# BookBeat: Audiobooks & E-books — user reviews > 134 indexed App Store user reviews of BookBeat by BookBeat AB, rated 4.50/5 from 270 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/bookbeat-audiobooks-and-e-books/id1056652614/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/bookbeat-audiobooks-and-e-books/id1056652614.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 215 · 4★ 26 · 3★ 4 · 2★ 6 · 1★ 19 ## What do users think of BookBeat? Overall sentiment: mixed **Pros** - 💰 Affordable pricing compared to Audible - 📚 Flexible subscription model with hourly options - 🎧 High-quality narration - 🔄 Ability to switch between books without penalty - 📱 User-friendly interface design - 🌍 Multilingual content available - ⏱️ Speed adjustment controls (up to 2x) - ⌚ Apple Watch and CarPlay compatibility - 📖 Extensive book catalog with niche titles - ⏰ Sleep timer feature - 🔄 Cross-device synchronization - 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Family account sharing option **Cons** - 🌐 Language setting defaults to non-English (Swedish/German) - ⏰ Limited listening hours per month (20-100 hours) - 📚 Smaller catalog compared to Audible - 🎯 Poor genre categorization and search functionality - 💳 Misleading 'free app' marketing claims - 🔄 Unused hours don't carry over to next month - 📖 Some books locked behind additional paywall - 🐛 Frequent app crashes and freezing - 🔐 Subscription charges despite cancellation - 📱 Difficult account creation and language change process - 🔍 Inconsistent search results and auto-suggestions - 📄 Missing pages in some audiobooks - ⏱️ Page counting inaccurate for reading vs listening - 🎯 Limited children's book selection - 🌍 Geographic restrictions (US version unavailable) **Commonly reported bugs** - App crashes when pausing audiobooks - Play button doesn't respond on app launch - Language settings revert to default - Payment processing failures with valid payment methods - App gets stuck on activation and payment approval screens - Bookmarks fail to save position accurately - Chapters finish mid-sentence - Social media sharing returns error messages - App freezes and requires restart - Subscription continues charging after cancellation - Free trial charges despite cancellation attempts **Most requested features** - Increase playback speed beyond 2x - Chapter outlines and easy chapter navigation - Better genre filtering and categorization - Persistent rollover of unused listening hours - Web app for laptop/desktop listening - Live chat customer support - Fade-out timer feature - Improved search algorithm with better suggestions - Book sharing functionality to social media - More children's and young adult titles - Bookmarks that persist reliably - Clear pricing display before signup ## Newest reviews (14 of 134) ### 4/5 — Great concept *2026-08-07, version 10.18.1* Love the hours element. Just wish you could listen at faster than x2 speed. ### 2/5 — Default language *2026-07-26, version 10.18.1* The apps default language is Swedish and can’t be unselected. This means the homepage will always be in Swedish. You do have the option to filter for English but this makes the user experience clunky. It seems like an odd design choice. When I messaged for support, I got a default email in Swedish so I will uninstall. ### 4/5 — Audio cut off? *2026-07-12, version 10.18.1* It’s really good! But from my experience the audio randomly just stops? I try restarting the app, swiping it away, checking my wifi and blue tooth but nothing? ### 3/5 — Bug issue? *2026-06-08, version 10.17.1* I’ve been using the app for a long time and love it, especially with recent updates. However, I’ve noticed that when I select the author or narrator of a book I’m currently listening to see what else by them is available in BookBeat it shows “0 Books” - even if I’m currently listening to a book written by that author! It’s incredibly frustrating and I don’t know why it’s happening (yes the app is updated). ### 2/5 — Language default problems *2026-04-16, version 10.16.2* Seems like a decent app, but every time I changed their website to English it would change back to Swedish when I clicked on anything. I wasn’t comfortable signing up to pay for something when I couldn’t reliably get communication in English. All emails were in Swedish as I was signing up. I ended up translating screenshots to delete my account because there wasn’t an option to do it in English ### 3/5 — Mixed review *2026-02-07, version 10.14* Good points: you can see how much of a book you have listed too, rather than just what’s left. Tells you what percentage you have listed too. Don’t pay per book so if you don’t like it you haven’t lost it. Easy to use. Negative points: can’t see how long is left in