, which can sometimes send up far backward/forward in the book when really you just wanted to listen to the last minute or so again. Finally, I tried hoopla on another device and on this one, despite downloading titles, it doesn’t let me access them unless I’m logged in... which requires WiFi. For me, this defeats the entire purpose of the app. I hate this app and only use it through my library when I can’t find specific titles on overdrive.Show lessEmma56762
Developer Response
Our Development Team is aware of this issue, and is looking into it. In the mean time you can reach out to us at feedback@hoopladigital.com if you need assistance!Works, but with a few glitches
The Hoopla app is my go to for for books not at the library. Normally it keeps track of my favorites, but its got a glitch lately. The ebooks, audio books, and music all have ebooks, the same ebooks repeat in each category. And that makes it hard to find a something I have saved. Also, it won’t let me return early. It gives me an error message in the app. I have tried to reload it, turned my device, iPad mini, off and on. It doesn't help solve the issue. I miss being able to check out more, before the limit was lowered. And, lastly the word definitions are not great, leaving me to search Google. I don't have any other complaints. I enjoy reading and it gives me more choices for ebooks, but also for music and Video’s. I can adjust the page to yellow, which is easier on my eyes, darken the font to help me see better, and choose fonts. I would recommend Hoopla!Show lessMs.M.Reader
It Works so well for Me
I had to jump through a few hoops but I got it to work. I even found a book online that I really wanted to read but was always reluctant to buy it. Fortunately, that book was available to listen to for free which was a real joy considering there are so many words use I could not pronounce much less understand. But hearing the book being read was a much better experience. And, it is not just another unread book on my bookshelf. Kudos to the reading app and those who actually do the reading. It makes some of the most difficult language easier to understand being read to me. There were so many words I didn’t know and pronounce were better understood in context when the whole sentence was spoken. This is a very rich tool for me when I find reading the book much more difficult than hearing the words being spoken to me. I really appreciate this tool that lets me hear what I would have struggled to complete by reading. It gives better meaning to “Thanks for Listening”.Show less10USUS
Great concept, terrible ebook reader
I love being able to borrow ebooks and audiobooks, but this app is painful to use. I am a voracious reader but I seldom have the time to read for hours at a stretch, so I like to sneak in a few minutes here and there throughout the day when I can. And hoopla is TERRIBLE for this purpose. If I close the app mid chapter and open it again, I am randomly sent to the beginning of the chapter, or the beginning of the LAST chapter, or the beginning of the book. If I forget to lock the screen and accidentally rotate it, the same thing happens. This would be annoying regardless, but if you try to use the scrolling feature at the bottom of the screen to jump back to the page you were on, it simply doesn’t work. Similarly you can bookmark a page, but from your bookmarks there is no way to automatically jump to the bookmarked page so you have to manually flip back through the pages to get there. I’m currently reading Snuff by Terry Pratchett which has no chapter divisions so it’s one 700+ page chapter, and anytime I close the app or rotate the screen or let enough time pass, I have to flip back to the page I’m on FROM PAGE ONE. This app makes ebooks less convenient than checking out physical books in a brick and mortar library and carrying then everywhere I go.Show lessSven the Returned
Developer Response
This sounds like an issue for our customer support. If you haven’t already contacted them, you may do so at feedback@hoopladigital.com.It’s getting ridiculous...
I’ve had this app for a few years now. It has been slightly irritating at times. Sometimes it won’t play so I’ll have to restart it. Sometimes it randomly pauses so I’ll have to restart it again. But the past few days have been way worse. It keeps telling me I’m using my account on another device. I have never logged into another device. So I change the password to my account just in case. Twice. Then it won’t load. My books won’t show up under borrowed. So I keep killing the app and restarting it and half the time (I’d say I did it over 35 times) it would show my books on the home screen. But if I click on any of them to listen to them or return them it freezes and shows a blank screen. Of the very very few times it actually showed the page with the book it hardly ever started playing. And if it did, it made an awful squeaking, stuttering noise. I have restarted my phone, deleted and reinstalled the app, used different wifi’s, and reported the problem. I’ve noticed other people have said the same thing since the last update and the response is that it was fixed. It is not so. I have been having the problem for the past 3 hours. I am still - right now - trying to play my audiobook and as I write this review I am hearing squeaking. The problem is most certainly not fixed. It seems to me it shouldn’t be this hard to play an audiobook.Show lessGiossio
Developer Response
This sounds like an issue for our customer support. If you haven’t already contacted them, you may do so at feedback@hoopladigital.com.