a chapter, can only listen to a certain number of hours a month depending on subscription. No chapter outline. ### 2/5 — Too few hours *2026-02-04, version 10.14* Great app, but you only get 20 hours a month! Which only adds up to about one or two books so it’s more affordable to just buy the paper books instead! Really disappointed with how few hours you get, feels like a scam. Would be a great app otherwise. ### 4/5 — 5stars *2026-01-10, version 10.14* Best app for audio books. ### 2/5 — 30 hours is ridiculously short *2025-11-01, version 10.12* The 30 hour limit for an entire month is ridiculously short to trial an app I got given a three month trial but in reality I only get 30 hours which is just pointless Back to Audible it is ### 2/5 — Can’t subscribe *2025-10-12, version 10.12* Looks good but can’t subscribe. Each time I enter my cRd details (or choose Apple Pay) it fails and reminds me to use a card issued in Italy. ??? Why Italy? I am not in Italy and my Apple account regional settings are not Italy either. Pity. ### 5/5 — Variety *2025-10-06, version 10.12* I wasn’t going to write a review for this, but I felt I had to after seeing so many people complain about variety. People seem to think this only has the most popular Booktok books, and that’s blatantly untrue. There are so many niche plays that I’ve found on BookBeat that I wouldn’t have been able to find in many other places (e.g Blue by Joe Munro). And yes, there are plenty of Booktok books, but there are also amazing essays like We Should All Be Feminists, and classics like Brave New World. There are plenty of thought provoking works by Ursula K. Le Guin, and much, much more. This isn’t just ‘Booktok books’. That’s such an oversimplification. All you have to do is explore for a little while instead of just waiting for BookBeat to recommend you something. Of course it will recommend Booktok books at first, because it doesn’t know your tastes. Just search for a little bit. It’s not that hard. ### 5/5 — Amazing *2025-09-26, version 10.11.3* This app is great. I can read any books I want and my family loves it. Well done to the developers. ### 4/5 — Tolles Angebot – aber die Hörzeit wird unfair berechnet *2025-09-05* BookBeat ist eine wirklich tolle Plattform für Hörbücher. Die Auswahl ist riesig, die App läuft stabil und es macht einfach Spaß, neue Geschichten zu entdecken. Besonders praktisch finde ich auch die Möglichkeit, die Geschwindigkeit beim Hören anzupassen – so kommt man schneller durch längere Titel, wenn man möchte. Ein kleiner Wermutstropfen ist allerdings der Preis: im Vergleich zu manchen Alternativen finde ich das Abo schon etwas teurer. Dennoch lohnt es sich ab und an, vor allem wenn man viel unterwegs ist oder einfach gern Hörbücher genießt. Was ich schade finde: Auch wenn man ein Hörbuch auf doppelter Geschwindigkeit hört, wird die gesamte Hörzeit in voller Länge vom Abo abgezogen. Das heißt, wenn man z. B. das Basis-Abo mit 20 Stunden hat und ein Buch mit 25 Stunden Länge hört, kommt man nicht bis zum Ende – obwohl man es rein rechnerisch in ca. 10,5 Stunden geschafft hätte. Hier wäre es schön, wenn BookBeat die tatsächliche Abspielzeit zählen würde und nicht die Original-Länge. ### 5/5 — Appli en anglais *2025-08-27* Seul bémol que ce ne soit plus en français ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Pointless free trial *2026-07-26, version 10.18.1* All the books I am interested in are locked under the free trial so I won’t be trying the app. Disappointing! ### 1/5 — I will not be using it *2026-01-31, version 10.14* My biggest gripe is that in the 2 weeks that I have been using it I already encountered 3 books that had MISSING PAGES. How on earth does this happen? Reading a book just to have a part of a chapter missing is not ok. The second reason I don’t like BookBeat is lack of filters / categories by genre. For example everything in “young adult” is lumped together. So you have fantasy and romance and horror all in one place. Very time consuming digging through of you are looking for specific genres or vibes. Third reason, the way they count the pages when you are reading rather than listening. It doesn’t seem to correlate with the actual reading time. The default font is microscopic so I use an extra large font and because less text fits inside the screen, they count it as extra pages. So my books gets read 2.5 times longer. Which is unfair. Fourth and final reason is lack of variety. There’s not that much I am genuinely interested in. And considering that they limit how many pages you can read in a month (unless you pay extra), it makes more sense to follow you know what for daily deals and build a collection of books you actually are excited to read for less. Or just get books from the library. ### 1/5 — Lie about being a free app *2025-12-30, version 10.14* This app is expensive despite saying it is free on the app store ### 1/5 — Be Mindful of Free Trial *2025-11-12, version 10.12* I thought I had ended my trial after the book I downloaded the app for wasn’t actually available. I’ve just found out I’ve been charged for the last three months due to them emailing me about raising the cost of the subscription. I’ve looked and this is the only email I’ve had from them. Do be weary of this! ### 1/5 — Terrible app *2025-10-17, version 10.12* The app is awful and half the time tells you that it can’t work right now. Luckily I’m on a free trial so can cancel but I would be furious if I was paying for this and the app constantly refused to work. ### 1/5 — Couldn’t change app language *2025-08-24, version 10.11* Maybe this app is good, maybe it’s bad. I wouldn’t know because everything was in German. I couldn’t figure out how to change the apps language to be in English. Every time I clicked on something to try to figure it out it prompted me to sign in and start my subscription but I can’t read anything to properly do that. ### 1/5 — Langue *2025-08-03* C’est une application que je ne vais pas garder car impossible de mettre en français je comprend pas comment sa fonctionne ### 1/5 — Scam *2025-07-30, version 10.10* No free trial. Just steal your money straight away. Don’t waste your money. ### 1/5 — Charged when I don’t even have the app *2025-07-17, version 10.10* I had the app for a week maybe then deleted never agreed to the free trial, never even used it got charged 4 times £6.99 a month. Contacted them and had no response, it’s disgusting and a scam. DO NOT download or use this app. ### 1/5 — Poor value for money *2025-07-01, version 10.9* I used to love this app, lots of choice, lots of books available. Recently resubscribed to find that lots of books aren’t included in the subscription. Won’t be using again ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — All Books on BookBeat are AMAZING *2026-08-14, version 10.18.1* I love all Books in BookBeat ### 5/5 — Excellent value *2026-08-04, version 10.18.1* I have 100 hours a month and love BookBeat. Loads of choices and a great model of using mins rather than having to choose a book! Love it 🥰 ### 5/5 — Fantastic app *2026-05-25, version 10.17.1* Love the book choices and being able to read or listen, I always listen while I do my cleaning jobs around the house or my clients or if my husband has the football on 😉😂 ### 5/5 — Mehr als genial!!! *2026-05-08* Ich kann es nicht in Worte fassen, wie verliebt ich in dieser App bin. Ich habe damals nur nach einer Möglichkeit gesucht, gute Hörbücher auf meinem iPhone zu hören. Und dann bin ich auf BookBeat gestoßen. Die Auswahl an sehr guter Literatur, in sehr vielen Genres, ist riesig. Es gibt neue Bücher, alte, berühmte und welche, die nicht so populär sind. Es gibt Hörspiele, eBooks und das noch in unterschiedlichen Sprachen: Deutsch, Englisch, Polnisch, Schwedisch, Finnisch, Französisch, Dänisch, Niederländisch, Italienisch und Polnisch. Und! Obwohl sie Auswahl groß ist, regelmäßig werden neue Hörbücher und eBooks hinzugefügt. Jetzt schon habe ich welche in meiner SuB stehen, die erst in August erscheinen werden (jetzt ist Anfang Mai). Vielen lieben Dank. Ich werde euer Kunde für immer und ewig bleiben ❤️ ### 5/5 — Parfait *2026-03-19* Mieux que tout le reste même s’il manque des éditeurs comme Acte Sud et d’autres. Et surtout il manque le mode sombre activable tout le temps( pas uniquement le mode qui suit le mode de l’iPhone). Il manque cruellement la possibilité d’avoir un égaliser et un compresseur intégré car les livres audio sont de qualité variable et sonnent un peu grave-sourd en général sur des AirPod Pro 3. La lecture longue est un peu fatiguante pour les oreilles du coup car on doit se concentrer pour bien comprendre ( les concurrents n’ont pas ce problème ). ### 5/5 — Customer service *2026-02-05, version 10.14* Such great customer service they helped me a lot with my subscription ### 5/5 — My favourite app *2026-01-19, version 10.14* I LOVE BookBeat. It’s my therapy when I am overstimulated from having a toddler and baby. Your not limited to just one book per month and has gotten me back into ‘reading’ as an adult ### 5/5 — BookBeat *2025-12-29, version 10.14* Enjoy BookBeat. Probably the only downside is you don’t get to keep the books you purchase ### 5/5 — I canceled you still charging *2025-12-21, version 10.14* Can you refund my money pls and stop nonsense,thanks ### 5/5 — Great - Super *2025-11-07, version 10.12* Dobra rozrywka podczas jazdy, spacerów, ćwiczeń czy lotów. --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-08-28.*